Huh, I thought to myself, That definitely means David Bowie will be on tonights episode ofTwin Peaks.
This is the mood that the revival season ofTwin Peakshas put me in, 14 hours in.
I look for clues in dreams and in overheard conversations.
Credit: Suzanne Tenner/SHOWTIME
I watch old David Lynch movies and seeobvious correlationsthat no god-mind could have possible created accidentallyoron purpose.
Hey, Ididknow David Bowie would appear.
(Separate thinkpiece: Is Sirius XMs Richard Blade secretly the Fireman?)
?
?
???
has been lingering this season.
There was a flashbackanda dreamplace waiting for us at the Hotel Mayfair.
But first, there was a phone call.
Gordon Cole called the Twin Peaks Sheriffs Office and was surprised by a familiar voice and an unfamiliar voice.
The familiar voice: Lucy.
Youve been there all through the years, Lucy?
Gordon asked, a hint of poignance in his half-deaf screams.
This season ofTwin Peakshas been full of people whove been there all through the years.
Lucy told Gordon that she hadnt been here thewholetime.
Shes been home, and to Bora Bora.
Gordon listened patiently, or maybe he couldnt hear her.
She transferred him over to the unfamiliar voice: Sheriff Truman, but not Harry.
We remember that Cole saw a vision of Laura Palmer outside his hotel room not too long ago.
But first, Albert told new recruit Tammy all about the origin story of the Blue Rose Task Force.
A woman named Lois Duffy was a suspect in a murder.
(Pause to imagine: Gordon Cole as David Lynch, circa mid-70s, withthis hat.
Phillip Jeffries as David Bowie, circa mid-70s,wearing these sunglasses.
Lois Duffy is, lets say, Catherine Deneuve.)
Cole and Jeffries ran into the room and saw a wounded woman.
That woman was Lois Duffy.
She said, Im like the Blue Rose.
The woman who shot that woman wasalsoLois Duffy.
By the way, Albert deadpans, Lois Duffy didnothave a twin sister.
That other Lois the original Lois, surely wound up hanging herself.
Tammy has a think on the meaning of that statement.
The Blue Rose does not occur in nature.
Ipso facto, the dying woman was not natural.
You know, guys, a tulpa!
The Buddhist-derived concept of creating a being out of sheer mental/spiritual consciousness!
Tammys mention of a tulpa could upend that trajectory.
She seems to be implying that Lois Duffy conjured her own double.
C similar to how Leland maybe-sortaconjuredBOB, in one of the 10,000 explanations for what BOB is?
And if thats true, how come all the Palmer women can pull their faces off?
Sorry, wait, getting ahead of myself.
Lets talk about how all David Lynchs favorite women are related.
(Next: Evil Half-Sisters)
Deputy Diane reporting, said Diane.
By hook or by crook, shes become part of this Blue Rose Task Force.
That means talking aboutthatnight, with Mr. C long ago.
Mr. C talked about Major Briggs that night, it turns out.
(Thats all shell say about that night, for now and maybe forever.)
My sisters name is Jane.
Shes married to a man named Douglas Jones.
But everybody calls him Dougie.
And her nicknames Janey-E.
How could this be true?Of coursethis is true.
This is a performance by both parties, the Blue Rosers and Diane.
Shes been waiting for them to ask about the ring; they know shes hiding something.
Gordon Cole calls up the Las Vegas FBI office, and asks them to hunt down this Douglas Jones.
(The local branch director played by Stan fromMad Men!
Diane left, performance concluded.
Perhaps this means that next week next week,surely!
Gordon Cole will meet Douglas Jones.
Stranger things have happened, like a cherry pie in the desert.
But now lets depart Buckhorn, and go somewhere much stranger, yet also more familiar…
So of course Lynch dreams of Bellucci.
That name Persephone conjures up a myth that anyTwin Peaksscholar has studied at least once.
A young girl is kidnapped by a dark being from the underworld.
And this is not some happy fairy tale about the girl being rescued.
For she was one of modern demi-god James Bonds many lovers, appearing in the movieSpectre.
She also became arthouse-famous in the provocative, maybe-stupid-but-definitely-powerful filmIrreversible, a.k.a.
