From: jblum@hamlet.umd.edu (Hi ho -- Kermit the Frog here...)
Newsgroups: alt.tv.twin-peaks
Subject: Buddhist ramblings and garmonbozia theories
Date: 5 Oct 92 04:08:21 GMT
Organization: University of Maryland, College Park

In article <BuyBxL.AFG@acsu.buffalo.edu> v075q5fr@ubvmsb.cc.buffalo.edu (Scott J Gorcey) writes:

>     Coop, Desmond and Jeffries must die...

>>I don't think ALL of them would be trashed.  After all, we need someone
>>to explain (or at least hint) at more of what's going on in the Lodge.
>>Chester Desmond is probably the most likely to survive -- after all,
>>his main reason for being in FWWM is as a substitute Coop.  (I get the
>>feeling that if Kyle had been more available / willing, he would have
>>investigated Teresa Banks like he did in the Autobiography.)

>     I get that feeling too... but Desmond's presence may have
>     worked to the film's advantage - to suggest, as with Blue
>     Rose, a wider, more formal investigation by Cole into
>     what's up in those Douglas Firs...  and Sycamores, for
>     that matter...

Well, yes, but the "blue rose" sequences could just as easily have been
played with Coop and Stanley, rather than Chris Isaak (who I thought did
a great job).

>     However, my point was: Coop CAN die now, because we don't
>     NEED a narrator anymore.  For several reasons: first,
>     a film has wider breadth of narration in and of itself;
>     especially a Lynch film.  Second, we have a workable
>     knowledge base of the backstory - perhaps it is still
>     harder, but in the end much more rewarding, if we are
>     forced to work through it ourselves.  And third, of
>     course, these people have a very high mortality rate:
>     Coop MUST die because he CAN die.

True, we may have a workable knowledge of what's going on by now -- but
the general audience still needs a point-of-view character to identify
with.  Coop was much more than a narrator -- he was the protagonist, the
one who set the plot in motion, the one who was intimately involved with
a number of the plot elements.  In Buddhist terms, he's the one who turns
the Wheel.  (See below.)  He hasn't finished his part yet... though when
he does, his life is probably forfeit.

>>On the other hand...  Coop must DIE.  For several reasons.  Kyle's
>>reluctance to continue is the least of them.  Another one is Jean
>>Renault's speech about how Coop brought the nightmare with him to
>>Twin Peaks -- and maybe, if he will die, the nightmare will end.

>     I'd take issue briefly with that: Josie says similar.  The
>     truth of it is, Coop didn't BRING the nightmare.  He
>     brought it OUT into the open.  Before Coop, the weirdness
>     in Twin Peaks - and Bend, Oregon, and Deer Meadow WA and
>     Missoula Montana, etc - was simply not spoken of: like
>     adultery in the 50s -- which contributed to the anachronistic
>     feel of the series.

Agreed on the anachronism, but this only adds to the overall Buddhist
theme (one of the many religious references in Peaks).  Compare this
with "Kinda", the similar Buddhist allegory in "Doctor Who".  Both deal
with a society which appears, on the outside, perfect.  But there are
demons, hidden, below the surface.  Patterns keep repeating themselves,
in the actions and behaviors of the people.  The Wheel of Life keeps
turning -- the hidden wheel which clocks the rise and fall of ways of
life.  The appearance that the wheel has stopped -- that the culture
has reached timeless perfection -- is only an illusion.  Finally come
catalysts, from outside and from inside, which bring the rot out into the
open.  In "Kinda", the catalysts were Tegan, the seductive woman from
another world, and Aris, the aggressive male.  In Twin Peaks, they were
Laura Palmer and Dale Cooper.  If not for them, the people living in
the enclosed world would never have realized that the nightmare existed.
They would have continued, blissfully unaware, until some other catalyst
arrived.  It takes a person from outside to bring the Wheel full circle.

Coop has certainly done a lot to break down the seeming normality of
Twin Peaks, but he hasn't quite threatened the entire town yet.  That's
what he needs to do.

>>  Most
>>important, though, is the fact that Leland died, and Twin Peaks is
>>cyclical.

Little wheels within big wheels.

>>  If there is to be a final confrontation between MIKE and BOB,
>>we know it will end with BOB getting shot, as in the dream sequence...
>>and that doesn't bode well for Coop.

