TV Rewind: Twin Peaks

Episode 8

By Eric Hughes

August 30, 2011

Creeptacular.

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Let’s keep aboard the crazy train a second, because there was plenty more otherworldly stuff going on that deserves some love in this post. As I said earlier, Leland - without explanation - is sportin’ bleach white hair now. (He claims he just woke up with it covering his head). He’s also got renewed personality, in that anything that comes out of his mouth anymore is sung.

A number he croons late in the episode is “Get Happy” by Judy Garland. Steeped in religion, the song’s got lyrics like “Shout hallelujah c'mon get happy,” “get ready for the judgment day” “the lord is waitin’ to take your hand” and “we're going to the promise land.” I so expected something to come out of it, and then Leland had a stroke of sorts -- or a stroke itself -- and collapsed to the floor.

The hair, the behavior, suggests radical transformation. And because Leland praises the lord before falling to the floor, the obvious cue is he’s made “a deal with the devil,” which, I know, is overdone. But the episode did air some 20-odd years ago.

If not the devil, then a pact between Leland and an evil entity seems appropriate.

Last season Leland, sharing the same space as amplified music, would lose himself in the beats -- as if without control. Now he’s making the tunes himself, and then enduring the regrettable after effects, too.

Speaking of radical transformations, Donna is undergoing one, too. As if keen on getting to know her former good friend in a creepy way, Donna is - I think - trying to be Laura Palmer. She specially requested Laura’s sunglasses from Maddy, and the pair now wraps around the bridge of Donna’s nose. As well, she’s requested from Norma her friend’s former Meals on Wheels route and, perhaps unintentional, mirrored exactly the way Maddy sat in a late scene. (Maddy, as you know, is a spitting image of Laura, but a brunette).

I didn’t pick up on these subtleties last season - were there any - so possible story here is rather new. I’ll be keeping my eyes peeled.




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So Jacoby’s alive! I’ll admit I was excited to see him breathing. He was afforded no more than a minute or two of screen time, but managed to share some intriguing introspection.

As we’ve heard from several Twin Peaks townies, Laura started acting very strange in her final days. But then, as Jacoby says, she was overcome with a sense of peace and, maybe, allowed herself to be killed. Not a suicide per se, but something more along the lines of assisted death.

Bob’s name got mentioned several times this episode, and blame for Laura’s murder seems to rest on his shoulders. Funnily enough, we’ve yet to meet the guy in the flesh, but have seen quick shots of him through visions and other supernaturalities (it’s a word).

As Cooper deduced, Bob might be our guy. Jacques - now dead - is in the clear because he’s, well, dead, and he confessed that he blacked out the evening Laura died. When he came to, everyone had vacated the cabin. Leo - now in a coma - took Laura and Ronette with him when Jacques passed out, but apparently left the girls behind. That leaves a third man - Bob? - who sacrificed Laura and nearly killed Ronette, too. Might Bob be our man?

A night terror by Ronette, who finally awoke from her coma, seems to suggest it. The final minutes of “Episode 8” - framed as a memory of Ronette’s - were unsettling and horrific. Laura and Bob, bloody and gross, are a choir of groans and grumbles before Bob beats her with a blunt object or a pair of fists.

Ronette’s recall of Laura’s fatal evening might be crucial here, so long as she can keep herself alive. Between last season and now, Laura, Jacques and Waldo (the bird) are dead, and Leo (and Ronette) are in comas.


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