Twin Peaks and the Look of Television:Visual Literacy in the Writing Class

DIANE SHOOS, DIANA GEORGE, JOSEPH COMPRONE

In CBS's 1991network campaign, Dr. Joel Fleischman ofNorthemExposureshivers, waves, and grins to the television audience. Murphy Brown flashesa toothy smile. Major Dad salutes. This, the announcer tells us, is the "look"of CBS. According to this promotional spot and others like it, the look ofCBS is contemporary, intimate, stylish, fun. Conspicuously absent from thisimage campaign is any indication of prime time's penchant for scarestories-reenactments of child molestations, spouse murders, night stalkers,and so on-all drawn from the newspapers and enhanced through docudrama.And, of course, even these frightening tales of danger and loss offer hope.The child is rescued from the icy waters. The falsely accused lawyer isvindicated. The look of CBS, like the look of network television in general,is upbeat and comforting. Stories have closure. Justice is served.

Certainly since the fifties, network television has helped shape andnormalize at least one vision of American life-a world of beautiful (mostlywhite) people who smile,wear trendy clothes, fall in lovewith other beautifulpeople, live dangerously, learn through adversity. Television, of course, didnot create this mythic world, but it has made that image such a common oneon the networks that any deviation mayseem an aberration. We would arguethat because these images dominate Americans' experience of everyday life,it is crucial that students learn to read them as expressions of a particular setof values formed from the perspective of a commercial medium. The "look"of television, then, is more than a set of camera angles and narrative codes,though certainly it emerges partially through those codes. The look ofnetwork television also proposes a way of reading the world, a way ofinterpreting past and immediate experience.

Because television serves this function and because it seems such aubiquitous medium, it has become one of the most common popular culturetexts to be brought into writing classes, especially those based on theconcerns of cultural studies. Television has the added advantage of being theone medium most students feel expert in. Even if college students havesuspended their watching in favor of other activities, most have grown upwith some experience of watching television. They know the characters.They can sing commercial jingles. They even have access to the television of

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their parents' generation. (ManyknowRon Howardas Opie rather than asthe director of the hit filmsSplash and Cocoon.) It is just this expertise,however, that often prevents students from seeing more than the meresurfaceofmost televisionprogramming.Anyonewhohastaughta courseinwhich televisionis the primarytext can testifyto the frequencywithwhichstudents claim they are not fooledby television'sideology. No one, thesestudents tell us, takes MillerBeer commercialsor sitcomsor soapopera orprime time drama seriously. Theyare not the dupes of such appeals andpersuasionsthat we, their teachers, think theyare. Theylaughat and withtelevision,useit fortheirownpurposes.Certainlysomescholarswouldagreewith this position.l

Many teachers, on the other hand, argue that it is just this seeminglyfriendly,in-the-knowhipnessthat disarmsthe televisionviewerand makesthat viewersusceptibleto the medium'smessages. When the EverReadybunny interrupts a parodyof a popular commercial,televisionreminds usthat it canlaughat itself. What isn't quiteasobviousishowthe ironicstanceof that laughtercanstillbe usedto sellproducts. As John Caughiewrites,"Ifironyisa usefulconcept,evenifonlyto holdat the backof the mind,it isnotbecause it offers a guarantee of the resistancewhichJohn Fiske discoverseverywherein televisionviewing,or eventhe romanceofthe guerrillatacticsofcounterproductionandrefunctioningwhichdeCerteaufindsin 'consumerpractices'" ("Playing"56). What ironydoesoffer,Caughiesuggestsand weagree, is the recognitionof the viewer"beingsuperior and beingthe dupe"of televisiondiscourse.

Studentsdo, of course,knowa great deal about television;theyare notsimplybrainwashedby it. At the same time, televisiondoes construct areality,a wayof seeingthat can come to influencethe viewer'sworld. Wewantour studentsto knowthat, to becomecriticalreadersoftelevisiontexts.Writingclasseshave,however,typicallyusedwrittentextsfordiscussionandanalysis.Whentelevisiontextsareused,teachersandstudentsrarelytakethetimeto considerthespecificityofvisualtexts,or, forthat matter,of televisionitself as a visual medium distinct from, for example,film or advertising.Televisiondoes have its owndiscreterhetoric,and part of our aim in whatfollowsis to offer a wayto begin to explicatethat rhetoric for teachers ofwritingwhowishto use televisiontextsin the writingclassroom.

Anydiscussionofnetworktelevisionoughttobeginwithanacknowledg­ment of both its commercialnature and its status as a visualmedium. As arule, what networksbroadcastiswhat producersand sponsorsdeemappro­priate, and those programstend to havea particular"look,"the redundancyofwhichmightseemto makethemimmuneto individualanalysis.Occasion­ally,however,a program breaks with television'scommoncodesand thusprovidesa wayof understandinghowthose codesfunction. In our attemptto delineate the look of television,it is useful,then, to considerone suchprogramthat doesnot conformto typicalnetworkprogrammingevenwhile

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it draws upon many of this medium's common tropes, narrative lines, andcharacter types. As Todd Gitlin has suggested, "In network television, eventhe exceptions reveal the rules" (273). Perhaps the exceptions reveal therules even more powerfully than regular fare, for the exceptions on networktelevision are scarce and often fleeting. The program on which we will focusour discussion is certainly one of television's exceptions.

