Twin Peaks ends with Cooper trapped in the Black Lodge because he feared, and BOB entering our world using his doppelganger. Coop traded his soul in exchange for Annie's life. Since Earl had no right to claim souls, BOB did it (because Annie's alive in the end). But BOB's now free and ready to kill again, so will he spare Annie? Judging by the way he repeated "How's Annie?", gleefully and maliciously, I seriously doubt so.

In FWWM, BOB gives MFAP back the garmonbozia he stole, and MFAP is MIKE - at least, his Black Lodge part (MIKE took off the arm with the tattoo, and MFAP says he is the arm). So this is it? Two bad guys resolved their conflict, the whole good/evil struggle reduced to nothing? Apparently, all the true Dale Cooper got in the end was to meet/comfort Laura. By telling her not to take the ring he tried to prevent everything that happened in TP, but failed.

Also, in FWWM, we see Deep Meadow - something like an alternative version of Twin Peaks, like a Black Lodge Twin Peaks, where everything that made this town paradise is corrupted, and TP events repeat themselves. Looks like the evil side has won, after all.

In real life, to belabor a subject I love to belabor, The Green River Killer was still killing teenage girls in the Seattle area (bodies were found near the Twin Peaks locations and in a local river just before locations for the show were scouted. The GRK would wrap them in plastic to move them) and would not be apprehended for 9 more years.

Even after his arrest, it looks a great deal of time to determine that all 50-odd bodies found were killed by the same person.

It's a chilling thought that evil wins, that it's not isolated to one or two demonic figures in history, that it could be your neighbor, or co-worker, or dad, or a respected lawman.

According to the FBI, "85% of the world's serial killers are in America. At any given time 20 - 50 unidentified active serial killers are at work continually changing their targets and methods"

http://www.fbi.gov/hq/td/academy/bsu/bsu.htm

Check out this link on suspected or convicted serial killers just in WA state.

http://www.seattlepi.com/dayart/pdf/20030220serialkillers.pdf

I think it's a fitting conclusion for the era and the theme... but not to railroad your topic, this is just my interpretation alone.

Welcome to the board!

Movies are the only place where good guys win, and even that doesn't happen all the time.

Yep, hi all and stuff 

ive said it in the past, so ill be short. i still contend that the last scene at the end of FWWM, after the garmonbozia is eaten and the monkey says judy, is the end of all things TP. the scene is the return of laura's angel that left her when she was at her lowest. cooper is there as well, looking calm and caring with an arm on her shoulder. she is crying from joy. my theory is that they've both entered the white lodge after being trapped in the black lodge. so to me, this is a redeeming ending. maybe not good defeated evil, but the two main protagonists of TP(even if laura was more of a spectre during the series, she owns FWWM) are, at least, at peace.

Like in The Lovely Bones, Susie gets her heaven just as Laura gets her angel in FWWM. It would be too horribly existential to imagine a world where a monster can just snuff out a child's life, and that's that.

We also don't want to think that serial killers are, like, doing their victims a favor by sending them to a better place.

I like how justice is and is not served in that movie. It's pretty realistic. Deus ex machina.

D'ya think that kind of resolution would be possible in Twin Peaks?

It took the dawn of advanced DNA technology to bust the GRK.

But how do you stop BOB? Ghostbusters???

Evil can be vanquished by not fearing evil.  Remember, "fear and love open the door", and "if you confront the Black Lodge with imperfect courage, it will utterly annihilate your soul"
---------

From Ep. 17 script:

COOPER
Major this is a fascinating concept. The other side of
love is not hate - but fear?

MAJOR BRIGGS
Absolutely. And fear is the absence of love.

COOPER
For yourself as well.

MAJOR BRIGGS
All perceptions or conditions must begin with the self.

They put their marshmallows over the fire.

COOPER
So when I let fear into my life, I'm not loving myself.

MAJOR BRIGGS
You are in direct contradiction to a state of loving
acceptance; incapable of it. Direct denial.

