What would a Season 4 be about?

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Mordeen
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Re: What would a Season 4 be about?

Post by Mordeen »

eyeboogers wrote:
Mordeen wrote:possibly final "stab" (wink wink)
This coupled with the image montage you uploaded the other week seems to suggest that Cooper could have died from the Earle incident (the first one) in a version of The Return script. This would especially make sense since the working title was Dead Man's Journey.

However, what ended up being on screen doesn't necessarily lead to this conclusion, it could even be that f.ex. Lynch didn't like the idea, and lets not forget the season didn't end up being called Dead Man's Journey. I would actually be really surprised if the conclusion to this would simply be that Cooper has been looping a few times through purgatory on his way to heaven.
But who is the dreamer?

Certain philosophies assert that life is simply a journey or dream quest where one learns through trial and error to find perfection and attain the afterlife in heaven.

And Cooper did, after all, give himself over to die to save Annie. No perfect courage. He had to find his way to the White Lodge and failed in the Return.

He didn't listen to the sounds (Laura's Diary symbolism) and was far away. Time and time again.

Seemed pretty straight forward to me, but who knows I guess.

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Cappy
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Re: What would a Season 4 be about?

Post by Cappy »

If it is the case that Season 3 completed the story, or closed the narrative circle, I'd be fine with Season 4 being an On The Air style comedy based on the Horne family and their zany antics. Ben, Jerry, Johnny, Audrey, and Richard all struggling to keep The Great Northern afloat, with Richard and Audrey interacting with everyone else like the events of Season 3 didn't happen (although it could be vaguely acknowledged/referenced).

Executive Secretary Beverly Page could be the normal, everyperson character that the audience most relates to. She takes the job to support her ailing husband, and finds herself as the only person holding the hotel together. Audrey is constantly arguing with her husband Charlie, Ben becomes consumed applying the Noble Eightfold Path to hotel management, lecturing guests on it to the point they point they get annoyed and go to the Best Western off of the interstate. Jerry is getting high and lost in the woods, Johnny has to be physically restrained by bellhops, Richard randomly shows up and attacks someone new every episode. The bumbling security guards, James and Freddie, never seem to be able to stop the Horne's from bringing disaster on themselves.

Other characters, like estranged daughter Donna Hayward and Richard's dad Dale Cooper could show up on occasion. The whole thing could be like Arrested Development or Fawlty Towers meets Lynch's Rabbits, as it would have small doses of Lynchian darkness baked into every episode. Horne's Nest, anyone?

Also, I can't help but imagine a prospective Season 4 would have something vaguely political in it -- Given Frost's twitter feed the last few years, and the references to Donald Trump in Secret History/Final Dossier, it's easy to see some reference or commentary on current affairs creeping into a new season.
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Re: What would a Season 4 be about?

Post by Rhodes »

Henrys Hair wrote:I wouldn't be surprised if a potential Season 4 was more abstract still. Beyond Laura/Carrie and Cooper/Richard I could see it continuing with the rest of the cast taking on new identities (on a morbid level, it would be one way to get round the actors who have sadly passed away since filming wrapped on S3).
I loved season 3 as a transition between the original show and Lynch's later, more abstract work.

For me, the most rewarding approach to S4 would be for it to even more abstract indeed. Moreover, it might be the only feasible way in terms of storytelling.

I would love an Inland Empire approach to S4 of fragmented scenes, where identity's are constantly changing and the viewer is constant in doubt about the timeline and state of the characters.

I thought S3 was, overall, much stronger than S1/S2, but I think that Lynch can do even better (as he has proven with MD en IE). As I said before: S3 was very good, but did not nearly have the intensity and scary moments of these two masterpieces. For example, the first time that we go through the window and see the Polish street. And the camera goes through the gate. Or the moment Nicky enters Smith's house using the alley entrance. Or the flickering lights in her bedroom. Or when she shoots Phantom and sees herself in his face. That level of fear and quality just was not there in S3, no matter how good it was.
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Re: What would a Season 4 be about?

Post by eyeboogers »

Rhodes wrote:Or when she shoots Phantom and sees herself in his face. That level of fear and quality just was not there in S3, no matter how good it was.
But then that is very subjective. For instance, as much as I loved "Inland Empire" that phantom shooting really did not work for me aesthetically.
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Re: What would a Season 4 be about?

Post by Mordeen »

At risk of being flamed, if there were to be a Season 4, I would want it to be as far from IE stylistically as possible.

I view IE as being a punishment for being a Lynch fan and still remind him he owes me for the time I lost watching it.

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Re: What would a Season 4 be about?