Even before its debut, Twin Peaks was hyped as a bold experimentwritten and directed by David Lynch (whose credits include the cult featurefilms Eraserheadand Blue Velvet)and Mark Frost (a writer and story editorfor HillStreetBlues). The reputations of Lynch and Frost as innovators forma part of the aura of difference that surrounded TwinPeaks throughout itspopularity, a difference that functioned first as a marketing tool and ulti­mately as one reason for the program's cancellation after two seasons.Though it is now off the air, TwinPeaksshows in Europe and is available atvideo rentals, and the show has spawned new programs apparently morepalatable to television's image of itself. The most conspicuous is NorthernExposure,a comedy/drama which vaguely picks up its location and sense ofplay from TwinPeaks. (In fact, in one episode of NorthernExposure,Joel,Holling, and Elaine refer to the weirdness of TwinPeaks,which they judgeabout as interesting as a pet rock. This easy reference might indicate thatNorthernExposuredraws much of the same audience that once watched TwinPeaksthough, as one writer says,this show is "TwinPeaksfor normal people"[Hickey 4].) In his discussion of the two programs, reporter Mike Duffywrites, "The comparisons are obvious: two quirky shows, both located insmall towns in the far northwest reaches of the country, both loaded withunusual (to put it mildly) characters" (6Q). Duffydoes acknowledge that theproducers ofNorthernExposureidentify a significant distinction between thetwo shows: "I think our show is very, very different in its sort of underlyingfeeling. It think that in "TwinPeaks' the woods were a dangerous place. Inour universe, the woods are a kind of benign place. Twin Peaks was a scaryplace. You don't want to go to Twin Peaks. I think everybodywants to go toCicely. It looks like a great place to go. Also, and I don't mean this asany kindof reproach, but I think there was an underlying cynicism in the show. Andwe try never to be cynical or sarcastic" (6Q). Producer Andrew Schneider'sremarks are doubly appropriate for our discussion. He identifies the over­whelming character of prime time: the desire to be liked by or acceptable toas large an audience as possible ("everybodywants to go to Cicely"). At thesame time, he recognizes a difficulty many have with TwinPeaks ("I thinkthere was an underlying cynicism in the show"). Yet, what Schneider callscynicism could just as well be understood as the deconstruction of mythicsmall town America, revealing the kind of unremitting darkness televisionserial fiction will not endure for long.

In popular culture circles, TwinPeaks captured an audience obsessedwith its characters and mysteries. That obsession was partially evident in the

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exceptionalamountof TwinPeaksparaphernalia(taperecordings,books,T­shirts, the TwinPeaks Gazette,residencycards,and more), and even moreevident in the amount of discussionthe showgeneratedamongfans,critics,and scholars. Computernetworkerscompiledcastlists,listsof symbolsandallusions, conversations, a "passion play," summaries of the Europeanendingof Peaks' premiere, and evenan episode-by-episodeplot outline ofthe series.t Muchof thisworkfocusedon the multipleborrowingsor parodyofLynch-Frost'screationidentifiedbyonenetworkerwhocalledTwinPeaks"everybit of pop culture evermade,"suggestingthat the programcanmosteasily be understood in terms of parody, pastiche, or just plain camp.Certainly,parodyisone wayof understandingthis programandof connect­ing it to the look of televisionin general. Television,PatriciaMellencampreminds us, relies on "parody, an internal referentiality to itself and theforms,styles,and charactersof other media" (4). Mark CrispinMiller hascalledthisself-referentialitya "HipnessUnto Death," television'spresenta­tion of itselfas sohip that it canjoke about itsownprogramming;thus, "TVpreempts derisionbyitselfevincingendlessirony"(14)in its advertising,inits comedies,and evenin muchof its serialfiction. Althoughan interpreta­tion of Twin Peaks that examinesits parodic function can be helpful inunderstandingtelevisualrepresentation,readingthis seriesas parodyalonedoes not get usveryfar in our understandingof howtelevisionserial fictionactuallyworks.Wesuggest,rather,that adiscussionofthespecificstructuresof TwinPeakscanserveto test commonlyheldassumptionsabout televisionand take us further in situating the showwithintelevisiondiscourse.

Beforewebeginour analysis,however,weshouldprovidesomeoveralldirection to this discussion. We choose to analyze Twin Peaks for tworeasons:first,to establisha meansof respondingcriticallyto a programthatwebelieveillustratestelevisionrhetoricat itsmostcomplexbecauseit issuchan exceptionto usualprogramming;second,to suggeststrategiesthat mightbe useful in teachingstudents howto read the visualand narrativecodesoftelevision.What follows,then, isa theoreticalfoundationforunderstandingthe rhetoric of televisionin generaland an extendedanalysisof TwinPeaksin particular.

The Look of TwinPeaks

"Coop. Tell me. The idea for this reallycame from a dream1"Sheriff Harty S. Truman to Agent Cooper (1002)3

Throughoutour discussion,wewillbe drawingon theworkofJohn Caughiewho,inarecentarticleinScreen,challengesscholarsto movebeyondfamiliartelevision theory. Caughie notes, "Much of the writing about televisionfictionseemsto me to remainat the levelofelementarygenres,groundedinthe dominanceof the semanticaspect [theme],with relativelylittle analytic

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or historical attention to the 'verbal' (style, miseenscene)or the 'syntactic'(narrative structure)" ("Genres" 137).4 For Caughie, then, style, mise enscene, and narrative structure are integral, if neglected, components oftelevision discourse. That is not to say that, for us, thematic studies areunimportant. Instead, we would suggest that theme or meaning emergesmost powerfully through television's verbal and syntactic elements.

We begin our analysis with a discussion of style because, as it manifestsitself through technique, style was central to the popularity of Twin Peaks,separating it from the banality of network television. There isyet, however,to be a careful analysis of the particular elements and effects of that style. Onthe one hand, the show makes liberal use of some of the visual conventionsor codes of television (for example, the close-up two-shot so common in soapopera). On the other, the look of Lynch-Frost's text is deliberately differentfrom the look of other prime time serials, the most distinctive (and muchdiscussed) aspect of this style being the show's use of obtrusive technique,especially unusual camera angles, movement, and position, many of thesetechniques drawn from stock codes of film noir or fifties cinema: JosiePackard receives an unexpected, threatening phone call from Hank Jenningsand the camera tilts, the canted frame suggesting aworld suddenly thrown offbalance ala Carol Reed or Alfred Hitchcock; Leland's interrogation sceneopens from the inside ofan acoustical tile hole, the camera zoom reminiscentof the subjective technique of a "madness" movie like The Snake Pit or thedream sequences in Vertigo.

