I don't disagree with anything you're saying, but I didn't say it was "just" representing explanation in storytelling, I was saying that it is possibly that AS WELL AS the spiritual explanation. Both meanings at once as they do not cancel each other out. Functioning on multiple planes at once, narrative, thematic, etc. One theory takes place on the meta-narrative level, the other takes place thematically right in the narrative itself. That's how this show works for me, and I hold both of those theories in my mind simultaneously because that's how I believe the show is functioning.
I hear ya. I was going off more on the Twin Perfect guy than yourself. If you get around to the Twin Perfect video, let us know what you think. The guy in the vid seems uber self confident and cocky that he decoded it all, also turned me off a bit.
there are plenty of meta things that are legit - the blueish glow on laura's face at end of FWWM does seem to be a call-back to the blue static from the TV, that he using as motif throughout, that maybe she is a TV character. using the actual owner of the Palmer house at the end of The Return, is very suggestive. it's like you've been playing a part, which is like taking part in a dream, and now reality is dawning on you. and Monica Belluci is a person who exists in our reality, it's not like Cole was dreaming of a fictious person, it was an actress from our reality who plays parts in dreams, and it's a coffee shop the real Lynch has been to.
so indeed, there are meta and spiritual things going on at the same time... one thing I got from 'The Art Life' is how much Lynch loved playing with other kids in his childhood, playing war in the playground and making up stories, and the mud thing with little Dicky Smith... he really treasures those memories. that does seem to inform a lot of the improvisational nature of how he wants to make movies, especially as he's gotten older, and really fully involved in the playing himself in The Return, giving such a large part to Cole.