Post by Soolsma »

I'm very much with Rhodes when it comes to the scary stuff. During The Return I never really crapped my pants like I did during FWWM, MD (that ending!!!) or IE. What probably came closest were the Woodsmen reviving Mr. C, their skull crushing bogeyman practices, not so much.

A little more of Lynch being the true master of horror he can be at his best would be great. I want this raw feverish feeling of inescapability, like a sleep paralysis one is unable to wake from, haunting images that will be imprinted in ones mind for many nightmares to come. Until this day, Lynch is still the one who scared me most through film, and I've watched a lot of horror movies. Admitted, most of those (horror movies) are really bad; cheap jump scares, loads of predictability, gore.

@Mordeen, give it another couple of watches. It only becomes really great when you watch it a third time :)
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Re: What would a Season 4 be about?

Post by mtwentz »

Soolsma wrote:I'm very much with Rhodes when it comes to the scary stuff. During The Return I never really crapped my pants like I did during FWWM, MD (that ending!!!) or IE. What probably came closest were the Woodsmen reviving Mr. C, their skull crushing bogeyman practices, not so much.

A little more of Lynch being the true master of horror he can be at his best would be great. I want this raw feverish feeling of inescapability, like a sleep paralysis one is unable to wake from, haunting images that will be imprinted in ones mind for many nightmares to come. Until this day, Lynch is still the one who scared me most through film, and I've watched a lot of horror movies. Admitted, most of those (horror movies) are really bad; cheap jump scares, loads of predictability, gore.
-I jumped out of my seat when the Evolution of the Arm Doppelganger suddenly appeared out of the statue. I did not see it coming and it was reminiscent of the MD elderly couple jump scare for me.
-Totally got the chills when the Woodsman was following the Army lady (forgot her name). Not a jump scare but very creepy.
-The Experiment chopping the faces of Sam and Tracy was pretty freaky the second time I watched (didn't get me as much the first time as on rewatches)
-Mother trying to burst through the door to get at Cooper while he was escaping through an electrical socket (reminiscent of the final battle in Mimic when the creature is trying to get through the hatch door at Jeremy Northam's character) was pretty intense.

I noticed Lynch used no 'stinger' musical cues this time. That may be part of the reason you felt there weren't as many jump scares. By 'stinger', I mean like the music in the original series when the unseen man hides behind a tree while Leo is meeting Mike and Bobby.
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Re: What would a Season 4 be about?

Post by Henrys Hair »

I remember Kyle tweeting 'poo will flow' when asked if S3 would be scary, but personally I can't think of any parts that scared me. I remember being wary of sitting up late on my own to watch the first parts broadcast and there were a few times throughout the series when I thought something scary was about to happen (the slowed-down drums in American Woman that sounded like gunshots when Bad Coop first appears, the idea that something might appear in that glass box) but the actual scares never really happened. The Woodsmen maybe seemed a little less scary due to the head-floating-up fx that happened with the first one we saw...
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Re: What would a Season 4 be about?

Post by mtwentz »

Overall, though, I'd have to disagree that I miss any sense of 'horror.' There was a heavy sense of dread laced throughout The Return, a couple of jump scares, some creepy scares, at least one shock scare, some 'humorous scares' (New Mexico woman), and...

a frog moth climbing into a girl's mouth!

Edit: Forgot to mention Sarah biting off a trucker's neck. While not scary per se, it created this great sense of darkness and dread, at least for me.
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Soolsma
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Re: What would a Season 4 be about?

Post by Soolsma »

mtwentz wrote:
Soolsma wrote:I'm very much with Rhodes when it comes to the scary stuff. During The Return I never really crapped my pants like I did during FWWM, MD (that ending!!!) or IE. What probably came closest were the Woodsmen reviving Mr. C, their skull crushing bogeyman practices, not so much.

A little more of Lynch being the true master of horror he can be at his best would be great. I want this raw feverish feeling of inescapability, like a sleep paralysis one is unable to wake from, haunting images that will be imprinted in ones mind for many nightmares to come. Until this day, Lynch is still the one who scared me most through film, and I've watched a lot of horror movies. Admitted, most of those (horror movies) are really bad; cheap jump scares, loads of predictability, gore.
-I jumped out of my seat when the Evolution of the Arm Doppelganger suddenly appeared out of the statue. I did not see it coming and it was reminiscent of the MD elderly couple jump scare for me.
-Totally got the chills when the Woodsman was following the Army lady (forgot her name). Not a jump scare but very creepy.
-The Experiment chopping the faces of Sam and Tracy was pretty freaky the second time I watched (didn't get me as much the first time as on rewatches)
-Mother trying to burst through the door to get at Cooper while he was escaping through an electrical socket (reminiscent of the final battle in Mimic when the creature is trying to get through the hatch door at Jeremy Northam's character) was pretty intense.

