Freddie's fight scene in part 17

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LateReg
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Re: Freddie's fight scene in part 17

Post by LateReg »

bowisneski wrote:
Mr. Strawberry wrote:01) What does everyone think would have happened if Freddie had failed? I worried for Cooper and others in the moment but I'm not even sure what dangers BOB posed, exactly. We've seen him possess people and entrap souls in objects. In this scene he was operating on a more base level, physically attacking and bloodying people in the room. Was he attempting to end Cooper's mortal life in order to protect Judy? And if so, would that alone have been sufficient?
That is a question that raises something that I hadn't actually thought about being wrong with the scene to me which is there is no tension. The visuals and sound design create some, but it never even crossed my mind that Freddie might or could fail(or even die after succeeding) or that anyone in the room might be in danger. While that fits in with the idea of the ridiculous super hero trope, I don't think I've ever felt that before from a Lynch piece. So maybe that's a Frost thing since he has written super hero stuff and Lynch created as much tension as he could.
That's really interesting that you say that, because I felt the opposite. When the Bob orb collided with Cooper and knocked him down, I literally gasped and said OH NO! out loud because I thought he was going to become repossessed. When Bob was attacking Freddie and had him down for the count, bloodying his face, I absolutely thought Freddie was done for. It was partially the intensity of the scene, and partially because the show had set us up to expect the unexpected all along. I was on the edge of my seat and feared for everyone because of that.
LateReg
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Re: Freddie's fight scene in part 17

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AXX°N N. wrote:EDIT 2:
AgentEcho wrote:I do think that Freddie being a completely a completely unrelated character from halfway around the world makes it quite a bit more absurd than a having a Twin Peaks character do it, absolutely. The idea that it would have been more acceptable for a Twin Peaks character to put on a magical green garden glove and super punch out a bouncing found footage BOB ball still seems to me to be seeking something more comfortingly conventional to an absurd idea.
I think this is on the ball, but I think there's an equally good 'answer' in a more simple line of thought. Given that we take gods and demons (or, if you prefer, positive and negative entities) as existing, why exactly would they follow our ideas of conventional physics, including conventional beats in storytelling? I mean, that's always been an aspect of Twin Peaks theorizing, and the dialogue between Freddy & James where the green glove is introduced allude to this idea specifically. Freddy asks, Why me? And the response he gets is, Why not you? This is, just like the over-the-top reactions in grief stricken characters, or the myriad quirks in behavior, a kind of dramatic paradox; what we see as unnatural on screen, seemingly based on our conditioning to what is presented on other TV shows or plot vehicles, is actually natural in reality. That someone would launch themselves into a dangerous scenario because they believe, but don't fully understand, that it has importance, happens on a daily level. The uncanny is ordinary, the extraordinary is often more commonplace than we might realize, etc. Life often does not adhere to our desire for narrative coherence. The workings of a contrived powerful entity has even less reason to do so.



Whether the scene works in terms of feeling, I think it does; my initial time, and my second time around after I pondered it over, there is a specific and visceral feeling. I get overwhelmed and exhausted by its execution; how I feel seems intentional, as it's reflected in the reactions (somewhat mockingly? but that uncertainty is also part of the feeling) in the Mitchums' reaction. I can't quite grasp how sincere or insincere it is, but I feel something and at that intensely, and that's pretty much how I would describe most of the franchise.

