As promised, my main patron podcast quickly got back on schedule after weeks of delay for the July episode. However, the biggest August event on Patreon was the grand conclusion of my Lost in Twin Peaks podcast, with a nine-part Fire Walk With Me episode which stretched into September (the daily uploads are still wrapping up in the next couple days, but I'm including all nine entries here in this August round-up for clarity's sake - evening update: there are now twelve, not nine, parts planned). In a month I will begin publicly unveiling my entire Twin Peaks series breakdown, from the pilot through the season three finale, but this film will not be available on a public feed until the thirtieth anniversary of its Cannes premiere in May. So if you want to hear these hours of commentary, now is the time to become a $5/month patron - plus you'll be able to listen to extended conversations with other Peaks commentators every month going forward as this tier switches to a new format.
The main episode tackles another Nicholas Ray film after casting a Peaks spotlight on Rebel Without a Cause in January. In this case, Bigger Than Life's dark portrait of a "possessed" patriarch makes a fascinating companion piece with Fire Walk With Me in particular, which is why it was chosen for this month. The film's grim social portrait also suits other aspects of this podcast, like my political reflections section in which I delve into the disappointments and frustrations (if not yet full-on despair) facing the left and the country as a whole this summer...and that's without even getting into the Delta variant or Covid vaccine culture wars! The episode ends with a reading from Greil Marcus' The Shape of Things to Come, a gorgeous sketch of American exhaustion that seemed apropos, not least because it describes a single frame from the Fat Trout Trailer Park sequence in Fire Walk With Me - a location that is also part of my "Twin Peaks Reflections" this month.
My coverage of Fire Walk With Me was split into many parts because it was so long (dwarfing even my finale episode) but this also serves as a preview of how I'll be repackaging the previous episodes when the show goes public, presenting sections like "historical context" or "my archives" as standalones for listeners particularly interested in a deep dive. Here, the heart of the episode(s) are numbers seven and nine: called "Laura Palmer" and "The Mysteries," they dive deeply into the rich subject of her onscreen journey and what this means in the larger context of Twin Peaks, expanding on ideas I've previously touched upon in video essays and other media. (Initially, these two episodes were intended to be one and described as one in this passage, which I've now revised.) The entries consisting almost entirely of readings from work (my own or others') previously published or quoted on this site are free to all listeners.
Finally, for $1/month patrons, I've opened up my discussion of "episode 24" which I consider one of the series' more underrated, in which the world of Twin Peaks is saturated with a fresh springtime feeling before we are swept toward the dark finale and, ultimately, the film.
Podcast Line-Ups for...
