Reaching the Finish Line for Public Film Writing/Podcasts

Early next week, I will share three or four new public pieces - an essay, a podcast, a conversation, perhaps a video montage - alongside some other announcements or teasers. These will serve as a farewell to the era of non-Twin Peaks (and perhaps non-Citizen Kane) public film/TV commentary on this website...

For over three years, I've been following a very particular schedule on this site, presenting written film analyses on Wednesdays, weekly or monthly public podcasts on Thursdays, status updates or other random posts on Fridays, Lost in Twin Peaks illustrated companions on Saturdays, Patreon cross-posts on Sundays, TV viewing diaries on Mondays, and video essays on Tuesdays. Out of necessity, I am abandoning this approach in the final days of October because the posts I hoped would be up this past Wednesday and Thursday didn't make it in time and I don't want to drag this process into November. I believe I can have the major holdouts - a conversation with blogger/author Sam Juliano, a written review of the documentary 63 Up, and my final Sight & Sound miniseries podcast episode on Andrei Tarkovsky's Stalker - ready by October 31. I also want to record a YouTube message about the Journey videos and other work (essentially reiterating what I'm laying out here but for the platform where the most people find and follow me).

For a long time, I've seen my November 1 birthday as a threshold for my online work, a deadline to wrap things up and shift toward a new approach. Initially I thought this would include concluding my three major Twin Peaks projects: the public presentation of my Lost in Twin Peaks podcast; the last thirty entries of my TWIN PEAKS Character Series; and of course Part 6 of my video series Journey Through Twin Peaks. I finally realized a few months ago that even if I devoted every possible hour to them I wouldn't come anywhere close to finishing them in October. So my goal narrowed to ending my public film commentary after fifteen years (future reviews and most other reflections will be reserved for patrons) so that from November onward, I could focus on finishing those Peaks projects before moving on to other ambitions. However, even this more limited goal may be slightly compromised since the remaining chapters of the Mirrors of Kane video series should be shared with the public too, fulfilling the promise I made back in 2016; like those Peaks projects, Mirrors has been years in the works.

By the end of October, I would also love to tackle a long-brewing avant-garde video montage idea involving Watership Down and Brideshead Revisited or, if that doesn't gel, maybe another Mirrors of Kane chapter involving Bernstein; wouldn't his wistful ferry speech provide a wonderful note on which to end this period? Unfortunately, this goal seems unlikely to be reached given my busy on- and offline schedule this weekend and early next week, especially, and unexpectedly if beneficially in other ways, the offline schedule. Meanwhile on Patreon, the Episode 100 finale of my patron podcast (composed of a dozen films in focus which have already been previewed for a higher tier) has long been completed but I've been waiting to release it until everything else has been published for the month. Additionally, I'd like to offer a couple more rewards just for patrons: a character study for the $1/month tier and an exclusive film review for the $5/month tier. Going forward, those will probably be the regular monthly rewards for those tiers (with back halves of bonus Twin Peaks Conversations sometimes replacing the film review for $5/month patrons) and I'll record a new Patreon welcome video reflecting this as well.

So far nothing has really worked out as expected, but maybe I can finally hit the target with these last offerings. Thanks for hanging in there and I hope you enjoy the end of October with me.