As for Freddie as a character, I didn't feel he was made intentionally unrelatable or out of place; to the contrary, his scene with James, René and the punch down was put in, I think, to soften the audience to him; I liked the scene and by extension, became that much more okay with Freddy's presence in the series. I think the subversion that was intended was that, with that bar scene, you were supposed to ask, "Wait, is that what the glove's purpose was?" Then it moves the chess-pieces, and once you see James & Freddy in jail in proximity to Naido, again, you ask "Oh, wait, was that the end of the glove plot?" And again when he decks Chad with the cell door. With the distraction of keeping in mind that Lucy, too, is being slotted into an important place, by the time it comes into play against BOB, you're rightly baffled. You remain in that suspension of disbelief the whole time, and I think that was the onus of the play with expectation; the glove is red herring until it isn't. The overall meaning of a deux ex machina being what destroys BOB and everything involving Cooper as hero-archetype after easily lends to analysis, but I think all the stuff with Freddy on a character level, and on a suspense level, was actually fairly conventional.
I just wanted to say I thought this was an outstanding post that brought up an excellent point that ties in to what I think is one of the key strengths of The Return. Doppelgangers and Lodges (and green gloves) be damned, The Return is a series that is predicated on realism in so many ways. In not hiding the lines of age, in its depiction of death, in its subversion of expectations, in its method of unforced 25 years later storytelling, and in its randomness. That randomness isn't just random for random's sake, it's also as you say a natural occurrence in everyday life, as opposed to within films and series, which often tell very specific, cloistered stories with only a few possible outcomes. This all fits into Lynch's pre-release statement about why films can't be like life, genre-less and unpredictable, encapsulating the whole spectrum of emotions and moods and tones.

And your feelings on the scene's uncertain, exhaustion-inducing viscera is precisely how I feel, and the way you put it about suspension of disbelief and bafflement was what I meant when I proposed that the whole thing was a dare to the audience that makes them second guess the ultimate purpose of Freddie, which works after so many red herrings throughout and effectively leads to bafflement at the actually expected scenario.
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bowisneski
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Re: Freddie's fight scene in part 17

Post by bowisneski »

LateReg wrote:
bowisneski wrote:
Mr. Strawberry wrote:01) What does everyone think would have happened if Freddie had failed? I worried for Cooper and others in the moment but I'm not even sure what dangers BOB posed, exactly. We've seen him possess people and entrap souls in objects. In this scene he was operating on a more base level, physically attacking and bloodying people in the room. Was he attempting to end Cooper's mortal life in order to protect Judy? And if so, would that alone have been sufficient?
That is a question that raises something that I hadn't actually thought about being wrong with the scene to me which is there is no tension. The visuals and sound design create some, but it never even crossed my mind that Freddie might or could fail(or even die after succeeding) or that anyone in the room might be in danger. While that fits in with the idea of the ridiculous super hero trope, I don't think I've ever felt that before from a Lynch piece. So maybe that's a Frost thing since he has written super hero stuff and Lynch created as much tension as he could.
That's really interesting that you say that, because I felt the opposite. When the Bob orb collided with Cooper and knocked him down, I literally gasped and said OH NO! out loud because I thought he was going to become repossessed. When Bob was attacking Freddie and had him down for the count, bloodying his face, I absolutely thought Freddie was done for. It was partially the intensity of the scene, and partially because the show had set us up to expect the unexpected all along. I was on the edge of my seat and feared for everyone because of that.
That awesome and I'm jealous, haha. If that had been closer to the end of the series, I probably would've felt it more. I think an important factor was knowing there was an hour and a half of show to go and The Return had been described as Cooper's journey/his FWwM.
LateReg
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Re: Freddie's fight scene in part 17

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bowisneski wrote: That awesome and I'm jealous, haha. If that had been closer to the end of the series, I probably would've felt it more. I think an important factor was knowing there was an hour and a half of show to go and The Return had been described as Cooper's journey/his FWwM.
Ha, I get that. But I really felt in that moment that BOB was going to re-enter Cooper, and I thought it would have perfectly fit everything we had known from the series so far, ie what some (not me) would refer to as Lynch's cruelty towards his characters. As soon as Cooper gets out, of course he gets possessed by BOB! I really thought it was happening. And now that I think about that, that would have been quite interesting. Because the real Cooper was never taken over by BOB. I wonder what would have happened? Something like Cooper's depiction of Richard in Part 18, perhaps. Or some new journey to overcome, or possibly a sign that that darkness was always residing within Cooper and there was no getting rid of it, only managing it? I've just intrigued myself.
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Re: Freddie's fight scene in part 17