The French Film With the Ten-Minute Rape Scene.
In the dream, Gordon Cole was on assignment in Paris.
Monica called him sure and they met at the Creperie Plougastel.
Monica said the ancient phrase: Were like the dreamer who dreams and then lives inside the dream.
Ten years ago, David Lynch introducedat least one screening ofInland Empirewith that exact phrase.
The full quote Lynch read was:
We are like the spider.
We weave our life and then move along in it.
We are like the dreamer who dreams and then lives in the dream.
This is true for the entire universe.
Apparently, Lynch read this out loud while Chris Isaak played background music (Chet Desmond!
), but actually, that seems to either be a wondrously loose translation or a purposeful misquote.
He manifests in it and again He withdraws the whole universe in Himself.
So: The Dreamer is God?
We are like God?
The filmmaker is God?
God is a filmmaker?
Gordon Cole understood that, fine.
However, Monica had a follow-up question: But, who is the dreamer?
She looked past him, indicating that Gordon should turn around.
He did, and he saw his younger self.
It was a long-ago minute on a long-day day: 10:10 a.m., Feb. 16.
Agent Cooper walked into his office and said he was concerned about a dreamhehad.
And of course this was the day Phillip Jeffries appeared.
They didnt look young then.
They look young now.
In cinema, the deadarealive.
Cole reacted with shock, admitting that he hadnt remembered that.
Nowthisis really something interesting to think about!
But Albert was also suddenly remembering that moment.
Was it a memory, truly?
Does Phillip Jeffries even exist?
Let me just conclude by pointing out one intriguing allusion bubbling through this sequence.
Cole meets Bellucci (and her friends!)
at a Paris cafe.
At Jack Rabbits Palace
The adventurers set off up the mountain to Jack Rabbits Palace.
There was Sheriff Frank Truman, who prefers roast beef-and-cheese.
There was Deputy Andy Brennan, who prefersjustcheese.
Into the forest they walked, like lost children in a fairy tale.
There was a magnificent dead tree that Bobby called Jack Rabbits Palace.
It looked like a throne, or like some creature crowned with ruin.
Andy reminded everyone to put soil in their pockets.
They walked 253 yards due east, and what they found there was surprising and inevitable.
She fell into space, but apparently space has a rock bottom here in the forest.
There was a pit of oil, like the one at Glastonbury Grove, indicating a doorway between worlds.
There was a strange fogsmoke, initially, but that gave way to an unearthly yellow light.
The men looked up, astonished.
Perhaps this is important.
Andy was there when they pulled out Laura Palmer, and he couldnt stop crying.
Poor, sensitive Andy but was there strength in his humanity?
He disappeared, and suddenly he was…
Inside a gray room, with a chair for two people.
We expected to find Agent Cooper in a place like this.
The character weve known as ?
?
?
???
sat down and said, I am the Fireman.
He held up his hand to say hello.
The mind wanders, and unravels.
Certainly, he is some kind of opposing number to the Woodsmen although fireneedswood to, like, be.
Or maybe we should go Greek again.
Recall the myth of Prometheus, who stole fire from the gods and gave it to the measly humans.
Was Prometheus the first Fire Man?
Or did he make usallFire Men?
The Fireman gave Andy…something?
Look:
Smoke funneled over Andy, and he looked up, and he sawanotherscreen.
What a marvelous place this Fireman lives in, screens everywhere full of helpful recap montages!
It seems to me that the Fireman was filling in Andy on, well,everything.
We saw the Experiment unleashing BOB, and the Woodsmen around the convenience store.
We saw the strange Woodsman saying Got a light.
Andy saw Laura Palmer, and angels, and the two Coopers.
He saw a phone ring.
He saw himself, and Lucy, him guiding her into a room.
He saw the telephone pole that has always tormented poor Carl Rodd.
They had no memory of what happened to them, but I believe they owed Andy their life.
And here was Andy the hero, holding the strange eyeless woman in his arms.
We need to get her down the mountain, he said.
Shes very important, and there are people that want her dead.
Also in a cell: Chad the malicious, who was being watched closely by Sheriff Truman all along.
Andy told Chad what weve all been thinking: Youve a very bad person, Chad.
You give good policemen a bad name.