COOPER
Major Briggs, if I may ask a personal question ... do you
love yourself?

MAJOR BRIGGS
Very much.

Cooper's fascinated. He rotates his marshmallow in the fire.

COOPER
Then it stands to reason that Leland Palmer didn't.

MAJOR BRIGGS
One could draw that conclusion. There are powerful
forces of evil in the world. It is some men's fate to
confront great darkness. We each choose how to react. If
the choice is fear, then we become vulnerable to darkness.

Cooper looks around, at the literal darkness surrounding him.

COOPER
Tomorrow I face my own demons, Major Briggs. But,
thanks to you, I believe I will do so without fear. I
carefully considered my actions before proceeding. I
went forward. I must accept the consequences.

MAJOR BRIGGS
You can do no more.

An owl hoots somewhere in the woods. They look for it. A reflective pause.

COOPER
Major, I think about "Bob." If he truly exists.

MAJOR BRIGGS
I have pondered the some question continuously since this
horror was revealed to us.

COOPER
I try to imagine him, "it", out there somewhere, lurking.
Searching for prey. Terrible.

MAJOR BRIGGS
Yes. But remember, we have a choice; to think about it in
that way, to fear it, imparts power to evil. There are ways
to resist. You, Sir, are blessed with certain gifts. In this
respect you are not alone. Have you ever heard of the
White Lodge?

------------------------------------------------------------------

From Ep. 18 script:

script:

COOPER
Roger, I know the move I'm supposed to make. And I
know the board.

HARDY
(palms turned upward)
So ...

COOPER
I've done a lot of thinking. And I've started to focus out
beyond the end of the board. On a bigger game.

HARDY
(losing patience)
What 'game'?

COOPER
The sound wind makes through the pines. The sentience
of animals. The last thought of a homeless man before he
takes a night's sleep. What we fear in the dark. And
what's beyond the dark.

HARDY
What the hell are you talking about?

COOPER
I'm talking about seeing beyond fear, Roger. About
looking at the world with love.

------------------------------------------------------------------

later in Ep. 18 script:

COOPER
Harry, last night, Major Briggs planted a seed in my
mind. And it's been germinating. The idea that by
focusing on our fears or desires about something, we give
them tremendous power. Consider this, Harry: perhaps
by our best-intentioned resistance of evil, we somehow
unknowingly join hands with it. Perpetuate it.
(he has lost the sheriff)
And now, being suspended, I'm suddenly empowered to
let go of my preoccupation with wrongdoing. I feel like
I've been exiled back to the natural rhythms of life.

TRUMAN
Well, if you ever come to feel you need a home base,
there'll always be a job for you here in Twin Peaks.

COOPER
(with emphatic gratitude)
Harry, in a world of continuing disorder, you are a rock.
Oh, Mrs. Briggs called. The notes beside Major Briggs's
bed? A rather detailed grocery list and a small
endearment. Nothing more.
(his eyes light up)
Hawk, Harry have either of you ever heard of a place
called the White Lodge.

TRUMAN
Can't say that I have.

Hawk's initial reply is a look of concern.

HAWK
Where did you hear of it?

COOPER
It was the last thing Major Briggs mentioned before he
disappeared. You know of it?

HAWK
(a cautious look at Harry)
Cooper, you may be fearless in this world. But there are
other worlds.

COOPER
Tell me more.

HAWK
Local legend. The White Lodge is a place where the
spirits that rule man and nature here reside.

COOPER
That's a place I'd like to see.

HAWK
Many have tried. They say it exists only on the spiritual
plane.

TRUMAN
(sitting; here we go again)
Maybe I'd better pull up a chair.

HAWK
There is also a legend of a place called The Black Lodge:
the shadow self of the White Lodge, a place of dark
forces that pull on this world. A world of nightmares:
shamans reduced to crying children; angry spirits pouring
from the woods; graves opening like flowers.

COOPER
Dangerous.

