Episode 9

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cowwithfivelegs
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Re: Episode 9

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Re: Episode 9

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Re: Episode 9

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while the barbershop quartet sings, Agent Cooper tells Rosenfield about the Happy Generations in tibet. Tibet is an isolated place with a magical/mysterious reptuation, not unlike Twin Peaks. Maybe Twin peaks had its own Happy Generations that benefited from the weirdness and isolation before the Black Lodge opened its doors?

and while we're in the Great Northern dining room, can we take a moment to appreciate that breakfast?
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i see eggs, bacon, sausage, pancakes, blintzes, grapefruit, juice, coffee, and a blueberry muffin bigger than Gordon Cole's hairdo.
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LostInTheMovies
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Re: Episode 9

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cowwithfivelegs wrote:I should clarify, I don't believe that the ring ensures death, I believe that it claims a host as Mike's. Since BOB's motive was to become Laura, her putting on the ring prevented that from happening, thus forcing BOB to murder her.
Ah, ok, gotcha. I agree with this.
I also believe that it was Leland resisting BOB when he screams "Don't make me do this" and that there is a psychic connection between vessel and spirit--as awful as it is, Leland derived sexual pleasure from raping his daughter, while murdering her brought him no joy.
This I'm not sure about (the first part, I mean - that he's resisting Bob). My take on Leland/Bob is that Leland has no awareness of him even though I think he is aware of - and responsible for - the things he does when Bob is inside of him. So I tend to think he's shouting at Laura, realizing he has to kill her for reasons he may not entirely understand (although perhaps recognizing the jewelry of his previous circa has something to do with it). Obviously a whole lot in this gene is open to interpretation! Though I feel pretty firmly about some stuff, a lot of it is fluid for me especially the role of the Arm and Mike in everything.
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LostInTheMovies
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Re: Episode 9

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cowwithfivelegs wrote:To further answer your question concerning Teresa, I think that it's a continuity error that Teresa isn't wearing the ring when she is murdered:

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In order for dirt to accumulate around the finger, she would have needed to be wearing it while being transported down the river and into the mud (which would still be virtually impossible, with her wrapped in plastic and all).
Good point although maybe it's more of an "inaccuracy" than a "continuity error" in the sense that Lynch probably intended it, but it doesn't hold up to scientific scrutiny? (I think he intended it for a few reasons, one of which is that he's quite fond of hiding the ring when he doesn't want us to see it - see her left arm under Leland's in bed or just dipped out of frame before Leland rushes off - yet here he makes sure she's holding her left arm in plain view without the ring. Subtle, but seems purposeful to me...)
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Re: Episode 9

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Imawholedamntown!
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Re: Episode 9

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cowwithfivelegs wrote:
Imawholedamntown! wrote:When the boy warned Laura that the "man behind the mask" is close and is looking for the book with the torn out pages, Ms. Chalfont gives her the picture that sucks Laura into a dream for the purpose of being given the ring so Bob couldn't use her body as a vessel, even though Coop mistakenly tells her not to take it. Makes you wonder if that was Good Coop telling her not to take the ring, or Coop's shadow self. It could just be that Good Coop, in having the same dream as Laura, really believed the ring to be bad and really was trying to warn her.
I disagree with this. If Laura hadn't taken the ring, BOB may have taken her as a vessel, but she could still possibly be saved from his possession. By taking the ring, it guaranteed her death, from which there is no coming back from (season 3 excluded).
She had already come to terms with the fact that she had to die. And Leland says, himself: "She said she'd die before she'd let 'em in." Bobby also tells Jacoby that she wanted to die. She had been abused and tormented by Bob for years, and it was getting down to the wire. Bob wanted Laura very badly, so considering this I have to ask you, in what other way do you believe she could have been saved?
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Re: Episode 9

