TWIN PEAKS

This seems to be much talked about right now, so that's a solid enough foundation to believe something is really happening and that we may hear about it soon. Personally I'm delighted. As phenomenal as Season 3 was, and as much as it would have made for a damn fine finale to the whole wonderful opus...I still want more! Also, I do feel like a handful of characters got a bit of a rough deal in terms of story expansion. So I'd hope they might get a little more. Perhaps they could even get Michael Ontkean back. If his reasons for dropping out ever became known, I didn't hear it.

Following all this speculation on Reddit has been fun to watch.

I just wanted to say it's amazing how influential this show is. I keep seeing shows from today that I know were inspired by Twin Peaks in some way.

Damn, looks like Naomi Watts has already been cast as a new character in the upcoming S4 of Twin Peaks:

https://www.instagram.com/p/B4DmzGblOVL

I too found it hard to keep track of who was who for the first couple of episodes, but as season 1 progresses the characters and their relationships become very easy to follow.

It's very soapy at the outset, but Episode 2 (actually 1x03) introduces the Black Lodge and the surreal/supernatural elements that will later become the show's signature, so keep it up. If after that episode you're really not interested, then maybe Twin Peaks just isn't your thing. But yeah, the first couple of episodes aren't really enough for you to completely gauge what the tone and themes of the series are like, and they're drastically different from the territory Lynch would later explore with Fire Walk with Me and especially The Return.

I don't dislike it. It's passably entertaining in a goofy soap parody sort of way. The scene-by-scene, moment-by-moment stuff is fine, moderately entertaining. But already this is straining my patience with all of its subplots: an abused wife, more people cheating on their partners than I can count, the murder, the plot to take over the mill, whatever is going on with Audrey Horne... so much information, so little development of any of these threads. This isn't about people right now, but caricatures. This is very early yet, but I'm already tired.

I think my problem is that David Lynch and Mark Frost don't like these people. The characters are more like sideshow freaks we're meant to laugh at. Or study, if I'm being generous.I'm worried that this will follow the Mulholland Drive path, and Lynch is just gonna go down the road of using strange happenings to replace three dimensional characters who have fears and dreams.

Lynch is such an odd duck for me: I dig Eraserhead for its comedic telling of a man's fear of fatherhood, and The Straight Story for its straightforward narrative of regret and bitterness. I despise Blue Velvet (IIRC, I found it mean-spirited in the way it painted people as ugly and cruel without any empathy for them... but it has been a long time and I can barely remember the film). I'm indifferent towards Mulholland Drive (strange doings, no characters!) and The Elephant Man (nice enough Oscar bait).

Mulholland Dr. is the most intimate and depressing character study for me in any film, so can't say I see eye to eye with ya on that one. We probably just interpreted the movie completely differently. 

I do (mostly) agree with and love your reading of Eraserhead, though - it's way funnier than most people give it credit for. 

I would now call myself a fan of the show, especially after the masterful Fire Walk with Me and The Return. However, I struggled as well with the original series at times, and agree with the critique that, while it certainly was intended to be a soap parody, it all too often just plays as an actual soap with quirky elements.

That being said, I did think the pilot episode was incredible, so if you didn't find any merit in that I'm not sure you'll like the show even in its best moments. I'd say give it a few more episodes, though.

Episode 2 (or 3) was pretty good. Nevermind the weird supernatural stuff, that was fine. I just enjoyed how utterly silly this whole thing got with that ridiculous Tibet sequence (thank you for making clear who the characters are!) and Albert's over-the-top team and the wacky diner sequence with Audrey and Donna. And then there was a dancing dwarf because why not, but that was the least fun I had among this episode's random comedy.

I finished season 1. It's no masterpiece, but a lot of fun when it embraces the silliness like it's an extra-long NCIS story.

I was expecting something a lot weirder, like Mulholland Drive or even Eraserhead. This is actually very tame. It's dreamlike, but more in the sense of a dream being weird when you look back on it. Take the scene at the vet in which Dale and Harry are talking over a llama. It's funny stuff, but not so extremely strange and unbelievable. Just a bit off kilter.

I think the first 9 episodes of season 2 are pretty incredible, and they really converted me into a fan of the show. It does dip after that for a while, but I was so sold after such a marked improvement over season 1 that I didn't really care.

Episodes 7 and 9 are stunning.