TV and Film Review: Twin Peaks; Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me

by Alexandria Whaley

I was born 14 years after the initial run of Twin Peaks ended (13 years after Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me). That being said, Laura Palmer is my favorite character of all time. I own a shirt with an image of her screaming in The Black Lodge, and I have pictures of her hung on my walls. She means a great deal to me. In light of David Lynch’s recent passing, I want to explore Laura - her life, her death, and the meaning behind it all. I want to explain why I think Laura Palmer is such a powerful character, and really why I think Twin Peaks is one of the most important shows of not just the 90s, but of the last 30 years as a whole. If you haven’t seen Twin Peaks in any capacity, consider this your spoiler warning. I’d also like to give a trigger warning for mentions of molestation and incest.

I want to start by exploring what it is about Twin Peaks that is so significant. For a brief background, the show follows the investigation of the murder of Laura Palmer. We eventually find out that it was Laura’s father, Leland, who killed her while possessed by who could only be described as the spirit of evil, Bob. Bob is theorized by one of the show’s detectives to be “the evil that men do” and, from my perspective, this is the theme of the show. Bob is a physical manifestation of the horrors women (and really anyone who doesn’t identify as a cisgender male) face. I think that what is so disturbing about Bob is that his physical appearance isn’t necessarily scary. He’s positioned in a way to be off-putting to viewers, of course, but he looks like a regular person. Bob isn’t an over-exaggerated, demonic presence. He could exist within anyone (although the focus here is on the evil men perpetuate against women). The second season of the series, and the original series finale, ends with Bob entering the body of protagonist Dale Cooper, a certified good guy. It doesn’t matter how well-liked a person is because Bob is a physical manifestation of evil. That’s why his involvement with Laura Palmer and her father in both Twin Peaks and Fire Walk With Me is so heartbreaking.

Fire Walk With Me follows Laura during the week leading up to her death. It is also the only movie that has ever made me cry. Lynch’s portrayal of Laura is the most sympathetic view of a woman I’ve ever seen from a male director. Sheryl Lee also gives one of the best performances I’ve ever seen in a film. She is Laura. Laura is presented to us as a flawed, but ultimately tortured human being. She has spent most of her life being molested by an unknown man that she discovers is actually her father, who has no memory of it afterwards. Her father was also a victim of Bob as a child, this being how Bob “possessed” him. The film does not show Laura any mercy because she is ultimately doomed; but it does not show the viewer any mercy either. We are directly confronted with the horror of Laura’s situation. If she can’t be spared, neither can the audience. However, I think it’s important to note that Laura does not merely exist as a victim. Lynch makes it clear to the viewer that Laura’s life held more significance than her death. She is a multifaceted, interesting character.

Twins Peaks has a power that has endured from the time it started. While I was not alive to witness it, I do know that it was (and still is) a pop-culture phenomenon. I feel as though we’re starting to see a resurgence in love for it following David Lynch’s death. I think what people loved about it was the mystery aspect of it because it gave them something to talk about - but I don’t find it mysterious at all. As I previously mentioned, I think Twin Peaks, if it’s about anything, is about the evil men do, specifically the evil that they inflict upon women. I also think that it’s about the cyclical nature of generational trauma. The abuse that Leland experienced as a boy was what he ended up inflicting on Laura, thus showing how trauma lives on. All of that is what I believe, but my goal isn’t to define what Twin Peaks is supposed to mean. My goal is to define what Twin Peaks did right with the portrayal of Laura Palmer. What it did right was that it showed Laura to us as a human outside of her suffering. It also showed the reality of that suffering without glamorizing it. I will forever appreciate David Lynch and how he treated women in film.

Twin Peaks

David Lynch and Mark Frost, Sabrina S. Sutherland (s. 3)
3 Seasons, 1990–1991, 2017
Starring Kyle Maclachlan, Michael Ontkean, Mädchen Amick, Sheryl Lee
ABC 1990–1991; Showtime 2017

Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me
Directed by David Lynch
Screenplay bye David Lynch and Robert Engels
Based on Twin Peaks
Produced by Gregg Fienberg
Starring Sheryl Lee, Moira Kelly, David Bowie, Chris Isaak,Harry Dean Stanton, Ray Wise, Kyle MacLaclan
Cinematography by Ron Garcia
Music by Angelo Badalamenti
134 Min, 1992, France/United States

Alexandria is a college student from Wisconsin, currently studying English Literature and Museum Studies at Lawrence University. She dreams of becoming a librarian and finds inspiration from digging through the archives.