Outside The Great Northern
James is still cool.
But in Part 14 ofTwin Peaks, we learned the horrible truth about James.
He has…a job.
Like every other adult, really.
Hes a security guard at the Great Northern.
Maybe he doesnt know that; maybe he knows, and doesnt care.
And what a history!
Seems that Freddie was living in London Town six months ago.
A young man, a boy really, but he could already see the route his life was going.
At the pub every night when he should be helping people!
He found himself floating in thin air, way up somewhere like a void.
He met a bloke named the Fireman, who gave Freddie some advice (a command?
): Go to the hardware store; find a package with just a right-handed green gardening glove inside.
Place the glove in your right hand, the Fireman said.
Your right hand will then possess the power of an enormous piledriver.
Freddie walked to the hardware store, and went into his own dream.
There was the box with a single glove.
He tried purchasing it, but the clerk wouldnt let him.
This man was a classic Jobsworth, a dysfunctional functionary.
Freddie threw down money for the glove, and walked out and the Jobsworth chased him.
Freddie slipped on the glove, was tackled, popped the Jobsworth one.
Eerily, we dont hear what happened to the Jobsworth.
And there youll find your destiny.
So here I am, Jimmy, said Freddie.
Theres an episode ofThe Prisonerwhere the protagonist has an evil-twin duplicate doppelganger.
But Ill save further thoughts for my dissertation.
Why do you think the Fireman picked you?
Well, thats a good question, said Freddie.
He asked the Fireman the same thing: Why me?
The Fireman said: Whynotyou?
He heard that strange sound that has so bedeviled Ben Horne lately.
Was the furnace making that sound?
Or was it coming from that door in the corner?
James looked, and we saw no more.
Sarah has haunted this season, or this season has haunted her.
A long-haired man approached her at the bar.
He desired her, or thought he did.
He wanted to drink with her.
Mind your own business, just she said.
Thats not very polite, he responded, not getting the hint.
(And she saidplease, so she was being polite, technically.)
Would you sit back where you were, kindly?
He called her a bulld, and worse.
He asked her, You like to eat c?
Ill eat you, said Sarah.
Like a lot of mediocre men, this doofus could dish it out but couldnt take it.
Likehellyou will, you miserablebitch, he said.
Illfingpull your little lesbo t-s off!
Sarah Palmer turned toward the man.
She pulled her face off.
Inside was black and white and smoke and a sound we could almost remember a deep electronic technological hum.
There were two little stabbing…things.
And there was a hand.
And there was a mouth, smiling.
Do you really wanna f with this?
said Sarah, or maybe it wasnt her.
She put her face back on, and bit the mans Gregory right off.
There was no blood on her mouth, and she acted shocked.
He just fell over!
she told the bartender.
Withhalf his neck missing?
He called out to someone: Honey!
We got a dead one at the bar!
The bartender turned to Sarah, and said: Well see about this.
Yeah, she said.
Sure is a mystery, huh?
There was a bright shining light within her a verydifferentspiritual interior from what we saw inside of Sarah Palmer.
But you wonder about that first moment, and this one, too.
Has Lauras power somehow taken hold within Sarah?
Once more, with feeling: The dead are alive!
One woman chastised another for hanging out at the Nuthouse.
(Weirdly, Chad had earlier described the jail as a fing nuthouse.
Are all the dreams colliding?)
Dont go in that nut place, said the woman.
(Apparently, her friend is getting high in her room on Sparkle, maybe?)
This woman whos getting high is a thief, too, lifting sweaters from her friend Paula.
And she has a strange story to tell about Billy.
She saw Billy jump over a six-foot fence, run into their backdoor.
There was blood coming out of his nose and mouth which was actually something Audrey had a dream about.
Billy left as quickly as he arrived.
And this womans mom and Billy had a thing.
Whats your moms name?
Its Tina, the young woman responded.
For no apparent reason, there was a deep rumble on the soundtrack.
Has Audrey become like Diane Selwyn or Nikki Grace, dreaming up her own doppelgangers?
Theres a strange circling around this information, blood on the floor, blood on the wall.
Me and my mom, says the woman, I dont remember if my uncle was there.
Theres a long pause.
The two women stare at each other.
