I know this was discussed on the old board but I don't think I've seen it on here lately. My question is: How much of the incest/rape act was pure Leland and how much was Bob? After initially watching the tv series I thought that Leland was basically a good guy and it was Bob making him do all the bad stuff(rape, kill). Now I'm not so sure.

What got me thinking was the scene where Leland/Bob is about to murder Laura. Leland tells Laura(after showing her the pages from her diary) something like, "I always thought you knew it was me". Then Bob tells her, "I didn't know you knew it was me". This leads me to believe that Leland thought Laura was "OK" with the sex that had been going on for years and it wasn't until he found the pages in the diary that he understood that she thought the person raping her was actually Bob. The diary and the scene where Laura "sees" Leland for the first time during sex make me believe that Leland had this problem regardless of Bob and his influence. I think from the get-go Leland was in it for the sex and through Leland Bob was introduced to Laura. After all these years of Leland raping Laura Bob became interested in "Becoming" her.

I think someone said on the old board that they believed Leland had THOUGHTS of rape/murder but it was BOB who made him ACT on those impulses. I'm not so sure about this now. The FWWM Leland seems perfectly capable of commiting murder(Theresa Banks) when driven to it. You don't have to be possed by an evil spirit to kill someone or try to kill someone(Hank shooting Leo, Josie shooting Coop).

Any thoughts on this? Was Bob in TOTAL control of Leland from day one? Did Bob have totally different goals than Leland and Leland's actions just help him accomplish those goals? Or to put it simply, what percentage of the rape and murder was committed by Leland or Bob? Example: 90%=Leland, 10% Bob? Any ideas? I'm confused.

someone connected lynch films to Freudian psychology, and I think it's the perfect example. whether or not david was aiming for it specifically it can probably be concluded that it was something like it. this seems to be the struggle between (call it whatever else you want) the id and the superego. as a human being has drives within their id, the superego keeps them from coming out. bob is the notion of the true id. bob feeds on fear, that is, the fear that a person has of having the drives of the id and making sure they don't come out. this is the duality which is obviously the main theme of twin peaks. it is seen in every character, but those who are most fearful (of expressing their id) can be posessed by bob. same goes for laura. at the time she was starting to discover her true drives and began to let them out. she mourned over them and perhaps even felt a sense of guilt, so she was scared. bob sensed she had a more intense will to express "id drives" than leland, so he decided to change the host to her.

i think precisely this is the surreal metaphor that is attempted to be displayed in twin peaks.  or at least what i got out of it.

By personifying the abuse as BOB, we allow ourselves the luxury of commiserating with Leland's own suffering.  We can identify with the part of him that isn't a monster.  If it was just Leland, acting the same way, it would be more difficult to tell the sympathetic side of his story.

Not that this helps answer your question.

I never understood what Bob was saying there. Thanks for clearing that out.

I think there are little bobs haunting every single person. The gifted and the damned are able to see that source of evil. "Normal" persons just live their lives with the actions they do and they are not aware of the spirits who are behind of every evil action and thought men do. Leland was just a child when he opened himself to that evil. Before he died, he remembered "them" (the spirits). That's why I think he had the gift (or damnation) to see the "true face" of evil. He knew the look of the spirits who are feasting on the fear and sorrow of people because he was gifted (or damned). The people who don't have the gift to see it, have been opened up for the "joy" of doing selfish evil things.

Normal people accept the feeling of that "evil" and gifted or damned people see the feeling as an image.

In Laura's case she was this |-| close to become a mentally ill person, seriously ill. She got beaten, raped and tormented and finally at the train car she was about to lose it. We and she saw it at the mirror. If she wouldn't have let herself to be killed, she probably would have lost her mind after all the terror she suffered. She would've lost her mind to Bob. There was absolutely no other way to stop it but allowing herself to die. No-one can get through that kind of hell without getting mentally crushed.

Maybe people who make the final decicion of accepting the evil (Bob) do not question their morals anymore depending on the subject of the evil thought they are choosing to follow - as, I believe, Leland accepted the sexual form of evil as he probably was sexually molested as a child. He might have been a nice guy who do not accept all the evil people do, but when it's about sexual things he's all Bob then (as he doesn't question the things he does when he's craving for sexual pleasure).

BOB is looking for hosts,who can be perfect servants for him in collecting garmonbozia.Leland used to have such sexual  inclinations(like Laura),when he was a child,and this is the best strategy for BOB-to progress these inclinations in his hosts,when they are in their early age.Maybe that's why he chose to possess Laura,because through her he would gain a lot of power.I think Leland was not aware when BOB was in control inside him.Before Leland died he said that when he was inside him,he didn't know that.It's hard for me to believe that Leland would consciously rape his own daughter.

I agree Leland would not have conciously murdered his own daughter. Does it say anywahere when Lelands possession started? It was definately there since Laura was a kid anyway. in season 1 its almost impossible to think Leland has anything to do with the murder.. but in fwwm, it does seem that he is aware of whats going on and his evil side is very apparent. its almost as if when he goes into the red room after the murder, and bob takes out the blood that spills on the floor, it was as if he was taking away all memories leland had of the murder and the events leading up to it.. ie: Laura sneeking out of the house, finding the diary with the ripped out pages, the murder.... I think Bob is in control all the time... hes part of lelands character.

what i really think is that Bob is in fact what people recognize as evil in people.. not actually a spirit or presence... leland was probably bi-polar... being two very completely different people at different times and someone, neither carachter recognized the other.

I have always thought that Leland desired to rape Laura, but would have never done it if not for BOB. The same thing with Teresa Banks. I'm sure that Leland would have handled the blackmail situation another way, rather than by killing her, if it wasn't for BOB. The TV show basically says that Leland was not guilty at all and that BOB made him do all these things (at the beginning of episode 17 when Cooper's talking to Sarah). This is a far too easy resolution in my mind and the "I always thought you knew it was me" scene in FWWM seems to contradict it. By the way I think that BOB had been possessing Leland for years, since he was a boy (since Leland hadn't seen him since then). Also in one scene the One Armed Man says that the "evil" has been living among them "for nearly forty years".

Putting all the Freudian metaphors and psychology aside for a moment...

Why is it that Leland remembers raping Laura but not killing her? It's this lack of "awareness" of the murder and continued knowledge of the rape that makes me see it like this:

Rape: 90%=Leland, 10%=Bob

Murder: 100%=Bob, 0%=Leland

Wait a minute...

Before Leland/Bob killed Laura he (Leland? Bob?) screamed "Don't make me do this!" after she put on the ring.  So..... Damn, I'm confused all over again!

I disagree.I will never believe that Leland can consciously rape his own daughter.The scene when he was dying in Coop's hands was so powerful.God,he loved Laura with all his heart,and his love was so pure.All he did to Laura was BOB's fault.It was 100% BOB who raped and murdered her.Leland was just his pawn.

I agree with Ivalinda in that it was 100% BOB. The scene with Leland dying in Dale's arms is powerful indeed. The scenes where you see Leland grieving are real and true...like in the scene in FWWM, when he starts crying and goes into Laura's room to tell her how much he loves her...that's all Leland. Back to the scene with Dale, he says, "He made me do things...terrible things..." and, "When he was inside, I didn't know....and when he was gone, I couldn't remember." And then after Bob did this, he did the most terrible thing of all. Pulled the ripcord that made Leland remember everything that he had done, even though it was not in his control. He was Bob's tool.