With episode 15 we approach the final moments of season 3 – and perhaps of Twin Peaks as a whole. There is a feeling that during the next two weeks we are about to complete the heart of the maelstrom, that we are about to cross the line into a realm where all the questions will find their answers, where everything will be decided. This is probably why this episode features so many moments with either thresholds (the one from Sunset Boulevard, for instance) or keys (which can be forks or garden gloves too). Unlike Audrey (still trapped in her own private version of a Sartrean Hell), the series will not get stuck at this point and we will follow Mr C and Dougie to where the narrative will take us – probably back to the town of Twin Peaks itself for a showdown of some sort.
As I have argued elsewhere, the moment to return to unity seems propitious. All the different paths of the story are about to converge towards Twin Peaks, back to unity. This is probably why the Twin Peaks Lodge bears that name, after David Lynch’s obsession with the idea of the “unified field”. This is probably why Norma gives up on all the other RR franchises to focus on the only one that matters. This is also why she finally decides to be with the only one who ever mattered in her life, Big Ed. E pluribus unum. Unity.
This is, of course, also the destiny of Dale Cooper: to return to a state of unity. His split personality will have to cease soon. The process of individuation that started a long time ago in the Red Room – the integration of his unconscious parts – is about to come to an end. It is too soon to say if this is going to kill him, but what is for sure is that some part of him will have to die – let us hope it is his dark side.
Mr C just went through the room with the flowers wallpaper that looked so nice on Laura Palmer’s bedroom’s wall 25 years ago. His trip through the secret rose garden led him through a dark room superimposed with images from the forest to the place where the device that Phillip Jeffries has become told him about Judy.
Reminiscent somehow of a moka pot (similar to those made of wood seen earlier in the episode, next to Big Ed, on the RR’s counter), this device exhales a flow of smoke that seems partially trapped by an immaterial orb. One can guess that Phillip Jeffries is in the orb, just like Laura was in hers in episode 8.
Which orb will it be that floats on-top of Dale Cooper, if my reading of the superimposed image in the opening credits is correct? Jeffrey’s, Laura’s or a different one? We only have to wait two more weeks to learn the answer!
TWIN PEAKS - Unwrapping the Plastic 