Twin Peaks Series Review

Twin Peaks (1990-1991)

Season 1 - 8 episodes (1990)
Season 2 - 22 episodes (1990-91)
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Created by:Mark Frost, David Lynch
Starring: Kyle MacLachlan, Michael Ontkean, Mädchen Amick, Dana Ashbrook, Richard Beymer, Lara Flynn Boyle
Rated: TV-MA
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Plot
An idiosyncratic FBI agent investigates the murder of homecoming queen Laura Palmer in the logging town of Twin Peaks.

Verdict
It's certainly a quirky show with many interesting characters, and it's definitely weird. The show is mystery meets soap opera. It's intriguing and strange, but is it great? It's pretty good, but the show is working against over thirty years of television progression. Everything this did that was unique has been copied and imitated. When this released, it was unlike anything else on television. The fact it is so strange yet a woman carrying around a log never seems silly is a testament to how well this executes the vision. Never explaining too much, it leaves us wondering as we search for and imagine answers.
Watch It.

Review
This was Lynch's first foray into television, and he's known for strange stories. This show was definitely a change of pace. Popular shows at the time were Cheers (1982), Roseanne (1988), Murphy Brown (1988), and The Golden Girls (1985).

Season 1
This starts with Laura Palmer's (Sheryl Lee) body found on a beach wrapped in plastic. Soon FBI agent Dale Cooper (Kyle MacLachlan) is called in. Laura's drug dealing boyfriend Bobby Briggs (Dana Ashbrook), who is also in a secret relationship with the married Shelly, is questioned before Cooper discovers Laura had a secret boyfriend  James (James Marshall). Cooper surmises this suspect has committed a similar crime, but this is a town with a sordid underbelly. The popular high school girl Laura was into some stuff, and this small town has plenty of suspects and even more romantic entanglements.

S1E4: Kyle MacLachlan plays Dale Cooper

In episode three, Cooper determines suspects' relevance by throwing rocks at a glass bottle, part of a Tibetan technique he learned. It's through a dream he figures out who killed Laura, at least that's what he claims. Cooper insists his dream holds the key to solving the case. From that he finds the one armed man who doesn't seem to know anything.

In episode six Laura's lookalike, her cousin Maddie shows up. Then there's the casino and brothel, One Eyed Jacks, that seems to be at the center of everything. The drama in this show is soap opera level, but the dialog is so much sharper than that genre ever exhibits. 

S1E2: S1E4: Kyle MacLachlan, Michael J. Anderson, Sheryl Lee play 
Dale Cooper, the Man from Another Place, Laura Palmer

In the final episode a suspect emerges and several plot line peak with an abduction, a shooting, arson, and more. Even then, the first season ends on a huge cliff hanger.

Nothing in this show is normal. Cooper certainly doesn't seem like the typical agent, but it's not like he's dealing with a typical case. All of these characters are quirky and unique. That adds to the fabric of this town that somehow has all these nearly silly characters hiding dark secrets. 

Season 2
At the time, I'm sure this was something else. It also came before the golden age of television, and that's tough competition.

This season picks up immediately after the first season's cliff hanger. Cooper gets more clues from his dreams, this time provided by a giant. He recovers quickly and realizes that neither of the two main suspects from season one are the killers. While they were present, there was a third man. BOB becomes the main suspect, though there's a question of what is he or it.

I wondered if Twin Peaks is some kind of nexus. What accounts for the excess amount of odd? Laura's father Leland develops white hair over night. Last season implied he may have killed a suspect out of vengeance for his daughter, but with this show we never know where the plot will go.

Laura was busy. She attended high school, was an escort, and now we discover she volunteered with meals on wheels. It's one of the shut ins that has pages from her diary that may hold a clue. Audrey is kidnapped with Cooper ensnared in her rescue. With all of that happening, the local diner is concerned over the food critic. The first season was a twisting crime drama, and this season strays from a focus on the core mystery. So many episodes seem to meander.

S2E9: Kyle MacLachlan plays Dale Cooper

In episode six Cooper has an experience with Mike who states his familiar is BOB. That pair are the source of what's going on in Twin Peaks. It seems BOB can possess anyone. Yet another suspect emerges before Cooper brings everything together in one room. We wonder what's going to transpire, and we finally get answers. BOB took possession of a human in order to cause suffering.

It seems odd to conclude the case so early in the season, apparently executive meddling is the reason Laura's arc ends so early. By episode ten the case is done and Cooper is on his way out before an investigation starts on his One Eyed Jacks sting. The DEA was watching the place and Cooper ruined their case.

In episode eleven David Duchovny appears as FBI agent Denise Bryson. 

The second half of the season feels like it has nowhere to go. While several story lines play out, to what end? The show no longer has a clear direction. I wasn't as invested in the story as it didn't have a goal. Ultimately Cooper makes it to the Black Lodge, this in between world to save a girl he met in town from his former partner Windom Earle. Earle shows up to wreak havoc, though it's never clear why other than to provide plot. The final few episodes are better with Cooper opposing Earle.

At its core this is a strange soap opera. At times it feels like it's making fun of traditional, cheesy soap operas but it spins the tropes into an odd narrative that works. It's the embrace of weirdness that frees this from needing to be constrained by physics and logic. The show also never explains too much, leaving a lot open to interpretation. The Black Lodge is this in between, a place Mike and BOB reside. Their goal is to create chaos. Well it was. Mike becomes reformed with BOB as the culprit behind many of the crimes of Twin Peaks.

I like a show that manages to balance absurd characters with such a strange and dark mystery. The effect this show had would have been exponentially more impactful at the time in context, but it's still easy to see why this show was so gripping.