>     When did BOB get shot in the dream?  In the Euroversion, you
>     mean?  I wouldn't go by that, myself... 

Also in Coop's retelling in #2003.

>     But: I don't see the grand scheme of Peaks mythology as
>     simply as a confrontation between MIKE and BOB.  

Not the overall scheme.  The overall scheme, at least as I see it, is still
a small town that time forgot, suddenly realizing that its perfect way of
life has been going all to hell while they sat in a state of bliss.
This situation happens over and over again throughout history, thanks to
progress, and each time is one turning of the Wheel.

>     These beings are from somewhere else - I don't want to
>     say another planet, that's stupid, it smacks too much of
>     Rocky Horror -- but they're from somewhere else, and they're
>     clearly stranded here.  At least, FWWM makes that clear (the
>     script makes it even more clear).

Not necessarily stranded here.  I think they might simply exist in a
sort of symbiotic state with this world -- they didn't come from somewhere
over the rainbow, just from a "reflection" of our world.

>     The "fuel" they need to get home is distilled from the 
>     fear and suffering of humans: FIRE distilled to Garmonbozia
>     distilled further to Creamed Corn.  MIKE and the LMFAP (who
>     were once one entity) and other residents of The Lodge
>     like The Giant inhabbit humans - perhaps even with those
>     humans' approval - and collect the ambient fear and
>     suffering we all feel daily.  

Not sure about the fire -- garmonbozia aspect of the link, but the feeding
off of fear and pleasure is a given.  FIRE seems to be a code word for
the darker aspects of human nature, the flames within Laura that are
burning away her soul, the hidden darkness of the human heart that helps
turn the Wheel.  (It's interesting that wood, which is Lynch's pet symbol
for ancient knowledge and wisdom, is the antithesis of fire.)  Fire is
not garmonbozia, but it is one of the causes of it.  Perhaps the poem
"FIRE walk with me" indicates BOB's call to the dark side of men's minds,
a desire to use it to spread pain and sorrow that BOB can use.

>     BOB, at some point, stopped collecting ambient fear and
>     suffering and started CAUSING it.  This indicates that
>     FIRE is addictive to the one who consumes it.  BOB is
>     an addict - he stole the creamed corn MIKE had "canned"
>     above the convenience store.

I agree that BOB is probably an addict.  But it seems to me that the other
beings are all trying to manipulate the situation to cause pain and sorrow.
Remember, the LMFAP also appeared when Josie died -- she was prime food
for them.  After all, the producers did mention that all of Twin Peaks
was a chess game between Coop and the spirits, and I can much more easily
see the Little Man sitting down across a chessboard from Coop than I can
see BOB.

The "good" spirits, like the Giant and the non-corn-eating Tremonds, want
to find another way back without destroying lives, but they are bound
by some sort of rules to not directly stop the others.

>     So BOB must give MIKE and LMFAP "their share" of FIRE after
>     killing Laura and taking hers: because he owes it to them.
>     In the script, LMFAP tells BOB: "You're not going home without
>     me" just before he demands his (and MIKE's) share of the
>     FIRE.

We'll have to see how that line is read in the extended version before
we decide what it means.

>     I think this has the ring of possibility -- what does everyone
>     else think?  I'd love some feedback!

Possibilities, but I'd like to hash out a few more philosophical
subtleties before we decided it's the official meaning.  Like you said,
it still sounds like Rocky Horror.

>>Besides, it's just such a neat image for the end of the film for Coop
>>to be in the chair in the red room, this time with Laura as his guardian /
>>angel.

>     But is Laura still in The Lodge?  (She was in the Lodge 25
>     years later... but she wasn't Laura, she was LMFAP's "cousin"
>     then - same Laura?  Dunno...)  I thought she was saved by
>     that angel - and perhaps taken to The White Lodge?

Well, perhaps the "thread" that the beings were trying to restore leads to
their real home -- the White Lodge.  Nirvana.  To mix religious metaphors,
that would make BOB a fallen angel, and perhaps the LMFAP the king of the
underworld.  Laura has been purified (or split into her good self and her
doppelganger), but she can't get home until the spirits have completed
whatever it is they have to do.

Somehow I think that Twin Peaks takes place on what will be the final turn
of the Wheel.  It just feels right.


(The other question is, if they couldn't make it back to the White Lodge,
well, where did Major Briggs go?  Any ideas?)