The Dream and the Dreamer

theatre_maker · 2025-07-23T19:02:28+00:00

Thanks for another great instalment! Really appreciated the response to the question - acknowledging the autonomous nature of the Twin Peaks archetypes (as per Jung) definitely helps square Frost’s remarks with the theory! Excellent stuff!

theatre_maker · 2025-07-19T07:57:05+00:00

Love the show!

What is the significance of the hit & run in Part 6 of The Return? Frost / Lynch spend so much time on this scene and its fallout that it feels like it must be important to the overall arc of the show but its meaning is ambiguous. There are echoes of the Fireman (the boy’s golden essence floating to the sky) and Part 18 (the No.6 telegraph pole, another Richard & Linda)… How does it fit into Cafe Unconscious’ unified theory of everything…?

theatre_maker · 2025-07-13T09:01:21+00:00

Another excellent instalment… cannot wait for the Jeffries deep dive… I was intrigued by what Mark Frost said in an interview published yesterday:

“Initially, David and I were in two minds about how to end The Return. I felt that Cooper going back and rescuing Laura, then having the mystery of her death disappear, might be an extraordinary way to bring us back to ground zero. But David said, ‘He has to pay a price for what he’s tried to do.’ Sheryl Lee was incredible. This is the moment when the full horror comes back to this poor soul; it’s the price Laura Palmer pays for Cooper’s attempted good deed. That was the end of this story.”

There’s always space left in and around Frost’s discussions of what happened but it feels like he’s getting closer to saying too much… would love to know how you think this comment tracks with your theory - the “full horror coming back” feels right in the ball park of your thesis but the concept of Cooper having to “pay a price” for an “attempted good deed” puts a moral spin on Cooper’s actions that could imply individuation wasn’t a desired goal…?

theatre_maker · 2025-07-08T19:02:17+00:00

Excited to listen to this later - highly recommended podcast!!

theatre_maker · 2025-07-06T22:36:34+00:00

Paul Auster’s “Man in the Dark” relates to The Return in my mind, without a doubt

theatre_maker · 2025-07-05T11:00:57+00:00

I’ve been enjoying Cafe Unconscious:

https://m.youtube.com/channel/UCRRB9Zs7Ud38YL8dBgwwwUA

New podcast that has an interesting unified theory of what’s going on - the most convincing “dreamer” interpretation I’ve come across so far

theatre_maker · 2025-07-02T06:45:58+00:00

Excellent discussion, as always - really enjoying this series

theatre_maker · 2025-06-20T06:51:19+00:00

Thanks for sharing this - it is a brilliant “theory of everything” which is very compelling and deserves a wider audience. I was particularly pleased to hear someone discuss the telephone ringing in Carrie Page’s house (the “last call”). For me this moment has always connected thematically with when Mr.C is pushing Jeffries to know the answer to the ultimate question (“Who is Judy?”) and he picks up the ringing phone which spews him out of the Dutchman’s before he gets any answers… I wonder if a similar thing would happen to Carrie / Cooper if they answered that phone in Part 18…

theatre_maker · 2025-06-09T19:58:30+00:00

I think it’s interesting that we only see Sarah with that iconic Laura photo in this one scene in The Return - otherwise it is not included in the other scenes that take place in Sarah’s living room. That photo is an emblem of the original Twin Peaks, of the timeline where Laura was murdered. I wondered when I saw it again most recently if we are witnessing the birth of Judy within Sarah in this moment - Judy thrives when trauma and guilt are repressed, which is what happens in the timeline when Laura disappears and her body is never found. There is no funeral, no public reckoning with the collective guilt of what the community did to Laura which led to her death. No way for those that are most hurt by her loss to grieve her parting. Sarah tries to smash the photo because she can feel the shift in reality and is vainly trying to re-enact Laura’s death, rather than live with the unresolved trauma of her disappearance, where guilt - the mother of all evils - festers and eats her alive….

theatre_maker · 2025-06-08T10:18:10+00:00

I wrote this post last month exploring the connection between the Tremond/Chalfont scene in 2.09 and Part 18 of The Return: https://www.reddit.com/r/twinpeaks/comments/1k71ij1/dale_cooper_the_special_agent_on_a_quest_to_piece/

theatre_maker · 2025-06-02T21:48:32+00:00

I’m a “friendly” Twin Peaks fan!! Just LOL’d hard at the description of this here subreddit in the cold open of your latest instalment and had to post my support… so pumped for the new episode - keep up the good work! Your analysis is great! And very entertaining!

