On the (Mis-)interpretation of David Lynch’s Oeuvre

How to understand Twin Peaks on an emotional level, even if you're lost on the direct meanings of events.

“Did you notice what was pinned to it?” “A Blue Rose?” “Good. But I can't tell you about that.”

I recently wrote an article that was meant to cover up in case I was unable to come up with an idea from watching back through Twin Peaks. It’s a huge time commitment that would have cut into working on articles. So much has already been said about the series that I was worried I wouldn’t have anything original to say about it as well. This assessment initially turned out to be true, but as time has passed I’ve thought more about Lynch’s opinions on how people try to encourage him to provide definitive answers on the meaning of his works. The American public has such poor media literacy that most people have no interest in solving the mysteries for themselves. That’s why YouTube channels like Twin Perfect¹ are able to pump out videos with somewhat above-average explanations of what has happened on both a textual and subtextual level. I don’t mean to pick on this channel in particular, but the smugness of his presentation is grating and his confidence in saying that he has “actually explained” anything is misplaced when he gets so much wrong. Instead of spoon-feeding people a “definitive” interpretation, I thought it would be more productive to give people the tools to understand some of the more esoteric and bizarre aspects of his work. 

I feel like it’s important to give a caveat before we begin that I’ve cribbed the general outline of this article from Lynch’s own “10 Clues to Unlocking [Mulholland Drive].” This is the best baseline to establish because we know these questions and statements pertain to tricks that David Lynch feels are important, or else he would have picked other things to point out and other ways to obfuscate them. As a show of good faith I’ll be adapting these to fit Twin Peaks for the most part. Not only does this provide more variety but I also feel more comfortable talking about it, as it’s the Lynch project I have watched the most and also most recently.

1. It is hard for artists to draw the eye towards important details in the medium of film. Painters and photographers can use the vanishing point as an arrow towards vital details, but focus becomes diluted with the addition of time and movement as variables behind the camera. In order to draw the eye towards certain symbolic objects, some directors will linger on one shot or another of a mundane action. Cutting the sound to a bare minimum (i.e. little music or dialogue) can also identify one of these scenes. There isn’t a lot of fat to trim on the works that Lynch produces. That being said, occasionally there are scenes in his shows that do not progress the plot in any meaningful way. The so-called “Missing Pieces” film consisting of 90 minutes of deleted scenes from Fire Walk With Me contains a lot of this “fat” that does not help to bring closure to the story of Laura Palmer. Instead, these bits and bobs flesh out the mythos behind the cosmology of the series and give a proper sendoff to beloved characters. Sometimes, someone sweeps the floor for an awkward period of time, other times the focus will be on a hallway or ceiling fan. Impatient viewers will skip through these scenes, but they are often vital on a thematic level. There's a joke in fan communities for The Sopranos about how a certain type of fan will outright skip the therapy scenes because they're relatively mundane. I get that those people want to skip to the "good parts" (i.e. the killing), but I cannot fathom why someone would be watching avant-garde shows like Twin Peaks if they intend to skip all the abstract and experimental scenes.