Come riguardare Twin Peaks ora che la terza stagione si è conclusa

L'esaustiva guida di Digg per ricominciare Twin Peaks come in un nastro di Möbius senza perdersi neppure un indizio attraverso l'intera, onirica, esperienza televisiva, cartacea e su pellicola.

David Lynch and Mark Frost's "Twin Peaks" casts a long, owl-shaped shadow over the history of episodic television. It's not an exaggeration to say that "Twin Peaks" changed the medium, though far too many people leapfrog over that statement and try to claim that any "weird" show made after 1990 draws inspiration from Frost and Lynch. "Twin Peaks" itself tried to be a handful of different shows at once. When it succeeded at this multiplicity, "Twin Peaks" delighted, frightened, amused and utterly perplexed audiences. When it failed — and it did fail at points — the show smacked of self-parody, an unpleasant posture for a show that deftly split itself between complete sincerity and savvy genre deconstruction.

Few if any shows have come close to the same variety of tone, let alone the ability to shift from satire to gripping procedural to transcendent art to slapstick non sequitur without breaking a sweat. For much of its second season, "Twin Peaks" itself couldn't keep it up, leading to a string of dismal episodes and audience disinterest. This fall eventually damned the show to cancellation.

Even the follow up film "Fire Walk With Me" seemed to respond to the show's later messiness by focusing in on Laura, a character for whom even the rare lighter moments had dire context. The film's initial reception and performance at the box office buried the chance for the show's immediate revival. That was almost exactly twenty-five years ago.

Yesterday, "Twin Peaks" ended yet again. Summer 2017 saw the show take to Showtime for a highly anticipated third series, this time with a seemingly last-minute subtitle appended: "The Return." Unlike the original show, this iteration was written solely by Frost and Lynch, with Lynch in the director's seat for the entire 18-part run. Like the original it shattered expectations and, according to some, it surpassed the original series. Chances are slim that "Twin Peaks" will come back for another season... but that's what people said two decades ago too.

For now, the story is finished, with an ending its creators intended; let's get into it.