I noticed Lynch used no 'stinger' musical cues this time. That may be part of the reason you felt there weren't as many jump scares. By 'stinger', I mean like the music in the original series when the unseen man hides behind a tree while Leo is meeting Mike and Bobby.
It's not the jump of the scare or other use of horror tropes that frighten me most. It's the way Lynch can set up a mood before leaving me in pure agony. This is a process that takes a while, possibly hours. What's important is that there are multiple hints throughout the work that point towards something very unnerving going on. What is probably also vital is how the character that gets scared acts. Some examples:
-the way Laura screams and trembles in utter fear after seeing BOB in her room.
-Diane screaming as she's terrorized at the ending of MD.
-Sue/Nikki's exaggerated, somewhat psychotic facial expressions during the hallway scene.
All of the above were properly built up to with an increasing sense of dread. Think convenience store scene, MD dinner scene etc.
(Or am I just a fan of frightened blonde women? Like Lynch?)

In this sense: another thing I found pretty damn eerie about TPTR was Hastings describing the murder of Ruth "There were SO many people there". I've always been so curious about what exactly happened there. The major's head floating up and all. Now there's a scene I'd like to see in season 4!

I very much have to agree with you about those mother/judy scenes being very well done, downright eerie, freaky and unnerving. There were other good moments as well. I'm not saying TPTR misses any sense of horror, it's still scarier than 95% of all horror movies; just not as scary as some of Lynch's other works. Poo didn't flow while it did before, that's my main point.

I Think that during the time the tree popped out I was too busy contemplating over the dynamics of the lodge to be scared. When the woodsman crossed the hallway, my mind was occupied by the police investigation. A proper horror mood was not set up for me during those scenes.

Maybe it has something to do with the format. And would the series have really benefited from watching them as an 18 hour movie. Having one or two scares per episode, while last week's have already slightly faded, might not work well for the fear factor.
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Re: What would a Season 4 be about?

Post by Mr. Reindeer »

I just found the EotA hilarious when I first saw it, and still do. In the best possible way.

I agree that one of the few things I missed on the show was more of the sense of Lynchian dread I was expecting, but that being said, the Sarah scenes may be among the creepiest he’s ever done. In a way, I found the bar/trucker scene the least impactful of them, because it was the most conventionally horror movie-ish. But, man. Something is VERY wrong in that house, and it somehow casts a pall over the entirety of the rest of the series.
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Re: What would a Season 4 be about?

Post by Rhodes »

Mr. Reindeer wrote:I just found the EotA hilarious when I first saw it, and still do. In the best possible way.

I agree that one of the few things I missed on the show was more of the sense of Lynchian dread I was expecting, but that being said, the Sarah scenes may be among the creepiest he’s ever done. In a way, I found the bar/trucker scene the least impactful of them, because it was the most conventionally horror movie-ish. But, man. Something is VERY wrong in that house, and it somehow casts a pall over the entirety of the rest of the series.
I didn't experience those scenes like that at all. I thought they were very good, enjoyable scenes. But not anywhere close to the creepiness of the scariest scenes and moods of Inland Empire and MD. Not at all.

Maybe the only scene from S3 that came a little close was the car drive of Mr C and Ray (episode 8 ), when they get off the highway and the car is driving more and more slowly and the road is getting darker and darker.
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Re: What would a Season 4 be about?

Post by Pinky »

For me, it was Mr. C's first prison interview and whatever is lurking in the Palmer house.
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Re: What would a Season 4 be about?

Post by Mordeen »

I'm not giving IE any more of my time. I watched it with someone involved and got the whole painful analysis of it scene by scene. A movie that was about 3hrs long took 6 to analyze and I still hated it for its improvised absurdity. Yet another "Hollywood Devours Women" film that he didn't need to make. My opinion.

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Re: What would a Season 4 be about?

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Mr. Reindeer wrote:I just found the EotA hilarious when I first saw it, and still do. In the best possible way.

I agree that one of the few things I missed on the show was more of the sense of Lynchian dread I was expecting, but that being said, the Sarah scenes may be among the creepiest he’s ever done. In a way, I found the bar/trucker scene the least impactful of them, because it was the most conventionally horror movie-ish. But, man. Something is VERY wrong in that house, and it somehow casts a pall over the entirety of the rest of the series.
The EOTA looks like this pokemon: https://www.reddit.com/r/twinpeaks/comm ... _this_arm/ , this is why I found it funny
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