With eyes closed, you’re lying on your back. You hear a voice break through the silence. It sparks an image in your mind.
This is the story of Twin Peaks, the mystery involving the death (or disappearance) of Laura Palmer in a small town in Washington state. “She’s dead. Wrapped in plastic.” is how it begins. Laura Palmer’s story leads you into an ever-increasing cast of characters from various realms.
Creators David Lynch and Mark Frost introduced us to more questions than answers. Perhaps there is no definitive answer but trying to figure it all out is part of the fun for many fans. Fans have been developing their own theories and sharing their interpretations for three decades.
I’m one of those fans, and I believe Twin Peaks is an epic work of art and literature. Season 3 of Twin Peaks, also referred to as Twin Peaks: The Return, led me to an odd conclusion. I’ve re-watched seasons 1 and 2, and some episodes strongly support the odd conclusion and none of them absolutely refute it.
I’ve found an interesting way to interpret the Twin Peaks story. So far, I haven’t found anyone else who has arrived at the same interpretation and I have no idea if David Lynch or Mark Frost ever considered what I’m about to share. But my interpretation actually seems to make perfectly good sense to me.
First, it’s all a dream…
“We all live inside a dream,” moans Phillip Jeffries in the Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me movie.
“We are like the dreamer who dreams and lives inside the dream. But who is the dreamer?” says Monica Bellucci in Gordon Cole’s dream.
At the sheriff’s station, Dale Cooper’s giant superimposed head of revelation echoes, “We live inside a dream.”
There are dream references all through Twin Peaks. Fans seem willing to accept that some of the story consists of dreams but few are willing to consider that it is all a dream. In my interpretation, it’s all a dream.
For me, accepting that does not weaken the story at all. Analyzing the circumstances of the dreamer just adds another level of enjoyment. The white lodge and black lodge are still at play in the dream.
Consider for a moment that everything we see in Twin Peaks is part of a dream and that there is something regarding the dreamer that motivates the oddities in the story….
The dreamer is hospitalized and on life support. The central issue of Twin Peaks is whether to continue life support (electricity) or turn it off.
The dreamer doesn’t know who she is or where she is. She just wants to go home.
Discussions of her medical condition by doctors and technicians are gibberish to her. They might as well be discussing Tibet and throwing rocks at a bottle.
The character Nadine Hurley is inspired by a nurse. As she closes the privacy curtain over the intensive care room window, she complains about how much noise it makes. She can lift the patient, so she is imagined as having superhuman strength. The dreamer tried to move her hand but Nadine did not see. That’s why Nadine has an eye patch.
Margaret Lanterman, the Log Lady, also represents a nurse. She keeps up with the patient’s vital signs in a written record, the log, and studies records left by night nurses, the owls.
Dale Cooper represents her primary physician, Richard. Early in the Twin Peaks timeline, he hopes for the patient’s recovery and wants to continue life support.
Diane represents his assistant, Linda. Naido is one aspect of Diane held at bay for a time by The Fireman.
Gordon Cole is a physician. The patient tried to speak to him but he could not hear her. That’s why Gordon wears hearing aides.
The Great Northern Hotel represents the hospital and James Hurley is a security guard there. The patient caught a glimpse of him as she was being admitted.
The dreamer’s mind is living through all the characters in the dream and the dream helps keep the fear of her precarious situation away.
“All things considered, being shot is not as bad as I thought it might be, as long as you can keep the fear from your mind. But I guess you could say that about most anything in life. Its not so bad as long as you can keep the fear from your mind.”
Dale Cooper – Twin Peaks, Season Two – Episode One
But fear enters into the dream as well. There are concerns about insurance and money to continue life support. Love keeps the electricity on, so love and fear are in conflict. Love powers the white lodge while fear powers the black lodge.
The woodsmen are hospital electricians. The patient is afraid of them because they control the electricity. They travel in elevators a lot, going up and down through pure air.
The electrician’s workshop is equipped with a non-electricity-conductive formica table. The workshop is probably located on the floor above the hospital gift shop or pharmacy, but the dreamer may have misunderstood directions she overheard.
She is sustained by a feeding tube and imagines the food is creamed corn that smells like scorched motor oil. She names it Garmonbozia.
The red room is a waiting room across the hall. The patient hears conversations taking place there when the door to her room is open but they are garbled. Sometimes she imagines she is in the waiting room but something happens in her room and she is pulled away.
The dreamer is aware of other patients brought to the hospital, victims of accidents, shootings, violence and illness. As she hears their stories, they become a part of her dream.
I think she feels a special connection to the schizophrenic shoe salesman, Phillip Gerard and his amputated arm. When the arm says, “I sound like this,” it makes the sound of a CT scan.
There’s a soap opera playing on a TV within her hearing some of the time and people come and go. They talk about their lives and fuel the dream. A question as simple as, “Has anybody seen Billy?” can lead to tangents.
The dreamer doesn’t know who she is but she imagines herself primarily as Laura Palmer. She is actually Carrie Page, the missing page of Laura Palmer’s diary.
Early in the Twin Peaks timeline, Leland, who represents the patient’s father, agrees to removal of life support. She imagines he is overtaken by an evil force, Bob. We see him molest, torture and kill her.
Her mother, represented by Sarah, originally opposes removal of life support and is filled with grief, but as time progresses she is also overtaken by an evil force, Judy, the Mother of All Abominations.
As Mr. C, Cooper’s evil doppelganger, her doctor has been overtaken by the force that once influenced her father, but there is still a kind and loving part of him, Dougie Jones, who is weakened by his assistant Diane’s influence.
The drugged out mother who shouted “1-1-9” and her son are the real Janey-E and Sonny Jim. Diane created another wife and son to detain Dougie/Coop.
Diane has black lodge cred. She has given rise to the dreamer’s greatest fear. She has convinced Sarah that the patient will never recover. We see the real Diane only outside the motel. The other Dianes are tulpas.
As the dreamer’s fear increases, the patient imagines herself in Odessa, Texas. There’s a potty chair next to her front door and a dead man on the couch in her house. Both are things you might find in a hospital. Her mother, represented by the horse emblem for Judy, is watching.
She is actually in New York, in an intensive care room that feels like a glass box, and there’s always someone watching. Nurses monitor their patients through a glass window and with video cameras in intensive care wards.
Diane ultimately prevails and the order to remove life support is executed pursuant to Chapter 430 of Family Medical Law in New York which allows a nurse practitioner, Diane, well Linda really, to counsel family members regarding these matters.
Having convinced Sarah to sign orders for removal of life support, and persuaded Cooper to carry out the orders (The motel sex was prearranged to seal the deal.) Diane’s tulpa leaves. Cooper/Richard stays with Laura/Carrie to take her home (turn the electricity off).
The doctor (Cooper/Richard) must record the time in the file so he asks what time it is. In the dreamer’s mind, his question is heard as, “What year is this?”
The dreamer screams and the electricity is turned off at the end of Part 18 of Twin Peaks: The Return.
One chance out between two worlds. Fire walk with me.
OK, maybe I’ve just spent too much time in hospitals, but this interpretation of the dream occurred to me and I thought I’d share.