Twin Peaks Return: The Profoundly Disappointed Support Group

[Wonderful & Strange]

This thread gets pinned, why?

[The Gazebo]

Naido turned out to be the real Diane. Why? Who cares.

You've pretty much aced the discussion throughout, and this is the nuts and bolts of my own criticism. Why should I care that some people are doppelgangers, or maybe tulpas, or maybe some other representations, like holograms, teapots and orbs. It adds nothing to my enjoyment. Supernatural logistics doesn't give me a tingle up my spine. The things I've appreciated this season have been purely visual or atmospheric. It's a shame that we're never, ever going to get the kind of continuation so many of us had hoped for, but fair play to those who have absolutely loved this season.

[Another owl]

The real funny thing was hearing Lynch sour and criticizing season 2 for years, showing absolutlely no respect for others work, just to present a tedious and lazy 18 parts season that is way worst than season 2 in every aspect. He managed to screw up all the lodge mithology and plus give us a cast of poor development new characters. I don`t have a doubt that this new season would be criticized with no mercy if the director was someone from Lost or something like that.
Well, FU, David Lynch, you pretentious twat. I would go with season 2 over you bullshit season 3 any day.

THIS! EXACTLY THIS! Well, minus the swearing part.

Yeah, I think that the swearing part was not that necessary, indeed. Sorry about that.

[Rex]

Frankly, I don't think anyone had a decent idea about how to continue the story and they made it up as they went along.

Season 3 was a complete waste of time and money. They should have handed off the typewriter to a monkey, or maybe they did.

[boske]

And yes, how's Annie? We depended on finding that out.

Mark Frost said Annie would be in the upcoming book. Don't know whether we'll find out how she is, though.

I must have missed that. All I know is that he had said that all would be revealed in the end, and it does not seem like it did. The "Depend on it" was Kyle's answer, there are some links 10-20 pages back in this thread on it.

[Manwith]

And yes, how's Annie? We depended on finding that out.

Mark Frost said Annie would be in the upcoming book. Don't know whether we'll find out how she is, though.

I must have missed that. All I know is that he had said that all would be revealed in the end, and it does not seem like it did. The "Depend on it" was Kyle's answer, there are some links 10-20 pages back in this thread on it.

I'm pretty sure I read a frost interview where he said that, but I don't remember where.

[cgs027]

I will say this season is definitely lacking in the re-watchability department, especially after that finale. To sit through hours of the Vegas insurance fraud subplot for the endgame of having the Mitchum brothers play the straight men during the Madballs-Bob scene and crack a few one-liners is asking a lot.

[cgs027]

And the line about Cole (AKA D f'n KL) not going soft where it counts was cringe inducing...

[Bookworm]

Frankly he sounded a bit like and old pervert here. I don't want to do some discrimination but an old man doing a dirty jokes is often cringe worthy. But for all I know Gordon may just be too cloudcuckoolander to realize it was of bad taste.

Frankly, I don't think anyone had a decent idea about how to continue the story and they made it up as they went along.

Season 3 was a complete waste of time and money. They should have handed off the typewriter to a monkey, or maybe they did.

Is it about the monkey?

[judasbooth]

Just popped over to welcometotwinpeaks.com and I can see, probably for the first time ever, a large number of dissenting voices. Maybe a few of the good folks over there held out for longer that I did, but have now reached the conclusion that yes, the whole show, in the end, amounted to less than nothing.

But still it continues - endless forensic discussions of all the supposed symbolism and hidden meanings woven into the fabric of the narrative. Some guy there even had the temerity to explain the whole thing as "existentialism 101". I cannot stress this enough: I thought the show was a failure, not because it supposedly chose to tackle big, weighty concepts, but because it was poorly written, acted, shot, edited and directed. All the fancy themes in the world cannot make up for the fact that it was lacking in the absolute fundamentals of scripted drama. I couldn't give a damn about the psuedo-philosophical musings of the show. It wasn't clever when the Matrix sequels did it, and it's not clever now. The ending, rather than being the main flaw of the series, was merely a final kick in the teeth.

[IcedOver]

Hm, just watched it this morning. At first I was feeling more charitable to it, but as the hours have passed, I'm becoming a tad more upset. I actually liked many of the absurdist and opaque elements of this season. The fact that almost nothing was conventionally "explained" felt interesting at first, although that feeling is wearing off. What I can't abide is the whole reality manipulation bullshit. That's what I was afraid would happen (that or it all being a dream, and it looks like both may have happened), and we have no emotional clue-in as to why Cooper felt he had to do it. The usage of the old clips altered was absolutely cringe inducing. I HATED every moment of the old clips. That was completely inappropriate.