In these cases and others like them, the effect of technique is not merelyone of parody or quotation, but also of a self-conscious stylization thatunsettles and even momentarily disorients. In Twin Peaks, the camerafrequently dislodges the viewer from the privileged position more commonin television fiction. When, for example, Agent Cooper meets with Annie atthe diner to tell her that she is on his mind, the camera frustratingly backsaway from the action and the ambient sound rises just as their conversationbecomes most intimate. When the camera snaps back just in time for the kiss,there is relief at being returned to this typical, thus more comfortableposition. At other times, camera position and movement are used to inflecta scene with a particular, often threatening mood, aswhen Madeline informsLeland and Sarah that she is going to leave Twin Peaks. Here, the cameratracks laterally behind a sofa and then slowlypast a phonograph playing "It'sa Wonderful World," these Objectstemporarily obstructing our view. In thiscase not only is the viewer's voyeurism blocked, but the perspective gives theimpression of a hidden observer. Situated at the beginning of the episode inwhich Madeline is killed, this technique functions as a kind of visual fore­shadowing of BOB's murderous presence.

1\vo other scenes are especially striking demonstrations of the way TwinPeaks employs technique to construct ambiance. In the first, Donna has justfinished relaying to Harold Smith the memory of the first time she fell in love;

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after she sitsdown,weseea slowmotionclose-upof the ashfallingfromhercigarette. Visuallythe shot comes as a surprise, condensingthe sense oftemporal suspension and loss conveyedin Donna's story. In the secondscene,a continuationofthe lovesceneat the diner,AgentCooperleansoverthe counter to kissAnnie,who knocksover a plate of food. A cut to a slowmotion close-upof dark,blood-likesyrupdrippingfromthe plate onto thefloormakesussuddenlyawareoftheviolenceanddeathwhichthreaten thatrelationship. Such momentspossesspowerand relaysignificancebecausetheyare atypicalof televisualstyle.Bycontrast,most televisionfictiontakescareto erasethepresenceofthecamera.Lynch-Frost'stechniqueinthiscaseand others likeit ismorethan visualplayand,thus,doesmorethan maketheprogram look different;it visuallyamplifiesmeaning.

Perhaps the most talked about scenes in Twin Peaks and the primeexamplesof the show'sstyleare the dreamsandvisionswhichpunctuate thenarrative. Manyofthese takethe formofextendedsequencesrepresentedasthe internalpoint ofviewofan individualcharacter,primarilyAgentDaleB.Cooper. Although the transitions into these longer sequencesare not asstronglymarked as, say,those of dream sequencesin classicalcinema,theyare nonethelesscoded, if onlybriefly,as shiftsin narrativemode. The firstsuch sequence,for example,is introducedby an overheadshot of Cooperlyinginbed. A later sequence,thisone in the roadhouse,beginswitha fade­out of singerJulee Cruiseand a reactionshot of Cooper,hisfaceisolatedinspotlight;as the visionends,Cruisefadesbackin and the lightingreturns tonormal. In these caseswe are warned, as the giant of this vision saystoCooper, that "somethingis happening." At other times,dreamsor visionsoccur as abrupt, seeminglyrandom eruptions in the narrative. The thirdepisode of season two, for instance,endswith a montageof dream imageswhich,althoughstillattributed toCooper,aredrawnfromearlierpartsofthenarrative,evenfromother characters'visions.Thus,althoughtheyfunctionas narrativememory,these imagessimultaneouslyinterrupt narrativeflow.Besidessimplymarking TwinPeaks as a different kind of televisionshow,then, technical play not only helps to construct what we might call theprogram's ambiance,but also disruptsnarrativestructure.

TwinPeaksand Television Narrative

"I'm beginning to tire of his interruptions."Agent Cooper to Annie Blackburn (2020)

TwinPeaksdeparts fromtelevisionserial fictionparticularlyin itsnarrativestructure. Later inhisdiscussionoftelevisiongenres,Caughiedrawsonworkby MikhailBakhtin and suggeststhat televisionis perhaps most profitablytheorized not as identicalto or distinctfromother narrativeforms,but as aparticular historicaldevelopmentin the moreextensivecategoryofnovelis­tic discourse:

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If we are thinking in terms of a specifically televisual addition to the forms which thenovelistic has taken since the Greek romance, the organization of narrative around theexpectation of interruption seems to me to be central. Just as journal serializationaffected the chapter formation and the structure of the nineteenth -century novelistic, soalso the break, mediated by the specific form of attention which audiences are believedto give to television, produces a mutation within the novelistic towards segmentednarration. Unlike the novelistic of cinema or of the twentieth-century novel, thetelevision novelistic is organized around interruption rather than closure.

("Genres" 141)

Caughie further proposes that this preeminent interruptability and segmen­tation has multiple repercussions for television fiction as a genre which issubsequently characterized by "an extended, rather than a condensed form ofthe novelistic, in which attention is dispersed rather than highly concen­trated; highly populated narrative communities in which causality is lessessential than character to the sense of continuity; a narrative structurewhich need not end (because not driven bycausality), but which, if it does end,may end arbitrarily" ("Genres" 145).

