Twin Peaks Virgin Diary – Still weird….

Season one, episodes 2-3

Far be it from me to not be deep about my television viewing, but I’ve got the pilot and two episodes down and I can’t help but think Twin Peaks is being weird just for the sake of being weird. That’s not okay with me. I want all this weirdness to be symbolic, I want every single bit of bizarreness to contribute to the greater mystery being solved.

I have a dreadful feeling I’m going to be disappointed….

“Traces to Nowhere”

Now, at the beginning of this episode, I embraced the weirdness because it was quirky and funny and cute. Agent Cooper hanging upside down, pondering the mysteries of life (Marilyn Monroe, who shot JFK….) while talking to “Diane.” Yeah, I’m still wondering about Diane. Then, everyone at the station is talking with their mouths full. It’s a fun bunch of characters they’ve dreamed up … like Barney Miller on some really heavy drugs. I like it.

I also enjoyed the questioning of the witnesses in this episode, along with the little glimpses into the different character interactions.

• I think they’re setting up James and Donna to be the all-American couple … sweet.
• Audrey and her Dad have a confrontational relationship — she’s passive-aggressive, he’s … not.
• I’d be an asshole too if I had Bobby’s dad.
• I nominate Grace Zabriskie (Laura’s mother) as best screamer ever. But still, WTF?

Other observations:

• What’s with the fish in the percolator? See, that’s just weird for the sake of weirdness … that can’t be meaningful.
• Audrey asking if Cooper’s palms itched … yeah, weird.
• Now I’m getting the coffee and cherry pie references from the comments of my last Twin Peaks virgin diary post.
• Ask the log….

Questions:

• Why does Catherine Packard want the sawmill to go bankrupt? Did I miss something?
• Who’s that guy Laura’s mother had a vision of?
• Who’s the one-armed man?
• Why does Dr. Jacoby have the other half of the heart necklace?

“Zen, or the Skill to Catch a Killer”

Now, the introduction to this episode wasn’t cute and quirky weird, it was completely FUBAR (brie on baguette — really?). So was the rest of the episode. I’m hoping there’s going to be some symbolism in the whacked dream Cooper had at the end, and I am a bit curious as to who he thinks killed Laura based on that dream.

Other bizarre things that I just can’t see as being connected:

• The whorehouse you get to by boat … I get that the whorehouse itself is very connected, but the fact that you get to it by boat is weird for the sake of being weird.
• Audrey in general. Kinda sick of watching her sway….
• Nadine and her abusiveness toward Ed, and her silent drapery runner.

I enjoyed the scene where Cooper narrowed down the “J” suspects by throwing stones at a bottle and Leo is just mean and creepy, too two-dimensional (as of now). When we met Albert and his team, it was the first moment I actually believed that Cooper could possibly be a real federal agent.

I still want to know who the long-haired guy is, now that he’s shown up in Cooper’s dream, and:

Beware the dancing dwarf….

I’m not completely sold on this series yet. It’s terribly slow-moving and I want to enjoy the way things unfold, but right now I just need the weirdness to mean something. Then it would be cool. Weird for the sake of being weird is just David Lynch’s self-gratification and I’m not sure I want to watch that.

Clacked by Debbie McDuffee
on Jun 14, 2010 @ 15:00 EST5EDT