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LostInTheMovies wrote:
cowwithfivelegs wrote:
Imawholedamntown! wrote:When the boy warned Laura that the "man behind the mask" is close and is looking for the book with the torn out pages, Ms. Chalfont gives her the picture that sucks Laura into a dream for the purpose of being given the ring so Bob couldn't use her body as a vessel, even though Coop mistakenly tells her not to take it. Makes you wonder if that was Good Coop telling her not to take the ring, or Coop's shadow self. It could just be that Good Coop, in having the same dream as Laura, really believed the ring to be bad and really was trying to warn her.
I disagree with this. If Laura hadn't taken the ring, BOB may have taken her as a vessel, but she could still possibly be saved from his possession. By taking the ring, it guaranteed her death, from which there is no coming back from (season 3 excluded).
If it's the case that the ring ensures death though, why is Teresa not wearing it when she is killed?
I actually couldn't tell whether or not Teresa was wearing the ring when Bob/Leland killed her (but then, my eyesight is pretty shoddy and I need new glasses), but I would think she was. I think Bob just discarded it because he probably didn't want to bring it back to the Black Lodge, and then Agent Desmond found it under the deputy's trailer. Since Laura died in the rail car in Ghoswood Forest and was temporarily in the BL until the angel came, the ring was able to be returned to the spirits who are more in favor of order. And months later, after Annie came out of the BL, she was given the ring as protection from Bob/Bad Cooper. Hopefully the final scene in "The Missing Pieces" will not follow in the third season, because that thieving nurse took it from her.
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Re: Episode 9

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cowwithfivelegs wrote:
LostInTheMovies wrote:
cowwithfivelegs wrote:
If it's the case that the ring ensures death though, why is Teresa not wearing it when she is killed?
To further answer your question concerning Teresa, I think that it's a continuity error that Teresa isn't wearing the ring when she is murdered:

Image

In order for dirt to accumulate around the finger, she would have needed to be wearing it while being transported down the river and into the mud (which would still be virtually impossible, with her wrapped in plastic and all).
Thanks for the still, Cowwithfivelegs. Now I see she absolutely was not wearing the ring. However, I think Bob was extremely more interested in Laura being his host rather than Teresa. As I mentioned before, he was obsessively and continuously tormenting poor Laura for five years, but I doubt that would keep him from killing anyone in the meanwhile.
And of course, you're right that she would've had to be wearing the ring post-mortem to get dirt around a ring mark on her finger...and then there's the matter of it being found by Desmond under Deputy Dips**t's trailer.
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Re: Episode 9

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Imawholedamntown!
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Re: Episode 9

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cowwithfivelegs wrote:
cowwithfivelegs wrote:
Imawholedamntown! wrote:
I disagree with this. If Laura hadn't taken the ring, BOB may have taken her as a vessel, but she could still possibly be saved from his possession. By taking the ring, it guaranteed her death, from which there is no coming back from (season 3 excluded).
She had already come to terms with the fact that she had to die. And Leland says, himself: "She said she'd die before she'd let 'em in." Bobby also tells Jacoby that she wanted to die. She had been abused and tormented by Bob for years, and it was getting down to the wire. Bob wanted Laura very badly, so considering this I have to ask you, in what other way do you believe she could have been saved?
Yes, psychologically, she was ready to die, but physically, she was in fine form. So that said, if Laura Palmer had been possessed by BOB in the train car--which almost happened--she would have still existed as herself and as host to BOB. Over the years, there is the possibility that something could've been done to free her from BOB's possession, and if so, she then could've lived out her remaining days free from the continuous horror that he brought to her life.
Sure, she was in fine form, physically, and that was probably one of the big reasons why Bob wanted control of her body. She obviously knew what would happen to her if she WAS possessed by Bob, and maybe the natural good in her wasn't keen on the idea of him making her do horrible things. How many of these horrible things would Laura do under Bob's control and how long would it take before anyone found out that she was, in fact, possessed by a malevolent spirit? And what would they do about it? How would they drive Bob out of her body, and/or possibly destroy him? I doubt that if Bob didn't just kill her while she was wearing the ring, he would've tormented her for the rest of her young life, possibly even past her 40's. I seriously don't even know how Leland lived with himself for as long as he did. Yes, Bob had him forget the specific bad things he made him do, but deep down he knew there was something horrible inside of him that was controlling his life. If I were Laura and that was the case, I'd probably just eventually end up pulling a Nadine to attempt to cease an existence of terror and torment. The mystery would never have been solved without Coop, and who knows how many more people the theoretical Laura/Bob would have murdered before Bob would commit one of his ritual murders? At the time of FWWM the story of the Black Lodge was nothing more than a semi-suspicious myth and Bob was unknown to everyone in Twin Peaks but Laura, Leland, And lastly, Ronette.
Not to mention, it wouldn't follow the storyline concerning the scene in Philly when Jeffries appears, points to Coop, and asks Gordon and Albert, "Do you know who that is there?" It's a very telling line, and the scene occurs prior to Laura's death.
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Re: Episode 9

