Catching Up on TV : Twin Peaks

Twin Peaks, a.k.a. “Who Killed Laura Palmer” is often mentioned as a cult TV series, but one I’ve not watched. I watched the first episode on RTM2 when it was shown back in 1991 (or possibly 1992), but I never continued the series. In any case I don’t think RTM finished broadcasting the first season. But I generally know the story, homecoming queen Laura Palmer was murdered, the entire surrealist series explores the townsfolk and seeks to solve the mystery.

So while on a break from The West Wing (getting somewhat boring) I started the with the pilot.

There’s a two hour premier, followed by 7 episodes of Season 1. Season 2 has 22 episodes, rounding it up to 30 episodes in total. After the series ended, there was a movie called Fire Walk With Me. Recently Showtime confirmed a new season will be coming, after close to a quarter of a century later.

Re-watching the pilot, I find myself only remembering the key scenes, namely the first (Laura scene) and the Ronette scene, and were probably the most memorable. Some websites have noted the premier as one of the best pilot episodes on TV. I tend to disagree, but its top notch tightly plotted no doubt.

The aforementioned opening scene is when a fisherman finds the body of Laura Palmer washed ashore, wrapped in plastic. Soon after that, we are introduced to the townsfolk, each seemingly hiding their own personal seedy secret. After that it can seem a little confusing, too many characters are introduced, each linked to someone else. the only 3 straight arrows seem to be Sheriff Truman and his 2 deputies.

Then star of the series, Agent Cooper, makes an appearance.

Out of the whole ensemble cast, and this being a HUGE cast, the standouts for me are definitely Kyle MacLachlan (Agent Dale Cooper) and Sherilyn Fenn (Audrey Horne). watching the series really made me wonder why Fenn never made it as a huge TV or movie star. Well, the mysteries… Some roles/characters were weak, like Joan Chen (Josie Packard), overplaying the victim role far too often.

The first season was strong, partly due it being shot and tightly plotted.

Then when I came to season 2, it was disappointing. I know that David Lynch was pressured by the network to reveal the killer midway through the season due to sagging ratings, but what it did was kill off the show prematurely. After the killer was revealed in the 8th episode, the remaining 14 episodes started to lose focus and get more surreal. the storyline line moved on to Windom Earle and Black Lodge / White Lodge arc, which to me, wasn’t as compelling as the Laura Palmer storyline.

The finale was the Black Lodge episode, full of symbolism which at the time I couldn’t really be bothered to decipher, and it all finally ended with an X-Files-like ending.

On to the movie Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me.

It was filmed as a sequel and prequel to the TV series, but personally I felt that it was a horrible movie. The only people who would have watched it would have been die-hard Peakies. Anyone else would have fell asleep or walked out of the cinema. I think it ruined the legacy of the series somewhat. The mystique of Laura Palmer was gone, in its place, we see this disturbed and unstable girl taking up most of the screen time.

it did end well for her, though, but it never really explains what happened to Agent Cooper, which is my biggest gripe.

In conclusion, Twin Peaks was definitely an outstanding TV series, for daring to be different. After completing the series I went back to the Internet to read the threads, and wow, I seem to have missed quite a bit of the symbolism especially about the two lodges. But I suppose Twin Peaks is a series set in that time in our TV history – the slow burn pacing and slapstick humour would definitely not fly on TV today. I’m not sure the secret of the killer would be kept that long today, either.

On another note, I was pleasantly surprised to see a few stars appear on the show, like Lara Flynn Boyle (The Practice) playing a major role, David Duchovny (X-Files) as a cross dressing FBI agent, and Heather Graham. the movie had Chris Isaak and a very young Kiefer Sutherland.

So we wrap up another series in my Catching Up with TV series. Now, I wonder if should go look up those Sherilyn Fenn movies…