Subject: The Twin Peaks Finale Timeline/Commentary (part 2/5) From: jgp@zodmate.Rational.COM (Jim Pellmann) Date: 1992-08-27, 14:22 Newsgroups: alt.tv.twin-peaks,rec.arts.tv [Start of File 2 of 5] <----------------------------------cut here----------------------------------> + -- Bobby tells Shelly he wants to marry her. Heidi arrives for work. ============================================================================== *** Deja vu ============================================================================== Repeated dialogue. The entire scene in the RR Diner, with the german girl we haven't seen since the pilot movie, repeating the same damned thing ("couldn't jumpstart the old man?" etc...) Weird. And we see Mrs. Horne again, too... ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Great of Lynch to bring back the old characters. The German waitress, Sylvia Horne, Leland (did anyone notice his hair changing color while talking to Cooper?), Maddy, Laura (my, can that girl scream!), LMFAP and Ronnette. Yea for not bringing back James! ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ After Shelley makes her remark about ``...jump starting your old man'', Shelley and Bobby say, in chorus: ``AGAIN!'' This is not in the pilot (I checked). There seems to be a nice double entendre here: Shelley and Bobby teasing Heidi for being late one more time; and the writers winking at the audience and saying, ``Don't you feel a sense of deja vu at this scene?'' ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Right after the penultimate episode, I posted a list of things that I would like to see and not like to see. Most of them did come true. I was hoping to see Sarah Palmer, Laura, Maddy, the Giant, and LMFAP. My biggest disappointment in the show was that there was no Albert. Of course, there wasn't any logical reason for him to be in the episode, I was hoping he'd show up anyway, perhaps he'd feel compelled to be there from a dream or something. Thankfully, preliminary reports pertaining to _Twin Peaks: The Motion Picture_ indicate that Albert will be back. I thought it was a nice touch bringing back Ronette Pulaski, too. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ A friend pointed out to me that much of the last episode sort of answered or reprised elements from last season's finale: Last season, Nadine tried to commit suicide, leaving us with the question of whether she would live or die and with the possibility of Ed and Norma having a non-clandestine relationship. This season, Nadine, the old Nadine, finally returns, seemingly torpedoing Ed and Norma's plans to marry (not to mention Mike). Last season, Pete rushed into a burning building to save one Packard (Catherine) and we were left uncertain as to their fate; this year Pete accompanied another Packard (Andrew) to what seems like certain death. Last season, Audrey was in danger of discovery by her father, this season she is in danger of death. (Given the L shape of the vault, it's just possible that she was shielded from the full force of the blast. Maybe.) Last year Leo was shot by Hank---an even bigger bully than Leo---and his fate was uncertain; this season Leo was booby-trapped by Windom Earle---perhaps the biggest bully on the earthly plane in TP, and certainly in the same kind of domineering relation to Leo that Hank was---and is left hanging on by his teeth, literally. And, finally, last season ended with the climactic scene of Cooper getting shot, with the fade to black, and the body thump, leaving us wondering for his physical well-being; this season ends with the still more disturbing image of Coop confronting his Bob-self in the mirror, leaving us in deep worry about his psychic/spiritual well-being. [There's also the tantalizing scene of Major Briggs in the diner, receiving the message that Cooper is in the Black Lodge, which is a throw-away in a true finale, but a hint that the Major may play a role in Cooper's rescue (redemption?) in a continuing series.] It's one hell of a season finale; if only it could have had the patented TP ``...To Be Continued''. ============================================================================== + -- Leo still surviving ============================================================================== *** Leo ============================================================================== What will happen to Leo? The guy is left hanging by a string.. (bad pun) Were those tarantulas up there? ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Tarantulas don't usually bite people unless provoked. Leo may survive. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ How conscious is Leo? If fully, why doesn't he take advantage of the fact and free himself, either getting the appropriate keys while Windom's out or by brute strength? What happened to the madman from the first season? Kinda unexpected that even Leo would turn out to have a good side ("save Shelly...") at the end. Maybe love IS enough after all. =) By the way, Leo's been at Windom's hideaway for quite some time now -- he should have longer stubble to show for it. Unless Windom has been shaving him... ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Of course, when he comes to after being stung by all those spiders, he'll either 1) return to the original Leo; 2) start showing a romantic interest in high school wrestling jocks; 3) look in the mirror and see Dale Cooper; 4) open a chic little Lebanese restaurant out in the woods; 5) wander the streets of Twin Peaks zapping himself with the Remote from Hell; 6) fart twice and die. It could happen!! ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ It has been mentioned before that Lynch is making fun of the public. This was never so clearly explained (at least to me) then through the use of the spiders above Leo. The viewing public are represented as the spiders in the cage, not being able to change their fate (i.e., not being able to affect changes in the show). The string represents twin peaks (the show) and how at this time it is being held on by a thread. Leo kinda represents the balance the show is in, i.e., what will happen in the future. It also represents a vision of the cliff hanger that Twin Peaks is known for. Those are my thoughts anyway. ============================================================================== + -- Jacoby brings Sarah to Mr. and Mrs. Briggs. Sarah has a message for + Garland: "I'm in the Black Lodge...with Dale Cooper. I'm waiting + for you." ============================================================================== *** Sarah ============================================================================== Who "channeled" through Sarah to give a message to Major briggs and what was he supposed to do with it? We didn't see him for the rest of the show. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ I noticed that the voice of Bob in Mrs. Palmer as she said to Briggs "I'm in the black lodge with Cooper" was exactly the same as the "power" voice in Dune. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ >> >> I noticed that the voice of Bob in Mrs. Palmer as she >> >> said to Briggs "I'm in the black lodge with Cooper" was exactly >> >> the same as the "power" voice in Dune. > > > > I thought that it was not Bob or Windom Earl (neither of which would > > make sense to be sending a message to the Major). Rather, I think it > > was Cooper saying "I'm in the black lodge with Windom Earle" - I > > definitely heard two parts to the name, and the second part was "er..." I had assumed it was Laura, saying she was in the Black Lodge with Cooper. Since most of Mrs. Palmer's visions, etc., seemed to be related to things happening to Laura (and at that point I don't think we had actually SEEN Laura yet) I just figured that a ghostly voice coming from Mrs. Palmer would be Laura's. Any other votes? Annie? The Dwarf? ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ > >Since Major Briggs APPARENTLY passed his test (facing the Black Lodge and > >reaching the White Lodge as he said previously that he believed this > >is what happened to him during his dissapearance?), he is the logical > >choice to go in after Cooper's good self (assuming BOB is in control of > >Cooper's evil doppleganger.). Suppose...maybe the Major is *just* as posessed as Coop... Anyone want to follow up on that idea? Perhaps the message Sarah Palmer delivered to him was one of "OK, time for you to begin Phase III of operation 'Life-Force-Sucking-Owls' - go after the Log Lady..." ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ >> >>The "voice that Sarah Palmer speaks" was that of Windom Earle. > >What makes you so sure? Well, I'm hearing impaired. Not deaf, just hard of hearing enough that I need to use a Closed Caption Decoder to understand most of what's said on a TV. Twin Peaks did have closed captions. The people who actually type in the captions do so from a printed script of the show as part of the original video recording process. Sometimes when a character speaks, his/her voice will have an unusual aspect, and this will be noted on the captions, as "gasping" is used below, for example: (gasping)"We've got to get out of here" In this case, it said: (voice of Windom Earle)"I'm in the Black Lodge with Agent Cooper." That's