ATF : 'Twin Peaks: The Return'

(Spoilers!)
How can i talk about this show? The return of 'Twin Peaks' ended a week ago and i'm still processing. Not only the two hour finale but the whole entire show. Every episode has been a puzzle we all tried to figure out but with David Lynch you can never put the whole thing together. And that's one thing i love about his work, that he lets things talk by themselves and doesn't try to explain his motives behind his work but this time has been a headache to try to figure out the basic. And hasn't that been something wonderful?

"I'll see you again in 25 years." It's like Lynch had this plan in the past but was this past or was this future? There are so many open questions about the third Season of the iconic 90s show that i don't know where to begin. We all were surprised with the news of the show coming back but i don't think noone expected something like this. And i think the director himself didn't want us to give the nostalgia we were expecting from a such loved and missed show. And he tricked us, introducing us to a whole bunch of new characters, giving us back the old beloved ones little by little, to contain ourselves and in the end, he gave us what we didn't know we wanted it but we did. A whole new entire show with some old familiar faces and some fantastic new ones, and they all make sense in the 'Twin Peaks' world. So, let's get deep into that because this has been quite a ride. 18 episodes no less, he gave us the entire treatment.

Premiering with a two hour episode (the first two parts of 'The Return'), we first encounter a new mystery that we can't quite relate to the old series, because that was what at first we were all doing. The glass box and the murder that takes place there after a ghostly shadow appeared. I don't think there was an explanation about that besides that it was like a gate through the black lodge, one made by humans but not definitely working as they wanted. That first part was dark and unsatisfying for those of us who wanted back on the town of Twin Peaks. And most important, he gave us two Coopers, but none of them were the Agent Cooper we knew. The Bad Coop, Bob reincarnated, and Dougie, someone who looked exactly like the FBI agent but that seemed like he had been sleeping for 25 years and forgot everything.

The second part though, that was something else. Here he gave us really what we were expecting and even at the end a peak to some old characters, with a stellar and haunting performance by the Chromatics that fit so well with the original show's soundtrack that it was the perfect brooch to end the premiere.

Up to that point, a series of storylines opened and they were rabbit holes you tried to understand or picture together. That and a bunch of fantastic new characters like the Mitchum brothers, Candie, Mandie and Sandie, Tammy, Janey-E, fucking Diane! And Becky, Bobby's and Shelley's daughter who seemed like the new Laura Palmer and i thought that was brilliant, though that storyline didn't develop. As well as many more. And there were the old ones we all loved, from Hawk, the Log Lady, Albert, Gordon (played by Lynch and who was been surprisingly one of the best things of the series), Bobby, Shelley, Ed and Norma, Andy, Lucy, a little bit of Audrey (but was it really her?) and Sarah Palmer, who made you feel sorry about her and also a bit frightened as well. They all fit perfectly in and everyone was nothing but brilliant, just like the leading man, Kyle MacLachlan, who has been nothing but extraordinary.

There were also touching moments moments like the late night phone conversations between Hawk and the Log Lady, especially the last one where she knows she will fade soon, just like the actress, Catherine E. Coulson who passed away shortly after the filming. Or Gordon Cole's conversation with Denise Bryson where he defended her from her colleagues once he transitioned (not enough David Duchovny though!). As well as Miguel Ferrer's performance as Albert who also passed away after filming, or the thought of how grand would had been David Bowie as Phillip Jeffries if he hadn't passed away months before production.

But let's talk about the two part finale. In part 17, it all nearly got resolved. Cooper was back and headed to Twin Peaks to end Bad Coop's existence for once, with the help of Freddie's hand (that storyline was bizarre). And he also went back in time to change things in the past, preventing Laura Palmer to get lost that night in the hands of her father Leiland (aka Bob) and get killed, so the story we know, didn't happen in the first place. And we saw how Pete Martell (Jack Nance) went out to fish that morning and didn't discover a body, wrapped in plastic, that turned out to be Laura Palmer. And nothing happened, and Dale Cooper never had to visit Twin Peaks to resolve a murder. So did Laura live happily ever after? We all thought so and that's why i got emotional during that ending because it never once crossed my mind that the whole thing could be undone and she got another chance at life, and that she wasn't brutally murdered like that. But what happened then?

In the last past part, part 18, i wondered what was coming on, as everything ended perfectly in the previous part, but little did we know what was coming. For what i could figure out, and i know everyone has their own of theories, our Laura didn't die but disappeared. Just like it happened with Cooper to Dougie, she became someone else and forgot about her past, or maybe she was someone else with an extraordinary resemblance of what an aged Laura would look like now? Through some Black Lodge wholes Cooper manages to find her and takes her back to her mom's house. It's a strange situation because while we saw Cooper and Laura together for the very first time ever in part 17 and it was thrilling and marvelous, here we're seeing different people. Maybe even Cooper is not himself, as he's been called Richard by his lover Diane, now presumably named Linda. But the Cooper we see takes Laura to her family home and she doesn't recognize it, a lady opens the door and it's not Sarah Palmer (the lady was in fact, the real owner of the house in real life, so Lynch is blurring reality, with fiction and past with future). But they got nothing and end up more confused because Cooper knows Sarah Palmer should be living there and there's no sign that she has ever owned the house now. And both end up on the street more confused than before, as Cooper wonders what year it is and if this is future or past, while Laura, after some wind blowing, delivers all of a sudden the most terrifying scream as if she has just remembered everything. And we're left with that. Confused, shacking and terrified by that scream. And i fucking loved it.

So, now the question is, will there be a new season? There could definitely be one, as so many things are left unresolved but i don't think that would be a good idea. Because the return has been so perfect that maybe doing more would lose its touch. But at the same time, i was skeptik at first about this new season and it turned out to be so excellent that if Lynch and Mark Frost do things right, they could be great again. But we'll see. I think that for now we all need to digest this new season, to re-watch it, to try to put all the pieces together, which i don't think it's possible, but to make a little more sense. Not that it doesn't have it, but to understand it better. But time will say so in the meantime let's remember some moments i liked from the show after the cut, which has been no less than iconic. Again. It happened again.