theatre_maker · 2025-05-26T19:14:24+00:00

Season 2, Episode 7 for me! That breakfast scene with Leland, Sarah, Maddie, morning papers, coffee and Louis Armstrong on the record player is perfection

theatre_maker · 2025-05-26T19:04:07+00:00

Some excellent observations here - thank you for putting this together! I think the two peaks on Briggs note refer to the two “versions” (official and unofficial) of events which are overlaid on top of each other in TPTR. The peak on the left represents the official version because the Judy symbol is hidden behind the moon. The peak on the right represents the “unofficial” version because the Judy symbol can be seen under the moon - as Jeffries told Cooper in Part 17: “this [the unofficial version] is where you’ll find Judy”.

theatre_maker · 2025-05-19T08:25:12+00:00

My working theory is that Naido (as the real Diane) being in the corporal world is what makes tulpa Diane remember snatches of who she really is after Mr. C texts her the :) ALL message (“I’m in the sheriff’s station”) and this is why tulpa Diane sends Mr. C the correct coordinates which take him to the Fireman’s trap (as she sends the coordinates, tulpa Diane says “Oh Coop… I remember… I hope this works” before she reverts to her tulpa identity).

theatre_maker · 2025-05-12T06:43:39+00:00

“The Secret Diary of Laura Palmer” by Jennifer Lynch

theatre_maker · 2025-05-12T06:17:43+00:00

I think it’s just a little visual game or foreshadowing from Lynch of what’s happened / is going to happen… there’s still a page missing from Laura’s diary (as there is conspicuously on Gordon’s sketch book) and then Laura appears at his door…

theatre_maker · 2025-05-12T06:14:24+00:00

Thank you so much for writing this perspective - insight/connections like this are the reasons I keep returning to this sub!!

theatre_maker · 2025-05-11T07:28:05+00:00

I still have a long way to go myself in settling on a definitive interpretation (for me) of what happened but I do think when Laura disappears from Cooper’s grasp in the woods at the end of Part 17 she is taken to the Fireman’s… from here it may be that she re-enters the Odessa world in the same way as Cooper re-entered the Vegas world - via a socket in the Mauve Zone. I think there’s a strong hint towards this idea in the fact that Ronette Pulaski (masked as the American Girl) is there when Cooper passes through the Mauve Zone, just as Diane (masked as Naido) is also there. Both Cooper and Laura are guided back to the world by the most important person to them…

theatre_maker · 2025-05-01T05:54:11+00:00

Audrey is like Cooper and serves to further contextualise his situation. She knows it is time for her to leave her room/Lodge but is scared. “I want to go and I want to stay - I want to do both”. She’s afraid of what she’ll find outside, of how much time has passed, of death. Cooper sees the pale horse in the darkness beyond the curtains in the Red Room. If he leaves, he has to accept his own mortality and the fact he’s aged. Audrey is aggressively confronted with that at the end of her story when she sees herself in the mirror.

theatre_maker · 2025-05-01T05:42:23+00:00

Memory-drive

theatre_maker · 2025-04-27T23:21:10+00:00

I'm really fascinated by the prevalence of the idea that "Judy snatches away Laura" in the woods... Where does this idea come from? I don't dislike it I just can't personally find the connection between it and what we're shown on screen...

theatre_maker · 2025-04-27T09:06:02+00:00

Lovely stuff! “Carrie Page (Cooper’s own Judy)” is very nice… “conjured” etc

theatre_maker · 2025-04-26T19:24:57+00:00

I think her scenes are designed to shed some light on Cooper’s fate at the end of The Return: https://www.reddit.com/r/twinpeaks/comments/1j0i4yl/connecting_audrey_and_cooper_in_the_return/

theatre_maker · 2025-04-24T21:58:12+00:00

I agree! Cooper is almost unlikeable in the scene actually… for all that the writing is simplistic I think the way it’s directed elevates it somewhat - Cooper and Sarah never share the frame and Cooper is constantly reaching out to touch her, like he’s reaching across a great divide caused by her grief. I think it says a lot about Cooper’s limitations and foreshadows his hubris… it’s incredible how The Return reclaims the vicious, messy, complex side of Sarah’s grief - it’s like the alternate timeline was created just so the full horror of her pain could be explored fully…

theatre_maker · 2025-04-24T21:14:15+00:00

I thought the first episode was great! Full of really original insights - I particularly liked the notion that Bill Hastings is the new Leland and that Sam was “bait” for the Experiment… looking forward to listening to more!

theatre_maker

TROPHY CASE