where I'm coming from with my statement that Sarah's voice was that of Windom Earle's. One advantage of this is that I get (i.e., read) *every single* word of a TV show. If any of you folks have some segment on the tape where you can't figure out what was said because of background music or something, let me know and I'll watch my tape and check it out for you. What this *means* is something else. It certainly points out that WE had some power to inhabit other people in a manner similar to BOB. ============================================================================== + -- Cooper and the little man from another place sitting in the red room. + LMFAP: When you see me again, it won't be me. This is the waiting room. + Would you like some coffee? Some of your friends are here. + Laura: Hello Agent Cooper. {winks, snaps her fingers} I'll see you + again in 25 years. Meanwhile... {presents her hands} + Great Northern room service waiter: Hoo! Woo, woo, woo, woo {with hand + in front of mouth--the "Indian noise"} Hallelujah! + LMFAP: Hallelujah! + GNRSW: Coffee. Coffee. Coffee. Coffee. Coffee. Coffee. {sets down + solid coffee for Cooper} + Giant: One and the same. + {LMFAP rubs his hands. Cooper picks up his coffee - it's liquid. When + he's about to drink, it's solid. LMFAP continues rubbing his + hands. The coffee's liquid. LMFAP continues rubbing his + hands. The coffee's viscous.} + LMFAP: Wow, Bob, wow. Fire walk with me. + {Fire. A scream. Strobe effect. Cooper walks to the other room. + Identical furniture but empty. Back to the original room.} + LMFAP: Wrong way + {Cooper goes back to to the other room. LMFAP babbles excitedly. Then:} + LMFAP: Another friend. + {Maddy enters wearing a black dress identical to Laura's. LMFAP + continues to babble, ducks behind a chair.} + Maddy: I'm Maddy. Watch out for my cousin. {can't see whether her eyes + are white} + {Cooper goes back to the original room. It's empty. Then:} + LMFAP (shadow self): Doppelganger + Laura (shadow self): {presenting hands} {angrily} Meanwhile + {screams, climbs up on the chair} + {Back to the other room. Empty, but Cooper is bleeding from his stomach. + There's a trail of blood on the floor-- Cooper follows it back to the + original room. Caroline and Cooper on the floor bleeding. No, + it's Annie. Annie gets up.} + Cooper: Caroline? Annie? Annie? Annie? Annie? Annie? Annie? + {Cooper goes back to the other room. Annie/Caroline is standing there, + wearing the black dress from the pageant} + Annie: Dale. I saw the face of the man who killed me. + Cooper: Annie...the face of the man who killed you? + Annie: It was my husband. + Cooper: Annie? + Annie: Who's Annie? It's me, it's me, it's me. + Cooper: Caroline? + {Annie changes to Caroline (shadow self), in Caroline's dress} + Caroline (shadow self): You must be mistaken. I'm alive. + {Laura (shadow self) screaming, then turns into Windom Earle.} + {Annie, in pageant dress, appears off to the side, vanishes} + Earle: Dale Cooper. If you give me your soul, I'll let Annie live. + Cooper: I will. + {Earle stabs Cooper. Fire. Rewind. BOB appears, grabs Earle} + BOB: {to Earle} Be quiet. Be quiet. {to Cooper} You go. He is wrong. + He can't ask for your soul. I will take his. {a spout of fire + appears over Earle's head, and his head slumps forward} + {Cooper's shadow self enters as Cooper leaves, crouches beside BOB, and + laughs with him} + {Cooper exits into the hallway} + Leland (shadow self): I did not kill anybody. + {Cooper's shadow self chases Cooper and catches up to him. BOB laughs.} + + + Night + -- Cooper and Annie are back + -- Will tends to Cooper in his bed. Annie's at the hospital and will be + okay. Cooper gets up, "I need to brush my teeth." In the bathroom, + BOB has Cooper ram his head into the mirror. "How's Annie?!" + [End of timeline] Discussion of the Black Lodge sequence is divided into the following topics: *** Annie *** Cooper at the mirror *** Doppelgangers *** Giant/Senor Droolcup *** Glastonberry Grove *** Inconsistencies *** Laura Palmer *** Pathetic theories *** Room configuration *** What it all means *** Windom Earle ============================================================================== *** Annie ============================================================================== A couple people have said that Annie was dopplegangized at the time she entered the circle of trees (they said, "Look closely at her eyes"). I did look closely at her eyes, and, to me, they look quite a bit different from the dopplegangers' eyes we see later in the BL. The dopplegangers' eyes are clearly glazed over to the point that the irises can't be seen; Annie's irises can still be seen after she enters the tree circle. I think that she has been enchanted or entranced, not dopplegangized. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Annie is kidnapped from the pagaent,, and a few scenes later we see Norma happily hanging out with Big Dumb Ed. Dont you think she would be a tad worried about her sister? Also Shelly didnt seem to worried about her. Dont tell me no one noticed she had disappeared?? ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ The words that Annie was reciting while WE was dragging her into the grove were not the 23rd Psalm, as suggested earlier, but the 141 Psalm (A Prayer for Preservation from Evil). The part I was able to identify matched the last verse from the King James version: "Let the wicked fall into their own nets, whilst I withal escape." However I couldn't make out all of what she was saying, so she may have quoted other passages too. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Who cares how Annie is? What the *%#$ happened to Josie??? ============================================================================== *** Cooper at the mirror ============================================================================== I went to see the finale at a friend's house in Beaverton, Oregon, about 190 miles south of the Double-R Diner. As you know, the finale featured many lights out, flashing lights, strobe lights, etc. scenes. Well, we got to the point of anti-Coop saying he needed to brush his teeth (about 3 minutes from the end) and BOOM!, a large explosion, and the neighborhood was plunged into darkness. Voices drift across the patio from elsewhere in the neighborhood, "It must be BOB!" After about 30 seconds, I begin to think it might very well be BOB, 'cause I am about to miss the ending of the whole series after watching it for two years. Well, the Major must have been looking out for us, because in about another 30 seconds, the power returned leaving us with the image of those two headbangers, BOB and anti-COOP, at the mirror. Maybe love (or the Bonneville Power Administration) is enough. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ I was kind of disappointed in the ending. Here is the great and evil Bob and the worst thing he can do is squeeze the tube of toothpaste from the middle. ;-) ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ For Cooper to have been trapped by BOB, it would mean that he still hasn't learned from his experience with Caroline, and also that he is weak. We've heard Hawk (perhaps an expert on spiritual strength) say that Cooper is strong and we've also learned from his experience with Audrey that Cooper can separate his logical thought from his love. --perhaps if Cooper had confronted his "dweller on the threshold" instead of running in fear. Did Cooper end up failing because of what we saw as "fear" while in the Black Lodge? In addition to the dweller conflict, when Laura was screaming, he ran away and found himself bleeding-- was this a result of his fear? During this scene, the bleeding reminded me of "... it's not so bad as long as long as you can keep the fear from your mind..." ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ > >For Cooper to > >have been trapped by BOB, it would mean that he still hasn't learned >from his experience with Caroline, and also that he is weak. Weak! Smeak! Coop wasn't weak he sacrificed himself for Annie's life. Remember WE asking Coop if he would give him his soul for Annie's life. Coop without hesitating agreed. Only thing it was a trap. WE couldn't take Coop's soul, but BOB could. At that point Coop was trapped. He may have blundered, but I refuse to beleive he was weak. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Who thinks that 1) Coop's twin as bob got out and Coop is still trapped inside the lodge, or 2) bob has taken over Coop's body? ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ I noticed that, just before Coop and Annie re-appeared in Glastonbury Circle, one of the Coops caught the other one in one of the red rooms. I hope this meant the the Coop who reappeared is a conglomerate of the two, doing internal spritual battle for control. That would explain why Coop (the good one) smashes his head against the mirror on realizing that he is harboring Bob. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ So did Cooper really let BOB in when he agreed to surrender his soul in return for Annie's life (even though BOB said WE couldn't make that exchange, he didn't say *he* couldn't!)