Part 17 was far weaker, with the showdown in the office, in the daytime, being again cringe inducing. I liked the "middle finger" that was Part 18 more, but I don't like what it points to -- Cooper being in the past, reality changed, all that bullshit. I have no idea if another season is actually in Lynch's mind, but what could it mean but a lot of uninteresting crap about changed relationships? The show had been heading towards some interesting, typical Lynch themes of depression and evil, with the idea of aging and time passing new this time around. That has been tossed out, and to throw in reality bending is just lazy. I wanted to know the Woodsmen's plans, what happened to Audrey, all that. Unless they have more in mind, what can we look at this show as other than Lynch saying "fuck you" to the idea of any search for typical plot structures or audience comfort? Mind you, I'm fine with the latter idea, and that's why I had the feeling of disturbed exhilaration right after watching it. However, I do agree that an element of disrespect is in this work, even to the ideas and plots developed during these 18 hours. I've thought during the run that this was his most "realistic" work in some ways, but to conclude it by messing with reality in such a lazy way is folly. For the most part, I'm disappointed, but I'll have to ruminate on it.

[Endangered_Wulf]

This thread gets pinned, why?

Well...as I mentioned previous, I'm always down for some David Lynch- Mark Frost shenanigans and overall THE RETURN was a fun little ride. However the overall 'RETURN' storyline continues to come across as disjointed and incoherent. I don't mind 'The Return' being nothing like Seasons One and Two after all, but good television is about good, solid story-telling. Avante-Garde or not....after 25 years I'm disappointed that between Mark Frost and David Lynch there wasn't a better storyboard in place. Still had fun. Looking forward to the Mark Frost book and maybe some BOOKHOUSE BOYS stuff in the future.

[Agent327]

Frankly, I don't think anyone had a decent idea about how to continue the story and they made it up as they went along.
.

That is fairly obvious.

I like how, when I would complain about aaaaaaall the slow dragging scenes of this season, and all the Jacoby infowars repeats, people would go "Just wait, by the end it will all make sense why Lynch made those choices". Well now it's over, and it turns out it HAD NO greater purpose.

That has absolutely been confirmed.

Even at the very end, with TONS and TONS of loose ends building up and less and less making any sense, we get about 20 mins of driving down a road, just to give one example that is symptomatic of the unprecedented time-wasting.

I've had discussions this past week with people who were thrilled that the good old Coop would be back for "a whole feature film's worth of running time" in the finale. An enthusiasm I found odd, given the wasted potential seen in light of the entire 18 hour run. And then to make matters worse, they got basically NOTHING of the old Coop we knew, in this finale.

The original TP is re-watchable for it's extremely relatable universe despite the handful of well documented lackluster season 2 problematic episodes.
For it's film-like visuals. For the perfect casting choices. For the amazing combination of genuine charm and chilling psychological horror.
The Return didn't have any of that, it turned out to be anything but relatable, and with this finale it ends up putting into question the ENTIRE TP universe in the most frustrating way imaginable.

[wxray]

This thread gets pinned, why?

Well...as I mentioned previous, I'm always down for some David Lynch- Mark Frost shenanigans and overall THE RETURN was a fun little ride. However the overall 'RETURN' storyline continues to come across as disjointed and incoherent. I don't mind 'The Return' being nothing like Seasons One and Two after all, but good television is about good, solid story-telling. Avante-Garde or not....after 25 years I'm disappointed that between Mark Frost and David Lynch there wasn't a better storyboard in place. Still had fun. Looking forward to the Mark Frost book and maybe some BOOKHOUSE BOYS stuff in the future.

I guess I'll end up in the moderate-trending-to-profoundly disappointed group.

Storyboard? Nah, who needs that? The whole season seemed to verge into left over ideas that both Lynch and Frost wanted to explored. They crammed them in and just shot them out of a cannon.

Some ideas were great. Most were great. But as a cohesive whole? Failure. And DKL, we get it, we know you like slow pacing. You proved it by the floor sweeping scene. You didn't have to ram it down our throat like in 18.

[CrockAlley]

Some of the people in the main thread are looking towards the next book or a hypothetical fourth season for answers. Why? The pervious book proved to have no connection to TP:TR or Lynch. Even if it does contain answers, they have no input from 50% of the creative duo. As for a season four: with the creative choices that were made in season three, why would anyone expect another season to be any different?

A question for those who hate the Laura death retcon: you say it ruins the original show. Aren't we meant to love Laura and be sad about her death? So her not dying is a good thing, yes?

Full disclosure: I stopped watching after episode 11.