I first watched some out of order episodes of Twin Peaks on cable TV when I was a teenager. I didn't quite know what the hell was going on, but I got the drift. I tracked down Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me on VHS, watched it, loved it, and realized I had to see the rest of the series.
You might already be aware of this . . . but Fire Walk With Me basically gives away the entire mystery of Twin Peaks. It's also a grotesque and confusing piece of cinema. I loved every minute of it.
I finally ordered the VHS collection of Twin Peaks right as I was graduating high school. It featured every episode-except the pilot-recorded in glorious Extended Play (EP) format. The quality was shit, but not unwatchable. I had to tape the pilot, which was unavailable on VHS for some reason at that time, off of cable. Later, I dubbed a rental copy VHS release of the international version of the pilot episode, and so I had, on a variety of shitty VHS tapes, a piecemeal Twin Peaks Perfect Collection.
As much as I rag on the VHS format-because it fucking sucks-I could not stop watching Twin Peaks once I got started-even watching crummy EP picture and sound quality. At that time, it was my first experience watching a long-form TV show from beginning to end. I hadn't even watched an anime series from beginning to end at that point. I couldn't get enough. I even liked all the Second Season shit with the boring dude on the motorcycle. That's how good this show was: it transcended the scuzziness of the VHS format to fire a beam of art directly into the center of my brain mass.
Some years later, I tried re-watching Twin Peaks on DVD, and I couldn't even get all the way through the pilot. Not because I disliked it, but more because my memories of the show were already so vivid. I didn't need to re-burn 'em into my brain. Now, I've watched Fire Walk With Me a number of times, because it remains a mystery to me, and also, probably, because I'm a twisted fuck . . . but I'll get to Fire Walk With Me down the road . . . but Twin Peaks has always stayed with me since the VHS viewings. That's how good this show is-it gets you the first time, doesn't need a second shot at your heart.
So . . . I don't think I'm going to re-watch the whole series. I don't have the time. My disdain for TV has only grown over the years, although I keep hearing that it's some kind of a New Golden Age. Are we still in that New Golden Age? There's been some good shit, for sure: The Wire, The Big O, most of Breaking Bad, a good chunk of The Sopranos, Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex, Transformers Prime, the PBS Frontline Documentaries . . . so I buy the New Golden Age rhetoric. Why not? You gotta stay positive in dark times. But TV . . . is just so tedious to me in general. I guess I got old and cranky. I can't even really complain about the commercials, now, that shit's purely optional. But I'm still aware of the passing of time, the growing shortness of my potential lifespan as I sit watching something passively, body going to seed, eyesight fading, ass cheeks gathering bulk, gut creeping over my belt-line, once beautiful mane of hair giving way to bald spots . . . hey, may as well sit down, watch some old TV all over again. Fuck it.
So . . . a compromise.
I'm only going to watch the episodes of Twin Peaks directed by David Lynch. I'll skip the others.
We'll see how that works . . .
