Welcome back, dear reader. Hot dang, that was a great episode. The comedy of Nevada. The tragedy of Washington. The drama of Montana. And a nice little husband and wife moment driving through Utah. What more could you ask for?
It’s just you and I, but I don’t wanna be your boss. Let’s theorize.
—–
Theory: There are alternate timelines / realities at work here.
Analysis: First, homework assignment, go read this Reddit post: [S3E13] Yet Another Timeline, updated to version 2.0 (with clothes, a ton of pics and details!). Once again, your Reddit team is hard at work for you. Impressive work.
It’s nice that people have finally stopped denying that scenes are being shown to us out of sequence. It’s obvious now that Good Cooper’s scene playing ball with Sonny Jim last week had to be out of sequence. Beyond that though, Vegas stayed pretty linear in this episode.
In Twin Peaks this week, we get Bobby saying that they just found something from his dad today, and Becky scared that Steven has been gone for two days. And it’s questionable whether those two scenes even happened on the same day.
During the credits scene, Big Ed, sitting at his desk eating alone (despite his advice to Bobby) had a reflection that took one more sip of soup than he did. Super spooky stuff, but is it indicative of an alternate reality, or something else?
There’s just been a lot of wonkiness in Twin Peaks lately. We’ve already discussed the rehashed Dr. Amp scene last week, Deputy Jesse maybe being in two places at once. Becky and Steven flip-flopping abuser / victim roles. This has been going on all the way back to the insurance salesman in Part 1. There’s just this prevailing feeling of wrongness. Ed is not with Norma. Bobby is not with Shelly. Harry, the Log Lady, and Beverly’s husband are all terminally ill.
Is this all another wrong that can be made right? Or is it indicative of another breach between two worlds?
—–
Theory: (You name it) are Richard Horne’s parents.
Analysis: So, amongst the cadre of bad guys that Renzo is “boss” over, we saw Richard freakin’ Horne. This does make a kind of sense, he’s on the lam and The Farm is apparently a place for folks like him and Ray to hide out. Watching Bad Cooper interrogate Ray on the floor-to-ceiling big screen, Richard pushes to the front of the crowd. Is he just mesmerized by the new boss, or does he recognize his daddy? Could his hatred of being called “kid” have originated here?
When Renzo punched Bad Cooper in the back of the head, he said “That’s from the nursery school teacher.” Now my first reaction was, holy hell, how does he know about Miriam and why does he blame Bad Cooper for that? Could Bad Cooper not only be Richard’s father, but Richard knows it and blames him somehow for the evil he commits? But perhaps calmer heads have countered that Renzo was just playing on Bad Cooper’s “What is this, kindergarten?” comment. Hmm, maybe. But kindergarten is not usually equated with nursery school, and Miriam was just identified by Frank as a nursery school teacher last week.
If Bad Cooper is Richard’s father, perhaps he is the Richard of “Richard and Linda”. If so, could Linda also be related? A twin sister? A daughter of Good Cooper, from Annie? The mind reels.
—–
Theory: The Audrey / Charlie scenes are not part of reality.
Analysis: Let’s start a separate “alternate reality” thread just for this subject.
Last week, Audrey’s army of fans were in full force trying to figure out how their heroine could have fallen so far from grace and ended up in her own personal hell. A few of the more popular theories included:
- They were acting in a play (under her own name with real locations – not likely)
- Charlie was her psychologist and they were role playing
- Audrey is still in a coma and dreaming this scenario
- Audrey died and is in Hell (perhaps even the 9th Level of Hell (as hinted at in the Dr. Amp scene just prior to her scene in Part 12), reserved for traitors, punished by being frozen in place)
Personally, I was ready to write off all of that as absurd, but then there was this week’s scene. Audrey feels like she doesn’t know who she is? She doesn’t know where the Roadhouse is? Charlie is going to end her story? And they’re still stuck in that same room, filled with antique furniture and antiquated technology. Now me and most of the rest of the poo-pooers from last week are actually interested.
It’s interesting that we’ve spent 11 parts in the Dougie-verse, slowly disavowing us of the idea that it is all a dream, which set us up to be dismissive of the idea that Audrey is living in a dream. This might even explain why we had to wait so long for her reintroduction.
—–
Speed Round:
- Bushnell mentioned that Dougie even implicated himself. So this is another “wrong” committed by Dougie Jones that Good Cooper has made “right”.
- The detectives Fusco just tossed out the fingerprint evidence we all had been counting on to finally get Good Cooper on track for rediscovering himself. Trolled again. Too funny.
- Ray’s big, pre-execution lore dump:
- … Got coordinates from Hastings’ “pretty secretary” Betty.
- … Philip Jeffries hired him, or someone who said he was.
- … A guard gave him the ring, or someone dressed like a guard.
- … Bad Cooper has something in him that “they” want – presumably the “something in Cooper” that Ray saw and relayed to Jeffries, i.e. BOB.
- … Jeffries is at a place called “The Dutchman’s”, which is not a real place, as Bad Cooper already knows.
- Now maybe we understand why Norma is always sitting in the corner booth working on the books. She’s not just running one restaurant, but a chain of five.
- Seems like maybe Nadine shoveled Big Ed out of her life, leaving an opening for her personal hero Dr. Jacoby. If so, must have been recent, as both are still wearing rings.
- Janey-E no longer has a crappy car. [Credit to Chopping Wood Inside podcast]
- Audrey and Charlie’s relationship is morphing from episode to episode the same way that Becky and Steven’s relationship seems to be.
- Audrey’s line about the little girl who lived down the lane? “That seems to be a reference to the movie The Little Girl Who Lives Down the Lane, starring Jodie Foster as a little girl who maybe lives by herself and maybe doesn’t and maybe there’s something strange going on.” [Source: EW]
- It’s been claimed the bottle rattling sound when Sarah went to go get more vodka is the same sound we heard in her scene with Hawk.
- The name of the episode that first featured James’s song, “Just You” is entitled “Coma” [Source: Matthew Gillespie, Twin Peaks (2017) FB Group]
- The Jones have a sycamore tree in the backyard behind Sonny Jim’s gym. Those shouldn’t really grow in Vegas, for what it’s worth. [Source: Jim Barnett, Twin Peaks (2017) FB Group]
—–
As always, please reply below with your own comments and corrections, or give me your own well thought out theory. You can catch me on various Facebook groups, such as “Twin Peaks (2017)” or our own “25 Years Later” page, on the Reddit r/twinpeaks forum, or email me at catnapspirit@gmail.com. See ya next week.
No, kindergarten is not equated with nursery school.
But Mr. C’s full statement was “what is this, kindergarten? Nursery school?” …and nursery school, traditionally, *is* equated with nursery school. 😉
I was at first skeptical of the connection to the Jodie Foster film, saying to myself “That line came from a nursery rhyme first.” But of course in Baa Baa Black Sheep, the line is “One for the little BOY who lives down the lane.”
The Foster movie seems significant since it has a magician in it… But also poisonings, a mysteriously absent father, impersonation, concealed deaths, all of which COULD be relevant in some way…
scenes out of chronological sequence: Bobby told Big Ed and Norma that something from his dad had been found that day! Surely the scene, where they found the item in the chair, was a few days previously?
Or has something else been found, but not shown?
Isn’t it all too dreamy… ?
This is such a great photo you chose for the article. Love the expressions on everyone’s faces.