The characteristics outlined by Caughie are not only valuable ones toconsider in a discussion of the structure of television serial fiction; they alsohelp demonstrate the dual status of TwinPeaksas both representative of anda type of limit-case within prime time drama. The question of television'stemporality, its interruptability, is a crucial one. While it may be true that inmany homes television is perpetually "on," the chain of programs creatingwhat Raymond Williams described in the mid-seventies as "flow," it is alsotrue that viewers habitually disrupt this flow by switching channels, talking,reading, or simply walking away from the set. Unlike watching a film in amovie theater, watching television is rarely experienced as a cohesive,continuous activity. Moreover, the commercial "breaks" which punctuateespecially American television constantly challenge the cohesiveness ofnarrative; as Caughie remarks, "Cagney looks out of the frame and theanswering reverse-field is a commercial for Mack trucks" ("Playing" 44).Television fiction accommodates, even capitalizes on this fragmentation,"organizing expectation and attention in the short segments which willsoften the disruption of being interrupted" ("Genres" 145).

If television can be said to be generally "interruptable," then a programlike TwinPeakspushed interruptability to an extreme on several levels. Thefirst and most obvious is that of the multiple storyline. Although in the firstseason (and slightly beyond), the death of Laura Palmer serves as a kind ofnarrative core for the show, the number of intertwining storylines it gener­ates creates a sense of fragmentation which far exceeds that of other primetime drama. Here we have not simply two or three subplots, but a tangle ofnarrative threads: occurring in and around Laura's death we have the arrivalof Agent Cooper and the beginning of the various investigations and rela­tionships at the Sheriffs office; the love affair between James and Donna andtheir search for Laura's killer; the arrival of Laura's cousin Madeline, who

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joins with Donna and James in their search; Audrey's investigation of herfather's store and subsequently of One-Eyed Jack's; Leland Palmer's break­down, and more. In the course of the development of the narrative, some ofthese subsidiary plots become relatively autonomous-for example, in thesecond season the set of characters and actions which developed aroundJames Hurley's travels after Maddie's death-adding to the sense offragmen­tation. While the overloading ofnarrative lines didadd texture to TwinPeaksand may have been used in homage to daytime and prime time soaps, itultimately created problems in that there was never enough time in eachepisode, or even in a season, to accommodate and sustain the momentum ofso many plots and characters.

A second level at which interruptability informs the narrative of TwinPeaks is in the internal rhythm of individual episodes. Like a soap opera, asingle episode may be composed of as many as eighteen different scenes,some of which may be no more than fiveor ten seconds in length. However,unlike soap opera, a significant number of these scenes maybear little or nodirect relation to what precedes or follows or, even, ultimately to the largernarrative of the show. Indeed, one of the most distinctive aspects of TwinPeaks is the way in which it is marked by odd, "quirky" moments not easilydeciphered or integrated into the narrative. Such moments, which stand outprecisely because we must stop and try to make sense of them, bring the flowof the narrative to a momentary halt. Near the beginning of the show'spremiere, for example, there is a brief shot of Audrey slowlydancing alone inher father's office in the Great Northern Hotel. It is a scene which, althoughit may add to the mysterious atmosphere of much of the show, contributesnothing to plot and only loosely to the development of Audrey's character.Other similar interruptions occur intermittently throughout both seasons, aparticularly effective one coming after the return of Major Briggs from hisjourney to the White Lodge. On this occasion, Major Briggs has just beentaken awayto be interrogated by the Air Force. After his departure, Cooperpauses to examine a Polaroid of the odd symbol stamped on Briggs' neckwhen droplets of water begin to fall like tears on the image he is holding.Cooper, Harry, and Doc Hayward look slowly up to the ceiling where asprinkler is leaking. They look down at the picture, then at each other, andagain at the picture. The camera then cuts to a close-up of the sprinkler anda drop of water falling to Psycho-like music in the background. Perhaps thisis an allusion to Leland's death scene in an earlier episode. Perhaps itportends something yet to come. Perhaps it is more of what some viewersconsider Lynch's visual play. The point is that as viewers we are leftwondering, for the narrative never again picks up this reference, and thecharacters never speak of it. It stands isolated, a slight suspension of thenarrative which then cuts abruptly to a comic scene involvingErnie, Denise/Dennis, and Agent Cooper. In moments like these, the very idea of whatconstitutes a scene, both in terms of content and of form, is called into

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question. In the first example, narrative causality takes a back seat tocharacter, in the second to mood. Although these moments may makeviewers ask questions about narrative significance, those questions are notnecessarily answered. Thus, TwinPeaksfrustrates the narrative logicwehavecome to expect from network fiction and, moreover, frustrates the viewer'sdesire for a coherent narrative world in which all scenes have meaning andstories typically have closure, even if that closure is delayed.

As our previous discussion suggests, another aspect of the"interruptability" of TwinPeaks is its constant shift in narrative mode andmood. Surely for much of its audience, a large part of the appeal of TwinPeaks came from its propensity for parody, for exaggerating the very generictropes, such as multiple intertwining narratives, which it-like othershows-made use of. Yet on another level, TwinPeaks took itself and wasapparently meant to be taken as serious drama, especially in those scenes ofprolonged violence. Here again the show overlapped with, yet also wentbeyond other forms of television fiction. Caughie refers to the "bouncing ofcomplicity and distance" which informed programs like HillStreetBluesandthirtysomething,leading to

a form of engagement in which identification and recognition are liable to be wrong­footed at any moment by ironic distance, and, at the same, ironic distance is liable to becaught out by sudden empathetic recognition. In an early episode ofHillStreetBlue8,the"joke" of a "nut" who thinks he is Dracula, complete with cape and thirst for blood, iscaught out by the discovery that he has hanged himself in his cell. ("Genres" 151)

In Caughie's example, the shift from parody to empathy takes place fromscene to scene. In TwinPeaksthese shifts occur not only between but withinscenes: a conversation between Bobby and Dr. Jacoby begins as a clichedencounter between shrink and rebellious adolescent that recalls numerousfifties movies (most notably Rebel Withouta Cause)and ends with Bobby'smoving revelation that Laura forced him to sell drugs so that she could haveaccess to them. At Laura's funeral, Bobby's denouncement of thetownspeople's hypocrisy and his raging attack on James gives way to darkhumor when Laura's father Leland throws himself on his daughter's coffin,causing the hoist mechanism to go haywire and his wife to scream, "Don'truin this, too!" Even further, in some instances, comedy and serious drama,distance and empathy infuse the same moment: the ride on the coffin is atonce ridiculous (as reflected in the laughter of the customers at the diner asShelley recounts the incident) and poignant. Or, later, at the scene of theparty for Icelandic investors, Audrey cries in the corner as she watches thepartygoers mimic Leland's bizarre movements as he dances; her weepingsuddenly brings to the surface the latent pathos of the scene.

