The Little Mysteries in TWIN PEAKS: THE RETURN
ShowtimeTwin Peaks: The Return is - and is about - a lot of things. Many moons of analysis would not be able to touch everything it covers, because there is so much to say. It is prudent, then, to try and find something representative of the whole: a microcosmic topic which can be extrapolated to get to the heart of the series, and why David Lynch came back to one of his most celebrated pieces of media after twenty-five years.
The Return was famously developed under complete control of Lynch, along with his writing partner Mark Frost. However, Frost was not in control of the overall project, with Lynch having the final say in every department, even above that of Showtime executives, who were beholden to the uncompromisingly auteurist vision Lynch handed into them, and likely sweated buckets. What one would have given to be a fly on the wall to witness their reaction to an almost entirely wordless scene just six minutes into episode one, where someone (at this point in the show, seemingly meaninglessly) delivers some shovels to an old man for over two minutes. This complete creative control makes it slightly easier to dissect the show, as any minor mysteries or unresolved plotlines - even if unintentionally so - would be down to a creative decision or omission as opposed to interference.
Mystery is intrinsic to Twin Peaks as a whole. The central question, that of the identity of Laura Palmer’s killer, was intended never to be solved onscreen, instead to remain an ongoing intrigue that would serve as a hook to keep viewers returning. ABC, however, insisted that Lynch and Frost reveal it. Thus, they reluctantly did. In a way, ABC was unfortunately somewhat correct. Viewership had dwindled, and the hook was obviously not going to work forever. It also worked out in the most unexpected of ways. In the aftermath, Lynch directed Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me, a masterpiece so intrinsic to unlocking the core of the entire universe Lynch and Frost had created that it ended up becoming one of the most underrated and underappreciated pieces of media in living memory—and something that could only exist with the identity of Laura’s killer unmasked.
For The Return, then, Lynch and Frost decided instead that those willing to watch an eighteen episode series, in which someone sweeps a floor for three minutes, already had their hook – Lynch himself. Thus, they created numerous small mysteries.
Crucial to understanding these mysteries is whether they are intended to be solved. They vary widely and appear in many episodes, although more concentrated in some than others. For instance, something as simple as the production company credited after the Showtime logo, seemingly created specifically for The Return, ‘Rancho Rosa Partnership’, has no obvious namesake and seems irrelevant until ‘Part 3’, where eagle-eyed viewers may notice that the estate Dougie lives in shares the same Rancho Rosa name. This may seem unconvincing but Lynch and Frost understand that part of the fun in solving the mysteries of Twin Peaks is deciding what is and isn’t relevant; what to focus on, and what not to, and this can turn everything into dissectible material, and enable the work to live on.
For example, a staple feature of the appearance of the Woodsmen is a low framerate in the most literal sense; the images on screen pass by slower, at about half the speed, giving a jittery look. This becomes evident around halfway through the series, and hints of this happening at other times later in the series can be found too, perhaps associating this nifty formal feature with the appearance of evil more generally. This can be expounded on even further in hindsight, however, where upon re-watching other elements, at first incongruous but unsuspicious, such as bizarrely low-resolution, jittery dash cam-like footage and odd, time-warping visual effects such as that of a certain head exploding in ‘Part 2’ come into their own. There are so many countless more examples that to spoil any would be to ruin individual discoveries, possibly some still yet to be found.
The biggest mysteries, however, are perhaps those which are most obvious; this includes the ambiguous returns of several characters, the introduction and immediate, unceremonious dismissal of many more and the biggest philosophical questions of the series. ‘Part 8’, for example, is the deepest Lynch has gone into the mythology of the show since Fire Walk With Me—and just like Fire Walk With Me, fans decried it as ‘not real Twin Peaks’ (“the more things change…”). Even the episode titles are key as to what Lynch deems the most important.
This all comes to a head in the final episode, ‘Part 18’, in which the entire thing is so comprehensively abstract that decoding it could prove too difficult for even the most ardent Twin Peaks fans. Maybe, however, that is a good thing; perhaps some mysteries are better left unsolved. What year is this, again?