HAWK
The legend says every spirit must pass through there on
the path to perfection. There you will meet your own
shadow self. My people call it the Dweller on the
Threshold. But it is said that if you confront the Black
Lodge with imperfect courage, it will utterly annihilate
your soul.

QUOTE D'ya think that kind of resolution would be possible in Twin Peaks?

im not sure what youre asking.
would the resolution of FWWM work within the fictional world of TP the TV series?
i dont think it would. TP was a soap opera, and was a whole range of emotions and situatons. in FWWM, it was like an elgey to pain and suffering(and sorrow). and not just the ending, the film as a whole isnt exactly cheerful, in fact it seems to be missing any cheer, which seems to strike people as extremely disturbing and negative, tho i dont see it exactly that way.
and youre asking how do you stop BOB?
isnt that the same question as how do we cope and still live with BOB out there?
(of course i hope you all know i am using the name and association to denote elements of our society like the GRK(85%? of the world? somehow that doesnt suprise me)(and also may explain FWWM's complete bombing on initial release, we americans rarely like to look at ourselves in a truely honest way) and not that a fictional character has become a reality to me(in derference to the beliefs of a few of our members)).
those are tough questions.
the majority of the world does it with varing degrees and types of acceptance to larger groups of people, and, respectfully to those of faith, the ensuing control makes us feel safe. even if he's out there(there have been female serial killers i shoud point out)we can be safe together in here. metaphorically speaking. but im not sure the absence of fear is enough. i would think we must be brave toward evil, and im torn between thinking its better if all of us could do it more individually or if the strength really is in the numbers. but im probably asking the question the wrong way. no amount of bravery caught the GRK until technology could help.
i believe lynch, and many other artists, thinkers, and do-ers of humanity, suggest another possiblity, which is our dreams. whether it be what our brain does at night, our imaginings during the day, the fictions we watch and listen to, or the metaphysical and spiritual way we each relate to the world and each other, those are all forms of dreams. and without our dreams, or our angels, how would we want to do good and just things? and stop what we define as evil? could we even define those abstract words? i seriously doubt so.

i clicked twice. sorry.

I always heard that the 3rd season was going to end with Cooper defeating Bob, and good winning....and when the show was cancelled, that this was going to be done in a series of movies...and then of course....FWWM bombed...and Lych decided to leave well enough alone.

I always heard that the 3rd season was going to end with Cooper defeating Bob

...but BOB cleverly thwarted their plans 8-)

Jokes aside, where did you read that?

Invincible- that is all well and good advice for protecting yourself from possession in the lodge, but if BOB doesn't get you, it will be someone else.

My question was, how would someone break this cycle?

p.s. As for the deleted dialog in the ep 18 script about by fighting evil you join forces with it, i don't think we can enter than into evidence. It was probably scrapped not because it revealed too much, but because it was a a bad paraphrase of Nietzsche : "He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster. For if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you."

And what lesson would that be to Cooper? Don't fight evil? Two wrongs don't make a right? Turn the other cheek?

 

I always heard that the 3rd season was going to end with Cooper defeating Bob

...but BOB cleverly thwarted their plans 8-)

Jokes aside, where did you read that?

I heard it at a fest some years back.  Trying to remember who said it.  There was a post on here YEARS ago where plots for season 3 were talked about.....apparently Frost and Lynch had some fresh new ideas about bringing the story to a close.

My question was, how would someone break this cycle?

 The One Armed Man said:

THE THREAD WILL BE TORN, MR. PALMER.....THE THREAD WILL BE TORN! 

So bob CAN be stopped...we just don't know how.  I have always theorized in order to defeat bob once he is inside you, perhaps cooper would have to cut off his own arm...much how Mike did to defeat the evil within him....but that is just a guess.

I had head that Major Briggs was going to enter the black lodge at some point to help save cooper.  Don't know how, though....

The One Armed Man said:

THE THREAD WILL BE TORN, MR. PALMER.....THE THREAD WILL BE TORN! 

