"David Lynch, Twin Peaks, and the American Art of Television", took a decades-long and circuitous path through which, "Twin Peaks Got Lost, and Found Its Way Back" with the series reconceived in 2017 in the midst of the abundance of cinematic, high-production-value, longform television. Rather than a recreation of the concerns, technical form and approach of the groundbreaking 1990 original David Lynch and Mark Frost Twin Peaks network television series "‘The High Point of TV as a Medium’: David Lynch’s Twin Peaks May Never be Bettered", the Twin Peaks: The Return miniseries advanced the art beyond the standards of what one would expect even in the current environment of longform streaming content. Dispensing with much of its self-referential observations on network soap opera television, "In ‘Twin Peaks: The Return,’ an Old Log Learns Some New Tricks", instead exhibiting the director's love of classic film, expressed in the series' cornucopia of references to cinema history, "David Lynch Weaves Film History into ‘Twin Peaks: The Return’".
As it aired, The Return delivered a weekly viewing that watched like nothing else, before it or since, producing more of an experience than just television, "Beautiful, Grandiose, Cryptic, and Punishingly Tedious: That's Why 'Twin Peaks: The Return' is So Beguiling". For those who followed the weekly installments of the miniseries on Showtime, there was an ebullient assembly of critical interpretation, enhancement and viewing aids, documented by Criterion via their ongoing "Twin Peaks Returns" column. Expertly insightful weekly recaps could be found on Mubi, The New York Times (concluding with a serving of weekly "donuts") and The Guardian, for those who were looking to delve deeper. Now nearly a decade since "David Lynch Returned to Twin Peaks", the miniseries remains a work to unlock and decode, offering up thematic and technical wonders to savor and rediscover. These lasting qualities earned it the Best Film of the Decade status on the iconic cinephile publication, "Cahiers du Cinéma Named ‘Twin Peaks: The Return’ the Best Film of the Decade, TV Be Damned". This month, the theatrical presentation of this most cinematic of series will see screenings in Seattle, showing at The Beacon Cinema alongside The Grand Illusion Cinema programming the totality of the series in episodes at Northwest Film Forum and SIFF Cinema.
