I got around to picking up the recently released Definitive Gold Box Edition of Twin Peaks this week. I've already owned the prequel movie subtitled "Fire With Walk With Me" for some time that came out one year after the series ended, but had held off getting the other season sets as they didn't include the pilot episode which sets everything up.
Thankfully they've got both the US and international versions of the Pilot in this set (the international version actually had an extra 20 minutes on it that tied everything up as it wasn't done as a series for overseas markets). The remaining 29 episodes are here as well with a bonus disc of great extras that really dig into what made this show tick and such a hit for a while before thing spiraled downwards in terms of ratings during the 2nd season.
Back when Twin Peaks originally aired it's pilot episode in 1989 (season 1's 7 episodes aired in 1990), I watched it not because of the hype machine, but as I was a fan of Lynch's work already mainly because of Blue Velvet. I was also a fan of co-creator Mark Frost as well seeing that he created Hill Street Blues.
Myself, like almost everyone else in America, kept wondering "Who killed Laura Palmer". We were all clamoring for some resolution to that mystery but when they finally revealed who the killer was in episode 14 of Season 2, lots of people had quit caring at that point as people were wanting the mystery to have been solved in the 1st episode of Season 2 due to Season 1 ending on a huge cliff hanger in regards to almost all of the main characters. People's limited amound of patience in this case wore out quickly.
After that episode, the show seemed to just kind of meander along losing its way as the Laura Palmer mystery is what drove the show and without it the show seemed to just get odd for odds sake to make up for that lack of mystery driving things.
I'm really glad to have the complete set on DVD now so I can watch everything in a row in digital clarity without commercials. I've been wanting to do this for years as I had the entire series on VHS but lost them in a move during 1999 (I think someone stole them from me actually who was helping me move).
I'm planning on watching at least one episode a night for the next 4 1/2 weeks. I watched the pilot first last night and am watching the 1st proper episode of season 1 tonight.
This show broke the mold something fierce when you look at what was accepted on network television at the time. Without Twin Peaks, we wouldn't have gotten other quirky shows like Northern Exposure, X-Files, Picket Fences and some other ones. This show showed what could be accomplished on network television if highly creative people were completely left to their own devices.
The one thing I think that they shouldn't have resolved was Laura Palmer's murder. That should have been the McGuffin of the series but due to dwindling ratings the network executives pretty much forced them to resolve the murder mystery which led to the final undoing of this once great show.
They talk on the extras (Mark Frost in particular) about where season 3 could have gone and he said that himself and David Lynch drifted to other projects during Season 2 (Lynch on Wild at Heart, Frost on Storyville) and came back near the end to try to get things on track to save the show. Frost says that they would have been willing to devote all of their creative energies to making season 3 as great as the 1st, but alas that was not to be as the show was unceremoniously canceled after the end of Season 2.
Still, I'm looking forward to digging all of the episodes now in order one a night (2 maybe if I have enough time to squeeze them in before bed).
What do you all think of this show and what kind of impact do you feel that it left?