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cowwithfivelegs wrote:I double-checked the scene when Leland rushes off when taking the above screenshot, and when she walks away with the money, you can see that she is wearing the ring--this is also when Laura has her flashback to Teresa wearing the ring on the same day.
That's exactly it though - Lynch only makes an effort to show us the ring after she has started to get clued in to Leland being Laura's father. In fact, if you watch all the action in the scene *up* to that point we only see the ring on her finger for a frame or two. Lynch goes out of his way to keep it out of the shot (stopping short of actually taking it off of the actress' finger, since the seeing/not-seeing is part of the same action). Consider: when she walks out of the motel, she is specifically holding an ice tray in her left hand (reminding us of the "numbness" as well as keeping her ring finger hidden). And then when she stands in front of Leland, the shot is framed and she is positioned *precisely* so that her finger is like maybe a centimeter below the line - just enough that we can't see the ring there. True, if we pause/slo-mo the video right as she's walking out to greet Leland we can see the ring for those couple frames. I suspect this is an accident - that for practical purposes, Lynch needed the actress to be wearing the ring but wanted to do everything he could to keep it out of view...until the fateful moment when she starts to realize what's going on with Leland. That's exactly when he has Teresa turn and raise her hand so that we can see the ring, and then has the whole dramatic "showing Laura the ring" thing inside the motel room.

Could it all just be coincidence? Sure. But when you add up everything else too - where is Teresa's ring hand when we first see her with Leland? crushed under his body. what is Teresa doing as she calls Leland to blackmail him, a real power play? quite prominently playing with the ring on her finger. - I think the ring is being used as a visual touchstone to indicate the moments when Teresa or Laura is coming into knowledge about Leland/Bob and thus gaining power over them. As such, I'd suggest the reason that Teresa isn't wearing the ring when Leland kills her is because he has overpowered her in this moment, whereas in Laura's case the moment he kills her is precisely when he has LOST power over her.

And even in cases outside of Teresa and Laura when we see the ring, it has to do with knowledge of the condition of Bob's host and/or what he or his host have done: we see the ring when Annie is telling someone about Cooper's real whereabouts (and thus, implicitly, Bob's), and when Desmond is discovering the place where Teresa was killed.

Keep in mind I don't think this is the only meaning of the ring - I also think it ties the bearer to Mike - but I think all of the meanings are synced up to one another. For example, Mike is the seeker of pain and sorrow, something that awareness of Bob's identity and Leland's actions will bring, and Mike is also the opponent of Bob, hence if the ring signifies awareness of his whereabouts and actions it's a boon to Mike.

It will be quite interesting to see what Lynch does with the ring in the new series, if anything.
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Re: Episode 9

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Ha, how did we get onto this topic in the episode 9 thread? I love this site...
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Re: Episode 9

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Re: Episode 9

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cowwithfivelegs wrote:Interesting perspective on this. The great thing about this is that there is nothing in writing describing these intentions, thus leaving it open for people like us to talk about it and interpret their meanings however we choose. All in all though, I agree with you, I just wonder if Lynch was consciously making these decisions--and talking about them--or if they're happy accidents that have evolved into deeper meanings.
Yeah, I wonder that too. My hunch is that he definitely wasn't talking about them, and probably not thinking about what they "meant" so much as "this feels right" and coming to conclusions later, if ever. I always think of that story of MJA walking by Lynch's editing shoe and hearing him marvel "So THAT'S what I meant by that!"
So you're saying that Teresa was murdered in the Chalfont's trailer? In order for that to happen, wouldn't Leland had had to have dragged her there to get her inside of it? I always just assumed that it was in her trailer, but thinking about it now, wouldn't there be a smashed TV, blood analysis, etc., to be had as evidence?
I'm pretty sure it's their trailer for a couple reasons: I've heard that the call sheet lists the location as "Chalfont's trailer" plus a fan recently sent me an email with some screenshots demonstrating that the decor was very different from Teresa's trailer (although I guess it could be a different room; I'll have to double-check). Plus the mound of dirt with a ring on top echoes (or foreshadows?) the mound if dirt with necklace on top at Laura's own place of death (both times an enclosed, immobile vehicle - that part just occurred to me now as I'm writing this). I kinda assumed the Tremonds/Chalfonts lured here there, maybe even got the ring from her, but that doesn't really seem in character given how the help Laura/Mike (although Pierre does tell Bob "fell a victim"). Plus it's hard to see how that would fit in with Leland - how would he know to find her there, what would his connection be to them? In fact I've never really thiught about this aspect (the Tremonds are always confusing to me) but will start to do so now. And how did Leland ensure that no one saw him arrive or remove a body in a crowded trailer park?
From what little I know, it's definitely in it.
:D
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