Twin Peaks Returns
It’s been 25 years since we last experienced anything from the weird and wonderful world of Twin Peaks (1992’s divisive prequel feature Fire Walk With Me). It’s been 11 years since we last experienced anything from the weird and wonderful world of David Lynch (2006’s Inland Empire). So the idea of a revival of one of the most iconic pieces of television in history by the master himself is an incredibly enticing one, albeit one I couldn’t help but approach with slight trepidation. How well would a show like Twin Peaks even work in this era of po-faced, expensive, prestige television? How much of this story is there actually left to be told? Will it justify its own existence without merely leaning on back on trapping of exploiting nostalgia? And just how far down the rabbit hole of weird will Lynch descend? All of my worries were put to resounding rest within the first five minutes of the first episode of Twin Peaks 2k17. So much so that it’s actually quite difficult to picture a more satisfying return of a beloved television show than what Lynch has given us here. Twin Peaks: The Return is thrilling, hilarious, terrifying and, of course, downright weird, and the best possible return to the world that we could have asked for. It’s Twin Peaks not as you know it, but you also couldn’t mistake this for anything else.
Peaks and Lynch aficionados know that if you’re looking for conventional narrative, you’re yet again in the wrong place. The first two episodes of The Return are right up there with the most Lynchian things Lynch has ever Lynched. They often descend into full blown surrealism, which took me off guard in the greatest possible way. Those looking and hoping for a happy reunion with old favourites will be significantly shortchanged and put off. Instead, we get metaphorical glass boxes, trees with living brains (which is pretty much exactly how you’d imagine that to be) and a brutal death scene that is among the most horrifying moments of any Twin Peaks episode ever. Fascinatingly, these initial episodes were actually more reminiscent of latter-day Lynch films like Mulholland Drive and Inland Empire than Twin Peaks itself. A lot of it is difficult to get your head around, and there’s absolutely no shame in admitting that you don’t fully understand it all. But attempting to make sense of it is missing the point of what Lynch is trying to do. Lynch wants you to digest the mood and atmosphere, to latch onto the emotions and make your own interpretations of what he is presenting to you. My favourite thing about Lynch’s approach to filmmaking is his ability to recalibrate the way we ingest art. He forces us to view it from an observational perspective; to focus on the expression rather than what is presented on the surface. His work has always done this, and here he seems to have mastered this craft more impactfully than before. An eleven year hiatus seems to have armed Lynch with a whole new plethora of brilliantly surreal ideas, and it’s absolutely goddamn thrilling to sit back and watch this master weave his weird genius over you.
The third episode is where proceedings morph into more of a straight-forward narrative structure. I realised at this point that The Return would be less a television show than an 18 hour film broken up into hour long segments. Familiar faces continue to pop up (the late Catherine E. Coulson makes a bittersweet appearance as Log Lady), as well as a fresh, star-flecked cast (Jim Belushi?! Michael Cera?!) that create a nice bridge between the old and the new. For me, the revival’s true brilliance lies in its bucking of the typical revival trend. It becomes clear very quickly that Lynch has no interest in pandering to fan service and refuse to fall into the revival trap of just being a vessel for a nostagic cash in. He’s more interested in exploring new ideas and pushing the story forward to bring this world into the modern age. He, in the most Lynch way possible, toys with ideas of technology and the modern age that actually gives The Return a sense of purpose that other TV revivals lack or don’t bother to even consider.
Lynch has always been a master with tone, continually crafting a tone over the years that can only really be described as Lynchian. While the original series juggled its light and dark tones to occasionally jarring effect (which, lets face it, was probably the point), The Return weaves its shifts in tone in a tighter fashion, both sides often feeding off each other. One minute, it’s deathly funny (Cooper’s scene in the casino is laugh out loud hilarious), the next, it’s absolutely horrifying (the aforementioned death scene in Part 1 will haunt you for days). It’s a great reminder of how funny, and how scary Lynch can be. The comedy seems in complete contrast to the horror, and thus makes the horror that much more resonant. In Part 5, as we see Dougie/Cooper amusingly attempting to navigate his way through his work day in his trance-like state, you begin to remember how he got there in the first place. And then the horror seeps in. Lynch also takes his time with the episodes. Scenes often continue longer than they probably should, and some of the episodes (Part 5, namely) pass without much truly happening. But Lynch being Lynch, he somehow makes this work. Perhaps because we know he is in total control of what he’s giving us, and that everything he does is deliberate. Additionally striking is how quiet a great chunk of the show is this time around, particularly in the first two episodes. Angelo Badalamenti’s funky lounge jazz is all but gone, replaced with cold, ambient drones that give it a truly unsettling atmosphere that lingers long after the credits have rolled.
Knocking out the first two episodes of Twin Peaks: The Return in one hit gave me an experience I was not expecting, and one I absolutely wasn’t prepared for. I didn’t realise how much I needed new David Lynch in my life until he was back in it, but boy, am I glad he is. Without coming across as too hyperbolic, these first two episodes impacted me greater than anything else I’ve seen this year, television show or otherwise. For a revival of a 25 year old show to be this impactful, this inspired, this…weird, is something to be celebrated. And while the (still excellent) following three episodes didn’t quite reach the insane heights of the first two, as a whole they absolutely are a better return than we ever could have hoped for, and bodes extremely well for the following 12 episodes. It may not be the Twin Peaks you expected, or even wanted. But it’s the Twin Peaks we should be happy we’ve got in the first damn place. And just like it was in 1990, there still is nothing on TV quite like Twin Peaks.