First, I didn’t watch Twin Peaks when it came out. Then I didn’t watch it for an additional 35(!) years. Then, the podcast people decided to[1] watch Fire Walk with Me, which meant I had to watch 32 episodes of TV to be ready for watching the movie. Which I have done, over the course of the past maybe not quite a month. And now I’m supposed to review the movie.

I was prepared for how weird the show would be. I was not prepared for how soap opera it would be. I can really see a direct throughline from this show to Passions. Which makes me sad I never went back and watched it before now, but at least it’s now. Another thing I can say is that it predicted modern television, insofar as 10 episodes for this kind of show is about perfect. The second season, at a traditional 22 episodes? It was a complete and total mess, and definitely needed to be shorter. If it had been two more seasons of 10 each, then a little shorter is still not nothing, but also the arcs would have been more tightly described I suspect.

What I loved the most is how seriously it took itself. When the FBI guy throws rocks at a bottle while the sheriff’s office reads the names of suspects, and the one that got read when he breaks the bottle becomes their prime suspect, and the sheriff’s reaction is awe at how good a detective he is? Actually, the thing I liked least about season two is when the sheriff complains that he put up with a lot of strange behavior from Cooper. Because part of what makes the show work is that nobody ridiculed him or took it as strange. It’s just how the FBI is!

Anyway. That brings me to the movie, a prequel in which some stuff happens a year ago and starring different FBI guys which had 5% bearing on the rest of the movie so far as I could tell, and then picks up during the last week of Laura Palmer’s life[2]. It’s a decent movie. As a character study of a girl who is slowly being destroyed by her family life (and her school life, but mostly her family life), and of the people around her who love her (her best friend) and who think they love her (her boyfriends, who do not know about each other, and also that family I mentioned), it’s definitely a David Lynchian character study, but that’s okay. As an explanation of how Bob and her killer interrelate, it… fell short. Massive spoilers for the show and at least partial spoilers for the movie follow, so see footnote [3].

But anyway. I cannot imagine watching this movie first, or especially as a standalone feature. It would never work. And I’m not really convinced it was entirely necessary, with a handful of exceptions. But was it good? Yeah. Mostly pretty good. And whatever else I might say about it, at least someone finally made me watch Twin Peaks.

[1] Well, random, whatever blah blah. The style was sequel plus, I remember that, but the scare? Man, it’s been weeks. I have no idea.
[2] If you do not immediately associate Twin Peaks with the phrase “Who killed Laura Palmer?” then you were not watching television in 1990. Not sure what else to tell you.

[3] Because if Bob is an as yet[4] mostly unexplained force for evil in the world as the show had me believe, her killer was mostly blameless. But having watched the movie, I come away with a different interpretation of events than the show clearly wants me to have.
[4] I’ve already watched an episode of Twin Peaks: The Return, which is itself somehow 10 years old already. How???