You may resume that icky tingle that was crawling up your spines, “Twin Peaks” devotees. Psychokiller Bob is not back to creep you out yet, but he’s one step closer — because David Lynch is.
After quitting the reboot of America’s noirest of TV noir miniseries from the 1990s over a salary standoff, Lynch said in a tweet late Friday that the deal’s back on, and Showtime confirmed it.
Lynch is back in the director’s chair.
Both parties unfurled allusions to the original series in their announcements on Twitter.
“Dear Twitter Friends, the rumors are not what they seem ….. It is !!! Happening again. #TwinPeaks returns on @SHO_Network,” Lynch tweeted.
‘It is happening again’
In the series, “It is happening again” was a warning of looming psychopathic carnage delivered in slow bass tones by a lanky, pale, spirit world character. The other phrase is a reference to the repeated line, “The owls are not what they seem.” (Its creepiness needs no explaining).
“It’s happening again!! #Showtime will be serving up some #damngoodcoffee! #TwinPeaks returns with @DAVID_LYNCH & @mfrost11,” Showtime tweeted.
The signature quote is from protagonist, FBI Agent Dale Cooper, “This is, excuse me, a damn fine cup of coffee.” “Damn good coffee” ended up on fan T-shirts.
Cooper was played by Kyle MacLachlan, who has confirmed his reappearance in the reboot. But he’s the only one so far.
Creepiness and love
In the original ABC series, the squeaky clean, all-American Cooper dispatches to the Pacific Northwest small town of Twin Peaks, a metaphor for American wholesomeness gone by. As he investigates the murder of high school beauty Laura Palmer — whose bluish corpse haunts the series with necrophiliac undertones — the logging town reveals its twisted underbelly.
In intimate moments, characters relive deep horror and confess longing in soft voices pushed by sentimental, yet ominous, musical scores.
And beneath it all beckons a surrealistic afterlife realm.
The parallel layers of reality and unreality, coupled with multiple characters and plot lines, angered and confused some viewers while hooking others who craved the next insane installment.
Their fixes ended after Season 2.
The reboot
Showtime announced a reboot — a Season 3 — but recently, Lynch walked away, saying he felt the network was not offering enough money to produce the sequel in a fitting way.
Lynch tweeted the bad news, and said he had personally called the actors to let them know he had backed away from directing the nine-episode comeback.
The stars teamed up for a video backing the show’s co-creator with a #SaveTwinPeaks campaign that says doing the revival without Lynch is “like pies without cherries,” among other nods to the original drama series.
Sherilyn Fenn, Sheryl Lee, James Marshall, Peggy Lipton and other familiar faces from the series appear in the video. (Some members also set up a Facebook page.)
Showtime Network, which will air the nine-episode comeback, had hinted back then that the door was still open and that it would strive for a deal.