The saga of “Twin Peaks: The Return– Is Anyone Watching?” took a slight turn for the better on Sunday night. The show added 24,000 viewers from the previous week and moved up to number 89 out of the 150 top cable shows on Sunday night.
The reason? Laura Dern, who was part of a ‘cliff-hanger’ at the end of last week’s show, appeared as Diane, Agent Cooper’s fabled secretary. Wearing a blonde blunt cut Louise Brooks wig, Dern met FBI Agent Albert Rosenfield (the late great Miguel Ferrer) in a bar and did a final segment turn to the camera worthy of “Dallas” or “Dynasty.”
The result was 24,000 more people tuned in this past Sunday to see if Dern/Diane could shed any light on the absolutely ridiculous non plot that’s gone on for six weeks. And to some extent, she did. Her boss, Gordon Cole (David Lynch himself) took her to see fake Agent Cooper in a prison lock up. Diane immediately knew he was a fake. The audience thought to itself, We’re finally getting somewhere.
Of course, it’s still the David Lynch show, so not much else happened. Someone swept up at a bar for almost 3 minutes with no dialogue, to the sounds of Booker T and the MGs’ “Green Onions.” Kyle Maclachlan bumbled around as Dougie aka Real Cooper. Naomi Watts slapped a few cops around verbally.
Back at the Twin Peaks police department, Deputy Hawk had to explain Agent Cooper’s situation– to the audience, really. Robert Forster– so happy he’s there– gave a call to Doc Hayward, so we got to see Warren Frost, the beloved actor and father of producer Mark Frost, one last time.
The best moment of the episode was Lynch/Cole playing his little game with Tammy’s fingers. It was right out of a David Lynch movie.
Well, this is all fun, and it’s Sunday night, what else are we going to do? But 11 more episodes? And most of the “clues” are random, will add up to nothing. Lots of numbers are given out, they’re likely as meaningless as the numbers on “Lost.” And where is the original “Twin Peaks” cast? Where is Lara Flynn Boyle? Sherilyn Fenn? Why is Sheryl Lee always in the credit roll even when she’s not in the show? Why is that dwarf trying to kill everyone? Why doesn’t Peggy Lipton say anything? (She looks great.)
Fewer and fewer people want to know those answers.