Welcome to Twin Peaks: Television Fiction and MiseenScene

Diane. 11:30a.m. February24. Entering the town of1\vin Peaks. Five milessouth of the Canadian Border. Twelve miles west of the state line. I've never

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seen so manytrees inmylife. As W.C.Fieldswouldsay, "I'd rather be herethan in Philadelphia."

Agent Cooper to Diane (Premiere)

As John Caughiesuggests,miseensceneisamongthose componentsoftelevision fiction scholars rarely address. Mise en scene is most easilyunderstood as the mixture of various elements photographed by thecamera-including lighting,make-up,costumes,props,setting,and compo­sition of figures in the frame-that constitute the character of any givenscene. Perhaps seriousdiscussionof this aspectof televisiondrama is rarebecause,in television,miseensceneis often reducednearlyto settingalone,andthat settingservesaslittlemorethanabackdropforaction. Eveninthoseprogramsin whichthe place namesthe series(for example,KnotsLanding,Dallas,and LA. Law), setting does little more than supplycolor, minimalrealism,or narrativeopportunity. Policestationsandhospitalsare the kindsof sites that provideongoingdramaor continuouscrisesenoughto supportaseason'sworthoftelevisionfiction,andafewcitiesareculturallyassociatedwith action,adventure,mystery,or a particular socialclassand can thus beused to create a specificfeel or an attempt at regionalism. During theopening credits of Dallas, for example, the camera zoomed up a superhighwayinto Dallasand then on to Southfork,a journeywhichmetaphori­callymappedthenewwealthandexcessivenessthat hascometobeassociatedwith Texasoil. The camera'strip up that highwayalso becamethe viewer'strip intoDallas.ThefirstseasonsofKnotsLandingopenedwithanaerialshotof the cul-de-sacin whichthis Californiaserial is set, the shot suggestiveofthe stiflingintimacythat canaccompanyclosesuburbanliving.Beyondtheseopening shots, however,DallasandKnotsLanding,like their counterparts,could take place just about anywhere. FalconCrestwas set in a mythicalwinery;St.Elsewherein a down-and-outBostonhospital;HillStreetBluesinan unnamedeasterncity'spolicestation;LA. Law in fast-paced,upscalelawofficesin the citythat bearsitsname;and thirtysomethingin the Philadelphiaofficesand homesof upwardlymobileyoungAmericanprofessionals.Tele­vision fiction attempts to codifyand therebynaturalize representations ofplace so that viewersrecognizethe typicalhospital, police station, smalltown,and officequicklywithout muchthought. It mightbe said,then, thatmiseenscenein mostoftelevisionfictionasksthatviewersbelievethe peopleand their storiesbecausethe placesinwhichthose charactersliveandworkare so familiar,partially through actual experience,but primarilythroughcultural representation.

The questionofsuchrepresentationisa stickyone. In hisdiscussionofpostmodern representationsof time,FredricJamesonnotes the difficultiesofadequatelydepictinga period,a place,or a nationalmood. Hisdiscussionis particularlyin referenceto popular culture's representationof the fifties,an era most useful for our discussionof TwinPeaks. Alreadyin the fifties,smalltownAmericanlifewasunder scrutiny. In TheTwilightZone, inRebel

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Withouta Cause,in the rock en'roll of groups like Bill Haley and the Comets,middle-American complacency was being challenged. And yet, later repre­sentations of the fifties (HappyDays,LaverneandShirley.AmericanGraffiti)were able only to recall the surface details of fifties popular culture. Jamesoncalls this use of detail nostalgia-deco:details without meaning, the bits andpieces of a time without an understanding of that time. Drawing uponnostalgia-deco, seventies replications of the fifties recalled the poodle skirtsand pony tails and Coca Cola signs, but they were unable to recreate whatJameson calls "a misery, an unhappiness that doesn't know its name, that hasno way of telling itself apart from genuine satisfaction and fulfillment," amood that he identifies as at least one reality of postwar America (280).

Because much of televisual representation of time and place tendstoward nostalgia-deco, viewers are often treated to bits of a fictional past ora mythical present even in shows in which place or time would seemperipheral at best. At the opening of each episode of the now-canceled Trialsof RosieO'Neill,after Rosie had complained once again to her psychiatrist,the credits rolled past the objects in Rosie's apartment-from lawbooks andstudy aids to sepia-toned pictures in silver frames, crystal perfume bottles, arose. Such details, photographed in isolation, function purely as collectivememory, nostalgia-deco. Crystal and silver and soft lighting combine torepresent a mythically simpler, more elegant past where long-sufferingmothers and hardworking fathers fought to keep families together. Thisidealized past can be measured against a present, in this case Rosie's rushedlife, her broken marriage, her visits to the psychiatrist's office-all subjectscontinually visited throughout the brief run of this series. Jameson calls suchrepresentation "the expression of a deep, unconscious yearning for a simpleand more human social system," a kind of "cognitive mapping" of place andvalues proclaimed by details alone.