? Or did the doppelganger Cooper merely overpower Dale and make it back to physical reality in his place? I wonder if TP would have taken this particular plot twist if Lynch et al hadn't needed a bang-up, shock ending for the series climax? If the show picks up again in some form, will Coop struggle from within against BOB, or is the good Coop still back in the Lodge? Will the good Coop only appear in visions and through owls? Will he really have to wait 20 or 25 years to escape? Will he age in the meantime? Aaaaggghhh... I don't want the show to be over!!! ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ I thought that the "...in 25 years..." quote referred to what we saw in the first dream-- Cooper was an old man, 25 years in the future sitting with the LMFAP and Laura. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ As soon as Coop mentioned brushing his teeth, I thought bathroom,... mirror,... BOB!... NO! I didn't read any of the Rolling Stone articles with the predictions until after 6/10. I'm sure that you too would have guessed what was going to happen even without having read the predictions. I think it was intentionally obvious. Lynch could have gotten Coop in front of a mirror in a much more subtle way, but instead used a rather obvious approach. The whole time Coop was walking to the bathroom and squeezing the toothpaste, I was saying to myself "No, not Coop. No...", yet was still shocked when he smashed his head against the mirror. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ > >What about Cooper saying "I Will" to Windom Earle's request to him > >about trading his soul for Annie's life? Is THIS why Bob now has > >Cooper? Note that Bob popped right in at that point, but mentioned > >that Windom had overstepped his "authority"...Hmmmm...... Yes! As a netter noticed (try saying THAT five times fast!), WE did not have the authority but BoB DID! I think Coop really lost it when he *ran* from his darker side instead of confronting it. When it caught him, it overpowered him and replaced him in the real world. The combination of these two things ("I will" and running/being caught) caused Coop to fail the "test" By the way... I knew...i KNew....I KNEW!...Annie was going to get Coop in trouble. I KNEW IT !!!! COOP drop ANNIE!! (you should've done it along time ago bud) Now we have CooBob to deal with. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ >> >>What about Cooper saying "I Will" to Windom Earle's request to him >> >>about trading his soul for Annie's life? Is THIS why Bob now has >> >>Cooper? Note that Bob popped right in at that point, but mentioned >> >>that Windom had overstepped his "authority"...Hmmmm...... > > > >This may have been a test of Cooper's love for Annie-- I guess he > >"passed" this part? Although he failed otherwise. I think he "passed" this part by reacting with love rather than fear. Later, when he runs from doppelganger-Laura and his own doppelganger, he fails because he's reacting with fear. I think. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ > >What about Cooper saying "I Will" to Windom Earle's request to him > >about trading his soul for Annie's life? Is THIS why Bob now has > >Cooper? Note that Bob popped right in at that point, but mentioned > >that Windom had overstepped his "authority"...Hmmmm...... I'd like to point out that Cooper didn't SELL his soul, he SACRIFICED it to save Annie. Pretty powerful stuff, that, at least in classic epic literature. That's why I believe it's not Cooper that Bob's possessing, but, as many have pointed out, the doppelganger, and it won't take much effort for Cooper to break free and put Bob back in the Black Lodge. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ IMHO, Cooper and the BOB/Coop are one and the same. His double caught up with him in the Lodge. They are both in the bathroom brushing their teeth (well gee, kinda, sorta). The key will be to extract BOB/Coop from Cooper. I guess he has to wait 25 year until the Lodge is open again. (?) It's just too depressing to have to leave Twin Peaks thinking that there aren't any good guys. What a pessimistic view of the world! ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Does BOB now control Cooper's soul? I think that Cooper assenting to take Annie's place granted BOB the authority to release Cooper's dark side. (I think that Coop's doppleganger did not appear until after this scene.) Cooper failed to defeat (or refute, disable or unconjure) his dark side (so far). I think that it is this dark side that has been released into the world and that the "good" Coop is still wandering the halls of the Lodge. This scenario scares me a little more. Cooper must have witnessed some pretty awful examples of human behavior as an Agent of the FBI. There must have been times when he wished he could go outside the law to punish a criminal. When his normal, good self is in control, such impluses are dismissed. But with the good interred in the Black Lodge the bad is free to act out all not only all his revenge impulses, but could recreate and re-enact many of the horrors he had witnessed professionally. Brrrrrrh. Kind of turns Cooper into a Hannibal Lector type, only scarier. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ I really enjoyed the (sigh) last episode last night. I had a slightly different take on the Cooper possession by Bob than has, so far, appeared in this group. I saw the whole Windom Earle arc revealed as a ruse by BOB to get Cooper to go into the Black Lodge. Cooper, not WE, was BOB's real target. After all, it was Cooper, not WE, who posed a genuine threat to BOB. BOB waited until Cooper surrendered his soul to WE, (a BOB minion) then dismissed WE and claimed the offered soul for himself. This was the permission that BOB needed to possess Coop. So Love doesn't conquer all.... However, I also don't see this as the end. I think that Cooper's soul is trapped inside the black lodge awaiting a rescue by a contingent of the Bookhouse Boys (Briggs, Harry, etc.). Also, Annie is (I think) still alive. She could be the one who frees Cooper. Earlier in the show when Cooper was dictating a memo to Diane he remarked that Annie (Love) had liberated him from his self imposed prison of solitude. And she did escape from meeting her own "dweller on the threshold" in the Black Lodge. Maybe she now possesses the strength and power to go back in and free Coop. Maybe Love does conquer all.... ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ It just occurred to me. No, I'm lying. It occurred to me the first time I watched the last show (I've watched it 3 times since ... ) perhaps Special Agent Dale Cooper has been evil since the beginning. Perhaps he has been a host to BOB for longer that we think ... ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Those of you who are so upset that Bob possessed Coop, take heart, it may be only the doppleganger. Coop may still be in the lodge, because someone sent the message to Briggs through Sara Palmer. If all else fails, go back and watch "Darth Vader goes to heaven!" from the end of Star Wars III. Happy ending! ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ As for Coop's present situation. The LMFAP did say "doppleganger" before WE, BOB and the evil Coop appeared. My feeling is that Dale is trapped in the Black Lodge, while his doppleganger is free to roam the material plane. I think it will be up to the Major (and Annie?) to rescue him. (I also think Truman is not up to the task.) As for Annie, did she make it out of the BL? She didn't look to good laying next to Coop in the clearing. Perhaps she did die, and Truman lied to spare Coops feelings upon his recovery? ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ > > As for Coop's present situation. The LMFAP did say "doppleganger" > > before WE, BOB and the evil Coop appeared. My feeling is that Dale > > is trapped in the Black Lodge, while his doppleganger is free to > > roam the material plane. I think it will be up to the Major (and > > Annie?) to rescue him. (I also think Truman is not up to the task.) > > I agree that Coop is trapped in the Lodge and his doppleganger is roaming the material world. As for his rescue, I think that Albert is the likely choice (with the Major's help). If the way to overcome evil is through love, Albert will be the one to do it. Albert has said his philosophy of life is based on love (remember the "...Sheriff Truman, I love you." scene?). ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ In Western religions, evil always requires cooperation. In _The Exorcist_, little Linda Blair gets possessed because she plays with the Ouija board and opens the door to the Devil. That was terrifying because it presented the possibility that actions and not intentions could consititute cooperation. TP had the chance to explore the other possibility; namely that even a very good, strong and uncooperative man could lose his soul to an evil power. Unfortunately, Coop's saga in the Black Lodge was a bit murky, and it isn't clear at all what happened to allow Coop to be possessed by BOB. As other posters have pointed out, it looked like Coop did everything right. I don't even buy that running for the exit was the wrong thing. Coop had gotten what he'd come for - Annie's life. He wasn't running from BOB, just running out of the situation. So the question remains: How did Coop's evil doppelganger win out? And if Coop cannot stand up to BOB, then who can? It's a chilling thought. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ When Coop said "I have to brush my teeth," I knew what was up... yup, predictable but damn frightening. The way Coop reflexively 'attacked' Bob by butting his head into the mirror seemed to indicate that Coop himself (the same Coop who asked "How's Annie?" when he woke up, the human part of Coop that is still there even though Bob is sitting atop his soul) saw Bob in the mirror and knew who he was and what that meant. Is Coop now aware that he is being possessed by Bob? If he's aware of it, can he fight it? Seems to me that unless Bob is always dominant in Coop (which would most likely, well, be noticed around town ;-) ), when Coop's human side is in control of his body he has a chance to do something. So WILL HE???? ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Perhaps that's it. BOB wants Cooper locked in the rubber room (as opposed to the red room), just as Cooper had gotten Windom sent to the mental ward years earlier. Divine irony, as BOB would see it... ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ A show of hands... how many paused at the bathroom door after watching the finale? "Mmmm... I don't think I need to brush my teeth tonight, nope, definitely not tonight...." Eeeek! ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Three cheers to Daniel Mittleman, whose posting I quote in full: From: dmittleman@misvax.mis.arizona.edu (Daniel Mittleman) Newsgroups: alt.tv.twin-peaks Subject: a possible ending - but not all the steps to get there Date: 13 Apr 91 13:00:47 GMT Organization: University of Arizona - MIS Department Fiona, I have no idea what it is you are looking for, but here are some ideas I had yesterday.. I have this idea for a final scene, but only sketchy details of what might come before it. Sketchy details: It seems to me that Windom Earle will manage to create a situation for Cooper where Earle has the ability to unleash all of the forces of the Black Lodge on the world. Doing so would cause untold death and destruction. Cooper has the ability to stop Earle, but because of the situation Earle has created, doing so was cost the life of Annie. In the climax Cooper decides to save the world, Annie is killed, Cooper is a hero, but is left inconsolable and despondent. Final scene: We are just inside the doorway of Cooper's room at the Great Northern. We see Cooper in a profile view sitting in a wooden chair at his desk/dresser staring blankly into the mirror in front of him (not wholly unlike the opening scene with Josie). The room is dark and warm and woody. The camera angle slowly moves towards Cooper circling around behind him. Very haunting TP music picks up in the background. As the camera comes around behind Cooper we can see his reflection in the mirror. It is Bob smiling and laughing back out at him. The picture fades to black. "Lynch/Frost" appears on the screen. This is all a brainstorm - additional comments and suggestions are welcome. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Most of the things I noticed during the finale have already been mentioned by the rest of you except for one (small) thing. Did anyone else besides me see Cooper's first line after waking up in his hotel room with Truman and Doc Hayward standing over him ("I wasn't sleeping!") as a message directly from David Lynch to the viewing audience that he wasn't going to cop out with a Wizard of Oz-like ending? As soon as I say Cooper in bed with Truman and Doc standing over him, I thought, "Oh, no! The whole thing's been a dream!". Then, as if on cue, Lynch seemed to be saying directly to me that, no, it wasn't a dream. ============================================================================== *** Doppelgangers ============================================================================== > > Alternatively, the Leland evil form existed as a seperate entity in > > the black Lodge and was obviously kin to the evil Dale form. Perhaps > > this is the Lodge's representation of possession by Bob. Hawk said that your spirit had to visit the Black Lodge and overcome your evil self before it could proceed to the White Lodge. Sounds like everyone has an evil self in the Black Lodge; you don't have to be possessed by BOB. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ "Watch out for my cousin" might have well have been a fortelling of what was to come, the doubles... the "dopplegangers", the opposites. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ The MFAP said that he'd show up again as someone else -- who? What he said was closer to: ``When you see me again, it won't be me.'' I think that what he meant was that each successive apearance of the LMFAP was merely someone who looked like him: doppelgangers (und treppelgangers, usw). Note that this happens with Laura. The first Laura we see, who says she won't see Cooper for 25 years, has clear eyes, while Laura/Bob, has glazed eyes. This seems to be a distinguishing mark of the doppelgangers. Also, the only Leland we see has glazed eyes, and the anti-Cooper also has glazed eyes. Still, the whole XXX Lodge sequence leaves open the question of what happened to those who have died and exactly whose side the supernatural entities are playing on---except for Bob, of course, who remains unchanging in his Bobhood. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ > > "Wow, BOB, wow!" Since no one has pointed out the obvious, I will: this is a palindrome that is also vocally palindromic, when spoken in the Lynchian double- reverse technique. Only other one I can think of is "Madam, I'm Adam." ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ It's "mom, pop, mom" upside down. The twin-peak theme is expressed in the dual points of the W/M, and in the double W's of "wow", and in the double-wow's of the palindrome. Just as the double-W's of "wow" represent the twin peaks with the town of TP between them, the palindrome as a whole represents the twin "wow"s of the lodges with the mundane world between them--and Bob is in the place represented by the mundane world. The reversed-ground version of "mom, pop, mom" is "pop, mom, pop"--Donna's dilemma. And the two "pop"s are the "horns" (i.e., peaks) of the dilemma. I can keep this shit up all day. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Doppelgangers. Coop's dark side escapes. As did Leland's (that's why the other Leland is in the lodge, and "didn't kill anyone")... Laura's light side escaped, leaving her dark side in the lodge. Sound somewhat right? ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ > >* Doppelgangers. Coop's dark side escapes. As did Leland's (that's why the > >other Leland is in the lodge, and "didn't kill anyone")... Laura's light side > >escaped, leaving her dark side in the lodge. Sound somewhat right? We've known for some time that in order to reach the White Lodge, one must first travel through the Black Lodge, and in the process meet and overcome one's doppelganger. Coop is about 75% of the way there. Now, all he has to do is overcome his evil side, and he'll be in. I personally was kind of disappointed by Coop's actions in the Black Lodge. In order to defeat the evil, he needed to have overcome his fear and fought back with love, not just for Annie, but for life, the world, his friends, and his enemies. Remember, "Fear is the mindkiller." Instead, all Coop does is run back and forth between the two rooms. And he didn't overcome his fear. Of course, I would be afraid too if I had a doppelganger of Laura Palmer screeching at you. Yow! I don't think that the evil Laura or Leland or LMFAP were real. Remember, LMFAP said, "When you see me again, it will not be me." There seemed to be four entities in the Black Lodge with Coop. They are: Windom, Annie, BOB, and Coop's doppelganger. My theory is that the evil LMFAP was actually BOB (he walked and sounded similarly), Carolyne was probably Windom, evil Laura was probably Windom (using frame advance on a vcr, one can see Windom's face in between flashes of the strobe light when the evil Laura is coming at Coop), and Leland was probably BOB too. Illusion *is* one of evil's major weapons. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Things to do while procrastinating at work: I looked up doppleganger in the Britannica, where it said (this is from a fried cortex) a doppleganger (which means "double goer") is a spiritual double that all humans and animals have. It is not a ghost, but an "apparition" or a "wraith". And if you happen to _see_ your doppleganger, it means your death is imminent. The moment good Coop turned around in the hallway and made eye contact with bad Coop was a moment of significance. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ This may already have been mentioned, but in the final episode of The Prisoner, "Fall Out", the hero (#6) meet his own evil doppleganger (#1). ============================================================================== *** Giant/Senor Droolcup ============================================================================== I didn't understand why the Giant/SDC were in the waiting room. I suppose that the waiting room was neutral territory for Black/White lodgers?