Post by Hester Prynne »

AXX°N N. wrote:
As for Freddy being like if Nadine walked up to BOB in the original ... I expect something like that would have happened; long ago when discussing how the original could have been resolved had it continued, I remember joking, actually, that the logical conclusion for how everything would end is that side characters, previously unconnected to the main plot, would lock into place. Including Nadine's super-strength being of plot use. And that did happen, in more ways than Freddy. Lucy shoots the doppelgänger, and Andy literally visits the lodge. Both of which, because they were previously safeguarded in the 'secular' sideplot world, their safety an unconscious thing to us out of familiarity that they never advance beyond the normal reality, were SHOCKING moments to me. So I don't think they did this willy-nilly, rather they did it for effect.
Actually, I think I would have liked seeing Nadine bashing the Bob orb in with her golden shovel. It probably would have seemed corny at first, but she was one of the few characters that had a happy ending. I never cared for her character when I was younger and found her annoying, but over the years came to appreciate her struggle with depression/mental illness/sadness much more. And I agree that having the minor characters be the heroes was not a random thing. I enjoyed that aspect much more on a rewatch, in addition to Nadine's speech to Ed about how she was freeing him.
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Cappy
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Re: Freddie's fight scene in part 17

Post by Cappy »

This is probably just me, but I wonder if the role/function of Freddie in the plot was originally intended for Wally Brando, but Freddie had to be created when Michael Cera couldn't commit to a longer schedule.

There is just something that feels similar about the two characters -- young men, early 20's, traveling the world on weird hunches. Not saying that any narrative can't ever have characters with anything in common, but I can just easily imagine Freddie and Wally's scenes as written for the same character in an early draft.

Also, had Wally Brando been the one to destroy BOB in S3, the fact that he had been conceived during the original series / FWWM would be made all the more significant.
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Re: Freddie's fight scene in part 17

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Hester Prynne wrote:Actually, I think I would have liked seeing Nadine bashing the Bob orb in with her golden shovel. It probably would have seemed corny at first, but she was one of the few characters that had a happy ending. I never cared for her character when I was younger and found her annoying, but over the years came to appreciate her struggle with depression/mental illness/sadness much more. And I agree that having the minor characters be the heroes was not a random thing. I enjoyed that aspect much more on a rewatch, in addition to Nadine's speech to Ed about how she was freeing him.
I tend to agree. It would have...made sense. (I can't believe I just wrote that.)

Jacoby, the golden shovels, and Nadine's interest in those things (along with her unusual strength) would have taken on a lot more narrative heft. The Fireman could have still been at work in this scenario, since Jacoby was up there on the mountain, closer to various elemental forces. We could also say that the golden shovel sort of mirrors the golden orb. Finally, it also might have been interesting to see not one, but two women take revenge on Mr. C and BOB.

I like Nadine. She's supposed to annoy and frustrate the viewer in the original run. Ed's predicament couldn't work so well without her. It's crushing when she comes-to at the end of episode 29, and Ed finds that he's no longer free. She has some great unhinged moments, even amid the super-strength high school arc, like when she breaks the glass in the diner with Mike, and is fascinated by the blood running down her hand (which is unsurprisingly directed by Lynch).
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zeronumber
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Re: Freddie's fight scene in part 17

Post by zeronumber »

I thought of Freddie and his glove as an Excalibur metaphor.

That in he being English and all that about destiny and selection.
This along with Cooper as the Hero, a Lancelot if you will who is armed with the weapon to slay the beast...ie Freddie and his Avalonian Glove,

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Leo K
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Freddie's fight scene in part 17

Post by Leo K »

Loved the scene and I was on the edge of my seat when first seeing it - good stuff!


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vicksvapor77
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Re: Freddie's fight scene in part 17

Post by vicksvapor77 »

zeronumber wrote:I thought of Freddie and his glove as an Excalibur metaphor.