As a cognitive map of small town, rural America, TwinPeaks might seemto fit quite nicely. Like Garrison Keillor's "little town that time forgot," TwinPeaks projects a timelessness typical of idealized spaces. Norma's RR Dineris a fifties-style restaurant in which the waitresses still wear those blueuniforms with scallop-edged aprons and useless little waitress hats. At theSheriffs Department, Lucy sets out coffee and doughnuts each night forHarry and the boys and can call Doc Hayward in on a case at a moment'snotice. Certainly ABC's promotional materials capitalize on the timelessinnocence projected by these details:

Welcome to Twin Peaks. It's one of those picturesque rural towns that reminds you oftime-honored American traditions, like peace and order and homemade cherry pie.Visitors tend to marvel over the magnificent Douglas firs and admire the breathtakingmountain scenery. Located in the Pacific Northwest, just five miles south of theCanadian border, Twin Peaks looks like a prosperous community of contented citizensdevoted to their families. On the surface, at least, it's a bucolic life. But that's on thesurface.

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Here TwinPeakscouldbe PeytonPlaceorAnother World'sBayCityor anyof a number of televisiontownswithwhat ABC'spromotional descriptionlater calls"the veneerof respectablegentility"beneathwhichare "seethingundercurrents of illicitpassion,greed,jealousyand intrigue."

ABC'spromotion linksTwinPeaksto soapopera,melodrama,andevenpopular romance novels. And, as we havealreadynoted, there is much ofsoap opera and the rest in this series. Still,TwinPeaksdoesnot completelyreplicate this formula. Certainly,Lynch-Frostpick up the details of smalltownlivingthat havebecomecommonon Americantelevision:asheriffwhois friendly,quiet, and surprisinglycompetent;a localdoctor who has deliv­ered everyonein townunder thirty-five;an unscrupulousbusinessmanwho"ownshalf the town"; and the oddballs,star-crossedlovers,and rock-solidfamilypeople we might expectto find in this sort of fictionalization. Theparticularsalonemightseemto benomorethan thenostalgia-decoJamesondescribes,the town'ssurfaceappearanceplacingit withinthe mythof smalltownAmericanlifeasit ismostoftenrepresentedin televisionfiction. TwinPeaks, however,seemsto insistupon questioningthis mythand exposingitas the sham it is. The sham is evident in fairlyobviousways-in the failedmarriages,dysfunctionalfamilies,and socialand politicalintriguesevidentthroughout the story. Whereasin soapoperawehavecometo accept-andthereby perhaps no longer question-the flawsof individuallives,in TwinPeakssimplecorruption palesin the faceofwhatseemsto be a far-reaching,inexplicable,even unstoppable evil. And whereasin soap opera lovecon­quers all,in TwinPeaks the evilcannotbe redeemed.Thus,the Lynch-Frostcreation doesnot simplydebunkthat mythand therebydo awaywith it, butrather continuallyconfrontsviewerswith its inadequacy.

On a moredisturbinglevel,then, the shamis theverymythitself,a myththat TwinPeaks'centralcharacter,AgentCooper,seemsto believemuststillexist somewherebeyondthe crime-riddenstreets of America. In the thirdepisode,Coopersetsout what isfor himthe importanceofa placelikeTwinPeaks. Confronting the big city attitude of Albert Rosenfield, Cooperdeclares,

Albert, I hope you can hear me. I have only been in Twin Peaks a short time. But in thattime I have seen decency, honor, and dignity. Murder is not a faceless event here. It isnot a statistic to be tallied up at the end of the day. Laura Palmer's death has affectedeach and every man, woman, and child because life has meaning here-every life. That'sa way of living I thought had vanished from the earth but it hasn't, Albert. It's right herein Twin Peaks. (1003)

With that statement,Albert leavesand Cooperturns to his tape recorder toask Diane to check into his pension options. He may look into buyingproperty in TwinPeaks.

The actionthat completesthisepisodesuggests,however,that Cooper'sidyllicsetting does not exist even for the people who already live there.

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Despite opening credits showing the town's welcoming sign, the GreatNorthern Hotel, and the majestic waterfall, the visual image of peace andharmony must be read against narrative action and character development.At Laura Palmer's funeral, Bobby Briggs accuses the town of knowing allalong that Laura was in trouble: "You damn hypocrites, you make me sick.Everybody knew she was in trouble, but we didn't do anything. All you goodpeople. You want to know who killed Laura? You did! We all did" (1003).Still later in this same episode, Harry, Hawk, and Ed call Cooper to the dinerto tell him what he really needs to know about Twin Peaks:

TwinPeaksisdifferent. Longwayfromthe world.... That's exactlythe waywelikeit.But, there's a backend of that that's kindadifferent,too. Maybethat's the pricewepayfor all the goodthings.. .. There's a sort ofevilout there. Somethingvery,verystrangein theseoldwoods. Callitwhatyouwant-a darkness,a presence-it takesmanyforms.But it's been out there for as longas anyonecan remember.

While this speech is certainly a reference to many horror films, it is also thefirst the audience has heard of the town's dark side. After all, everyAmericancity and town has known murder. Laura Palmer's death is dreadful but notunfamiliar. What is unfamiliar is the continuous questioning of the natureof place-small town America, the good life-that seems to engage Lynch­Frost and that takes TwinPeaksbeyond nostalgia-deco. The miseen scenethat results is not a mere simulation of gritty reality but rather thedeconstruction of a myth against whichAmerican television fiction measuresgood and evil.