So bob CAN be stopped...we just don't know how. 

 

There are different ways to interpret that line.

The thread could just mean the connection of BOB to Leland:

"And when I go, children, I'll pull that ripcord and you watch Ben remember. But not for long."

Mike is telling Laura that her father is BOB, but also warning Leland that all will be revealed to him, as well.

The thread could go along with the parachute metaphor. He is not telling BOB that the thread will be torn (he will stopped), but possibly the thread of Leland's life will be cut short when BOB bails out.

I heard it at a fest some years back.  Trying to remember who said it.  There was a post on here YEARS ago where plots for season 3 were talked about.....apparently Frost and Lynch had some fresh new ideas about bringing the story to a close.

 Robert Engels told in an interview to the Wrapped in Plastic magazine that they were at some point thinking of a scene where Truman is driving a car in some corn(?) field. Bob and Mike would be there with Truman. They are heading towards a portal of some sort trying to send Bob and Mike back to their home. However, Engels told they were just messing around and not too serious with it. Thank god.

They also messed around with an idea that Bob and Mike would be from a planet filled with corn. I think that if Evelyn, Little Nicky or Nadine throwing people around wouldn't be the point where the series jumped the shark, these things I just wrote would've certainly been. :D

Also, in FWWM, we see Deep Meadow - something like an alternative version of Twin Peaks, like a Black Lodge Twin Peaks, where everything that made this town paradise is corrupted, and TP events repeat themselves. Looks like the evil side has won, after all.

That has pretty much been resolved to have been a dream of Coop's - Right after that first 20 minutes of FWWM, he says to Gordon Cole "let me tell you about a dream I had last night". In the autobiography of  Dale Cooper, HE was the agent who investigated the murder of Teresa Banks. There is no Chet Desmond - it was just a dream.

Cole said Chester Desmond really vanished. It wasn't a dream.

Also, in FWWM, we see Deep Meadow - something like an alternative version of Twin Peaks, like a Black Lodge Twin Peaks, where everything that made this town paradise is corrupted, and TP events repeat themselves. Looks like the evil side has won, after all.

That has pretty much been resolved to have been a dream of Coop's - Right after that first 20 minutes of FWWM, he says to Gordon Cole "let me tell you about a dream I had last night". In the autobiography of  Dale Cooper, HE was the agent who investigated the murder of Teresa Banks. There is no Chet Desmond - it was just a dream.

Just so you know...he says, "I was worried about today because of the dream I told you about."

Lynch has said repeatedly that the books do NOT coincide with the movies.  In the original script of FWWM, Dale was the one who investigated Therea's death....Kyle didn't want to be as big in th emovie...because he felt he was being overwhelmed by 1 character.  So the murder investigation was re-written to have another person investigating theresa's murder. 

It is not a dream.  It is just part of the story.  When Lynch was asked if he wishes he wouldn't have had to change that, he explained that he thinks things like that happen for a reason.  So it WAS going to be Dale....Kyle just requested a smaller role for Dale once he read the script.

Also....that whole scene where Cooper came and bowie appears was originally supposed to happen the same day Laura died.  In editing, Lynch changed it to a year before. 
 

Cole said Chester Desmond really vanished. It wasn't a dream.

 

No - the whole prologue is theorized to be a dream. It hasn't been proved, but it makes a lot of sense

http://twinpeaks.2000revue.com/community/topic.cfm?topicid=3026&page=1

If the beginning is a dream, then why is it when Cooper returns to the trailer park afterwards, Carl recounts Desmond's visit? 

Lynch said he changed the early investigation from Cooper to Desmond at Kyle's request....I don't see how he could do this and it still be a dream...unless the entire realm of reality is a dream...hence (we live inside a dream-bowie line)

The article suggests that there are different layers of Cooper's conciousness that we see.