That in he being English and all that about destiny and selection.
This along with Cooper as the Hero, a Lancelot if you will who is armed with the weapon to slay the beast...ie Freddie and his Avalonian Glove,

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That's an interesting angle to see it from, especially with the other references to Lancelot Court and Merlin in the season.
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Re: Freddie's fight scene in part 17

Post by Mr. Strawberry »

The thoughts that popped into my head while the show was airing:

Freddie isn't just some average guy, he's someone with an open heart, and is therefore more likely to be receptive to The Giant's request. In addition to this key factor, he's also in the right place at the right time, due to the vicinity of The Glove with its great potential and critical importance.

The way I understood it, The Glove is a once in a lifetime fluke, a manufacturing flaw that has never happened before, and will never happen again. Just some brief, random error resulting in a minor but significant chemical change, thereby accidentally creating one single glove made from an undiscovered material, all powerful and indestructible.

That's why it's absolutely vital that Freddie obtain this particular glove. It might be the only thing in the world that can stall BOB as it does, so communicating with Freddie and then trusting that he is caring and courageous enough to carry out the mission is much less random and silly than it can seem at first. It manages to be that as well, however, due to some great execution and timing.
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Jasper
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Re: Freddie's fight scene in part 17

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Mr. Strawberry wrote:The thoughts that popped into my head while the show was airing:

Freddie isn't just some average guy, he's someone with an open heart, and is therefore more likely to be receptive to The Giant's request. In addition to this key factor, he's also in the right place at the right time, due to the vicinity of The Glove with its great potential and critical importance.

The way I understood it, The Glove is a once in a lifetime fluke, a manufacturing flaw that has never happened before, and will never happen again. Just some brief, random error resulting in a minor but significant chemical change, thereby accidentally creating one single glove made from an undiscovered material, all powerful and indestructible.

That's why it's absolutely vital that Freddie obtain this particular glove. It might be the only thing in the world that can stall BOB as it does, so communicating with Freddie and then trusting that he is caring and courageous enough to carry out the mission is much less random and silly than it can seem at first. It manages to be that as well, however, due to some great execution and timing.
I like this.
Mr. Strawberry
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Re: Freddie's fight scene in part 17

Post by Mr. Strawberry »

Jasper wrote:
Mr. Strawberry wrote:The thoughts that popped into my head while the show was airing:

Freddie isn't just some average guy, he's someone with an open heart, and is therefore more likely to be receptive to The Giant's request. In addition to this key factor, he's also in the right place at the right time, due to the vicinity of The Glove with its great potential and critical importance.

The way I understood it, The Glove is a once in a lifetime fluke, a manufacturing flaw that has never happened before, and will never happen again. Just some brief, random error resulting in a minor but significant chemical change, thereby accidentally creating one single glove made from an undiscovered material, all powerful and indestructible.

That's why it's absolutely vital that Freddie obtain this particular glove. It might be the only thing in the world that can stall BOB as it does, so communicating with Freddie and then trusting that he is caring and courageous enough to carry out the mission is much less random and silly than it can seem at first. It manages to be that as well, however, due to some great execution and timing.
I like this.
Thanks Jasper! I tend to feel like my reactions are the obvious ones and that posting is a complete waste of everyone's time, but reflection (and reading these forums) eventually convinces me that no two reactions to this show could ever be the same.
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Re: Freddie's fight scene in part 17

Post by albie »

missoulamt wrote:With some time having passed, what are your thoughts on this scene?

Personally, the first time I saw it I couldn't believe that the monumental killing of Bob played out on an almost parodic B horror movie level. It was sad.

Watching it again it's perhaps a bit stronger but so empty on atmosphere that it couldn't be further removed from the vibe conjured up in the original.

Would you agree?
I have a wild idea that Freddie is Freddy Krueger, who also wore a glove. FReddie was played by a Brit. And Krueger was played by Robert ENGLUND.

Or it could be that FReddie was a tribute to director FReddie Francis a pal and workmate of Lynch.
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