Television Fiction and Character

"You look likeCary Grant."Blackieto Agent Cooper (1006)

Ironically, the vehicle for this challenge is the character of Agent Cooper.Cooper serves, as Caughie suggests most often happens in television fiction,to hold narrative together. This character-handsome, competent, moral,innocent, smart, intuitive, spiritual-is crucial to our understanding of whatis actually "happening" in TwinPeaksand absolutely integral to the way inwhich the narrative is finally worked out. If, as has been suggested earlier,narrative flow is subordinate in television fiction, it is subordinate to charac­ter, which we expect to remain stable, even predictable, throughout.

From the show's premiere, viewersare led to believe that Cooper willnotchange, that he will be the center force in this wildly de-centered narrative,and early dialogue reinforces that impression. In the first episode, Jacobycalls him Gary Cooper. Later, Blackie sayshe looks like Cary Grant, and hedoes. He believes in dreams, has visions, mourns for the Dali Lhama, and isgenuinely swept awayby the world he believes he has entered-where peopledon't take death easily, where there are ducks on the lake, where the cherry

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pie and coffee are "damn good," and where Douglas Fir scents the air.Cooper is a believer in the myth even though that myth is contradicted forhim in every episode. After Leland has been arrested for Jacques Renault'smurder, for example, Cooper meets Judge Sternwood, who has just com­forted the pregnant Lucy by telling her, "Life is hard, dear. Still in all, it'sharder in most places than in Twin Peaks." In a continuation of that samescene, however, Sternwood's exchange with Agent Cooper suggests that,though life may be harder in other places, Twin Peaks is no Mayberry:

Stemwood: Mr. Cooper, how do you find our little comer of the world?Cooper: Heaven, sir.Stemwood: Well, this week heaven includes arson.multiple homicides, and an attempton the life of a federal agent.Cooper: Heaven is a large and interesting place, sir. (1011)

Later in the series, Jean Renault accuses Cooper of ruining a simple town,but as Jean describes it, 1\vin Peaks appears to be a simple town of drugrunning, prostitution, and theft:

Before you came here, Twin Peak was a simple place. My brothers deal dope to theteenagers and the truck drivers. One-Eyed Jacks welcomed the businessman and thetourist. Quiet people lived a quiet life. Then, a pretty girl die, and you arrive, andeverything change. My brother Bernard shot and left to die in the woods. A grievingfather smother my remaining brother with a pillow. Kidnapping. Death. Suddenly, thequiet people they are quiet no more. Suddenly the simple dream become the nightmare.So, if you die, maybe you will be the last to die. Maybe you brought the nightmare withyou. And maybe the nightmare will die with you. (2013)

The nightmare Agent Cooper brought with him was, apparently, his insis­tence that the population of 1\vin Peaks acknowledge the evil around them.During the series, Cooper's faith in truthfulness led him to confront everyone(even Harry after the death of Josie) with hard realities; yet, he never didquite accept those realities himself, the foremost reality being that his mythicTwin Peaks (or, for viewers, Lake Wobegon or Mayberry or Cicely, Alaska)does not exist (never has) at least not in the way he wishes it would.

Because Cooper believes so absolutely in the myth of small townAmerica, he believes he can stop the corruption simply by ferreting out thewrong-doers. He essentially admits this when, after Leland's death, Harry,Cooper, Albert, and Major Briggsgather to talk overwhat hasjust happened.In searching for a wayof understanding this horror, Major Briggs asks, "Anevil that great .... Finally, does it matter what the cause?" "Yes," Cooperanswers, "because it's our job to stop it." Lawand order are here evoked, t.hecamera angle slightlybelow Cooper, looking up at his square jaw and paddedshoulders, the image linking him to clean-cut comic book and Westernheroes of the past. Yet, the narrative has already revealed that Coopercannot stop this evil. It is not a matter of catching and jailing the criminal.BOB is something that cannot be controlled, at least not in the cops-and-

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robbers way of popular legend.This scene is essential, aswell, for understanding the horror represented

in the creature BOB. Apparently, BOB is the unspeakable, the violence thisculture refuses to confront:

Harry: I've seen some weird things, but this is wayoff the map. I'm having a hard timebelieving.Cooper: Harry, is it easier to believe that a man would rape and murder his owndaughter? Any more comforting?Harry: No. (2009)

Though no more comforting, this violence is what viewers know has hap­pened. The fact of Leland's possession might save him as a character, but itdoes nothing to blunt the pain ofwatching Laura and Maddie die at the handsof a man who is father and uncle, trusted friend, local lawyer, pillar of thecommunity. In the end, perhaps it was that pain that contributed mostpowerfully to the failure of TwinPeaksas a television serial. Television, aswe suggested earlier, is no stranger to violence, but TwinPeakslaid bare thefrightening senselessness of violence as it happens in ordinary people'shomes. Violent death is ugly,as these scenes revealed, and the killer is oftenexonerated. For us, at least, it is no more comforting to think that a manwould rape and murder his own daughter, but (contrary to Lynch-Frost'snarrative) it is sadly more likely than ghostly possession and most viewersrecognize that. TwilightZone was clearly a series of stories about anotherworld, a scary place of imagination and fear; TwinPeakswas too often a storyof a scary place of real-world violence and macabre humor.

The final episode of TwinPeaksleaves us with one further point made byJohn Caughie and worth returning to here. Television narrative, not drivenby causality but instead by character, may end arbitrarily if it ends at all("Genres" 145). At the close of season two,Agent Cooper has become BOB.The possession was not entirely unprepared for. Before Major Briggsdisappeared, the two spoke of Leland's death:

Cooper: You know, Major, I find myself thinking a lot about BOB-if he truly exists.Major Briggs: I've pondered that same question continuously-before it was revealed.Cooper: I try to imagine him out there, incarnate, [CLOSE-UP OF COOPER] lookingfor another victim to inhabit.Major Briggs: There are powerful forces of evil. It is some men's fate to face greatdarkness. We each choose howto react. If the choice is fear, then we become vulnerableto darkness. There are ways to resist. You, sir, were blessed with certain gifts.

