Resuming and then pausing my character series once again, I knew I could not reach the end of my Twin Peaks projects as originally planned - so instead my focus shifted to wrapping up non-Twin Peaks work. After fifteen years of writing and five years of podcasting, I offered my final public prose and audio reflections on cinema in the last days and even hours before the November 1 deadline set years ago. Though Peaks work and perhaps general video essays would continue, this marked the end of an era.
My public conclusions included an elegiac reflection on the all-about-aging Up series, a discussion with old friend Sam Juliano (whose own film site started at the same time as mine), an episode on Stalker closing off several weeks of a Sight & Sound miniseries and two years of my Lost in the Movies feed, and The Curious Case of Benjamin Button as a climax for my "Unseen" series related in many ways - onscreen and off - to the passage of time; meanwhile, on Patreon I signed off my longtime podcast approach with a hundredth episode containing a dozen films in focus.
As an appropriate bridge between the twilight of my public film writing and the dawn of patron-exclusive essays, I'm going to cheat a bit by highlighting two pieces which come together to form one: Barbie & Oppenheimer and September 2023 Patreon round-up: EXCLUSIVE - More thoughts on "Barbenheimer" & Podcast Episode 100 Feedback + ADVANCE - TWIN PEAKS Character Series entry.
JULY
For each year of my online work, a Twin Peaks and non-Twin Peaks piece
Although limited in scope, the Log Lady's screentime (and thus, my original entry) expands significantly for season three
This lowlife is a survivor, but that may not be enough when attempting to double cross a man with nine lives
Plainspoken and bewildered, the Buckhorn police detective offers a counterpoint to the eccentric FBI agents investigating his fishing buddy for murder
Notes on the duo who dominate the early part of Fire Walk With Me but nothing before nor after
A tough, savvy, and fairminded boss finds himself embroiled in an odd employee's drama with massive implication for his insurance business
Paired as a meme that became a real-life phenomenon, two massive but wildly different summer blockbusters - the comedic adventures of a doll in the real world and the tragic downfall of an atomic scientist - are reviewed side by side after I screened a double feature
Thanks to his humorous cameo in The Return, a brief update to the old entry is in order
Although absent from season three, Annie's extended presence in Mark Frost's book The Final Dossier demands an update to the original study
AUGUST
Notes on one of the old show's silliest characters
From menacing to magnanimous, these gangster brothers' full arc lends itself well to the character series format
Continuing to preview upcoming character studies, I reach entries which would remain publicly unreleased at the end of 2023
Notes on a scoundrel whose story concludes offscreen before the third season
A whirlwind of a personality who finds both pleasure and purpose when her "husband" returns home from his lost weekend as - literally - a changed man
Notes on the archvillain of season two, long gone and all but forgotten in The Return
What a revision this character required, as a cannabis entrepreneur lost in the woods!
Notes on one of Sheryl Lee's many faces, in this case limited to the original series
An anthology of artists whose onscreen appearances and offscreen bios illuminate a wide world beyond Peaks' narrative focus
Time to pause once again, for much longer than initially expected
SEPTEMBER
Realizing that my latest plan is falling apart, I consider how to approach both Peaks and non-Peaks work going forward
My monthly round-up is dominated by advances of work which would go public within a few months (as well as a character study which won't)
A group of Peaks commentators gather to answer enigmatic and open-ended questions spanning all aspects of the series
Launching one last public podcast hurrah with an exploration of "greatest films of all time" I've never covered before (accompanied by a long list of links to those I have)
The co-host of Twin Peaks Peeks shares her thoughts on Chantal Akerman's poll-topping avant-garde opus which I watched for the first time before this discussion
Yet another marker of time's passage, reminding me that the epoch which birthed my blogging is truly coming to a close
OCTOBER
Launching a new Patreon reward structure involving monthly exclusives for the $5/month tier, my continued reflections on Barbie and Oppenheimer involve the previous works of Christopher Nolan and Greta Gerwig, the films' unusual zeitgeist- and generation-spanning vibes, and how/why the pop phenomenon of their fusion came about
Another film I'd never seen before: Billy Budd meets the French Legion in a moody late nineties meditation
What I hope to achieve with a few weeks remaining in my revised schedule
The last first-time viewing of this miniseries, an Iranian documentary blurring the line between fact, fiction, and re-creation as it studies a struggling, eccentric cinephile posing as an auteur
My first Harry Potter viewing, wildly out of franchise context while placed within the larger context of its historical period
Forming a neat bookend with the online public film writing begun when it was released, the movie about a man aging backwards punctuates a series I've been writing backwards
This time a silent classic I'm quite familiar with, but had not discussed before, fills the Sight & Sound slot with a tonally/stylistically adventurous marital melodrama (and comedy?)
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Anna Karina and a dark horse provide the perfect illustration for a goodbye to my longtime traditions
Exploring the early years of Sam's site (and partnership with Allan Fish), the content of his new novels, and his thoughts on recent films and their Oscar odds, this talk provides an appropriate coda for my own online history as well
Trancelike in its dystopian minimalism, Andrei Tarkovsky's last Soviet film has long fascinated me although it eluded my Favorites series and any of my other online commentary...until now
On the cusp of my fortieth birthday, I observe individuals who find themselves on the other side of middle age in the latest entry of the Up project (whose earlier entries did make my Favorites list); this is the final work of director Michael Apted who passed away after its completion.
NOVEMBER
Spanning months of work and many hours of material, this grand finale closes off a half-decade patron podcast and yearlong decade series with a bang, concluding with the poignancy of The Fabelmans' youthful, optimistic ending which points toward a future now in the past
Final flourishes of this period include a couple entries for abandoned TV viewing diaries, leaving no stone unturned in my backlog...
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