Cooper is haunted by the memory of his failure at the trailer park. His dream self is guiding him to the ring. Desmond disappears because that is all Cooper needs to know: the ring is important (and his investigation at the trailer park in reality was cut short, a dead end.)

This part of the dream slips away from him, but not completely. Because he instinctively goes back to the trailer space where Desmond (and the trailer, apparantly) disappeared. Sharp detective senses at work, or his dream trying to jog his own memory and get closer to the clue? Remember- he also forgot his dream about Mike/BOB and what Laura whispered about who killed her in the series.

Like Fred Madison, who can't have Renee even in his fantasy, Cooper can't solve the Teresa murder in his dream.

The article says that when he dictates to Diane, the end of the dream, he is trying to make sense of his dream to himself so he can remember it when he wakes up:

"He summarizes all that he knows. His mind attempts to impose order on the events. But Cooper knows there is more to the case than is apparent. His dream has opened his mind to other possibilities and prepared him for the important role he will play later in the film, and especially later in the series."

Again, the most compelling argument I see is that Jeffries disappearing into thin air is something Albert would have remembered in the series if it was not Cooper's dream, and he would not have been so sarcastic about "seeing BOB on Earth"/"confining conclusions to the planet Earth". Jeffries is telling everyone in the room that they live inside a dream, after all. Then he says "who do you think this is there?" Answer: the dreamer/ or Desmond, in a different identity.

We know Cooper worked with Sam Stanley before, and The Autobiography, written by TP screenwriter Scott Frost, includes the investigation of Teresa Banks! That's a far more glaring inconsistency, especially when we consider Lost Highway and Mulholland Dr are both split into dream sections.

12rainbow is my tp god.

 hyde, never dreamt about yourself?

So whose dreams are responsible for Donna being played by a different actress and the Palmer house being different?

12rainbow is my tp god.

 hyde, never dreamt about yourself?

 12rainbow works tirelessly to make the board a better and more purposeful place and we love her for this. The things she tells you will not be wrong. 

Why, thank you kindly for the sweet words. This is my go-to diversion and I love babbling on, but sometimes I do slip up. Luckily there is Booth and Gordon to correct me. lol.

mtl, that Wrapped in Plastic and the follow up issue are gold.

The two Palmer houses really makes no sense. It could be that the interior of the Everett/FWWM house looked more like the Palmer house interior set than the Monroe/series house did after a few years went by.

Damn Lara and Kyle and their personal drama. FWWM worked out without them, of course, as did MD when it turned from an open ended pilot into a feature. If Lynch/Engels didn't haven't to work out Desmond, there might have been time for some Big Ed/Norma, Audrey etc scenes.

interesting....never thought of it that way.

That is cool.

I still don't completely agree, but it is still cool.  Well said!  I find that is what is interesting about visiting a Twin Peaks message board...learning about these different interpretations.

Anywho, since the original script Lynch wrote for FWWM was the same only with Cooper doing the things Chet Desmond does.....(doing the autopsy for Teresa, go to deer Meadow, work with Paul Stanely) and since Lynch has said he changed this, due to actors request, I am concerned that deciding it is all only something in coopers mind that REFLECTS what happened in real life....to be a bit reaching. 

However...I admit it could be as 12rainbow and the other post suggests and just be cooper's mind unraveling to the audience.  I think it is a mistake to use this as something definate one way or the other though..... 

AUGH, I am searching for the interview or interviews where Lynch talks about Chet Desmond and his investigation, and how it was simply a replacement for not being able to have Kyle do it, making it a prequel to the show, but not in accordance with the books.  

During one of these interiews, Lynch is asked about his friendship with Kyle and how it desinagrated at the time, and Lynch was silent and didn't speak, as he thought and smoked a whole cigarrette (the inteviewer actually wrote that lynch paused to reflect and smoke an entire cigarette)....does this ring a bell to anyone?  Does anyone know where this interview can be found?  It might not even be the same interview with info about Chet Desmond VS Coopers character......I Can't remember for sure...but I THINK it had something about that.....anyone?