Thus, though the camera might seem to presage Cooper's failure in the BlackLodge, Major Briggs assures viewers that Cooper is one of those specialpeople, "blessed with certain gifts." The stalwart hero who exchangedhimself to save Dentse/Dennis and Ernie in an earlier episode, valiantlyoffers his soul to save Annie in this final episode. The only trouble is-thedevil takes him up on it.

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In television,that isnotwhathappens. As in the firstexchange,Coopershouldsomehowhavebeenableto cheatthedevilandsaveAnnie,but Lynch­Frost uncover the flawof such fairy tale endings and, in so doing, leaveviewersunsettledinwhatwouldseemaparallelto narrativeinterruptability:the arbitrary reversalof a characterwho has, until the end, served to holdnarrative together. In fact,until this moment,it hasbeen Cooper'snaivete,his belief in the goodnessof small town life and in his own ability to stopwhatever is out there, that has made the Lynch-Frostvision bearable forviewers.Withoutthat possibilityofredemption,TwinPeaksmayindeedhavebeen too dark, too unpredictablefor the "look" of television. In fact,whenthe series did end, manyviewerswere ready for the relief they found inNorthernExposure'sCicely,Alaska.

A Final Note

"Whatweobserveis not nature itselfbut nature exposedto our ownmethodof questioning."

Annie (quotingHeisenberg)to Agent Cooper

Our analysisof TwinPeakshas servedas onewayofdelineatingthe mannerinwhichtelevisionconstructsmeaning,howthat meaningiscoded,andhowthose codes might be deconstructed. In the classroom,however,teachersneed not relyon thisparticularprogramto encouragethat samediscussion.There are others, some availablein video rental, that mightservethe sameends. At least one reader of this essay, for example,worried about itsdatedness, about the problem that TwinPeaks is now off the air and thatNorthernExposure(or anyextremelypopular series)mayjust be this year'snewfad. That is a reasonableconcern,andyetwehope wehaveshown,notsimplyhowone verydifficultprogramworks,but howtelevisionin generalconstructs a perspective on the world that has implications for the wayregularviewersmakesenseof their ownworld. For us as teachers,a criticalapproach to televisioncan onlybe achievedby close examinationof indi­vidual instancesof televisiondiscoursewithan eyeto their specificity,theirsimilarityto and differencefromother programsand other visualmedia.

A culture'svaluesand fearsare often embeddedin its stories,and todaytelevisionrelates most of our stories. A carefulexaminationof what thosestories say and how they are told can giveus insight into contemporarymoods, values and frustrations.> Prime time fiction, news programming,evencommercialscarrywiththem informationabout aculture'sdesiresandfailures.Our studentsknowagreatdealaboutthisworldalready.Webelievethat theycanteachusandeachother astheyinterrogatethe commonandtheuncommonlook of television.

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Notes

1Withinculturalstudiesdiscussionsoftelevision,John Fiskehasbeenthe mainproponentof this position.

2From the time TwinPeakspremiered to beyondits cancellation,a nationwidecomputernetwork generated a conversation about the program. This network and other computerconferenceslikeit recorded interviewswithcast members,gossipabout the program,specula­tion about plot changes,ABC promotionalmaterials,and muchmore. Wewouldliketo thankJohndan Johnson-EilolaandFritz Ruehr for introducingusto the networkand for helpingus toaccess information from it. In addition,we acknowledgethe help, encouragement,conversa­tions, a-ndargumentswe hadwith friendsand colleaguesSusanGuitar and MarilynCooper.

3TwinPeaksepisodesare not namedand soLynch-Frostrefer to individualepisodeswithfour-digitnumbers. The firstdigit indicatesthe seasonnumber,and the others are the order ofthe episodeswithinthat season. The premiere episodeof TwinPeaksis numbered 1000; thus,episode1002 indicatesthe secondepisodefollowingthe premiere. The secondseasonpremiereis numbered 2001.

4Caughieborrowsthe terms"verbal,""syntactical,"and"semantic"fromTzvetanTodorov,TheFantastic:A StructuralApproachto aLiteraryGenre.

STaniaModleski,forexample,suggeststhat the interruptablenatureofsoapoperasmimicsthe frustratinglyinterruptable nature ofwomen'sdailylives(101).

MichiganTechnologicalUniversityHoughton,Michigan

MichiganTechnologicalUniversityHoughton,Michigan

ArizonaState University-WestPhoenix,Arizona

Works Cited

Caughie,John. "Adorno'sReproach:Repetition,Difference,andTelevisionGenre." Screen32(Summer1991): 127-53.

--. "Playingat BeingAmerican:Gamesand Tactics."Logicsof Television:Essaysin CulturalCriticism.Ed. Patricia Mellencamp.Bloomington:IndianaUP, 1990. 44-58.

Duffy,Mike. "CicelyFeels Cozierthan '1\vinPeaks." DetroitFreePress28July 1991: 60.

Fiske,John. TelevisionCulture.NewYork:Methuen, 1987.

Gitlin,Todd. InsidePrimeTime. NewYork:Pantheon, 1985.

Hickey,Neil. "It's Quirky,Offbeat-and Hotter than BakedAlaska... Here's WhyAmerica'sEating up NorthemExposure."1VGuide 7 Sept. 1991: 2-8.

Jameson,Fredric.Postmodemism;or,TheCulturalLogicofLateCapitalism.Durham:DukeUP,1991.

Mellencamp,Patricia, ed, Logicsof Television:Essaysin CulturalCriticism. Bloomington:IndianaUP, 1990.

Miller,Mark Crispin. BoxedIn: TheCultureof TV. Evanston:NorthwesternUP, 1988.

Modleski,Tania. Loving witha Vengeance:Mass-producedFantasiesfor Women. NewYork:Methuen, 1982.