Back in Twin Peaks, the sheriff's station still has klutzy, whiny-voiced Lucy working the front desk, and hapless (and useless as ever), deputy Andy Brennan, sporting an absurdly high cowlick, along with a middle-aged paunch. Not being terribly good actors, and lacking their youthful charm of the 90's, their return hasn't been particularly delightful. The new element, though, is that they have a son named Wally Brando. In fact, in this episode they are just receiving the news that Wally Brando (always mentioned by full name) has just arrived in town. You see, Wally Brando is a soul of the road. He rides his motorcycle hither and yon following his heart on an ongoing discovery of the American spirit. Lucy and Andy are proud of him for it the same way that the parents would be for an olympic medal or Nobel prize winner.
Joke 1 is that Wally Brando is decked out in a perfect replica of Marlon Brando's biker from The Wild One (1953), and joke 2 is that he's played by Michael Cera. Joke 3, the cruelest of all, is that Lynch graces us with a five minute (feels like twenty) soliloquy by Wally Brando, motionless, with Andy and Lucy looking on admiringly from his side, a seriously-delivered but cliché- and pablum-laden discourse on the truth and goodness of the great American highway.
Like I say, noone's laughing yet it's funny as hell. Michael Cera doesn't even ride the motorcycle, just sits on it.
The rest of the episode is similarly light in flavor, compared to the macabre dimension-travelling of the previous. Agent Cooper's earthly persona is still mentally incapacitated, and having replaced the Cooper lookalike "Dougie", he is still assumed to be Dougie by those around him. He pretty much just bumbles around like Peter Seller's Chance the gardener from Being There.
The dangerous hood Cooper character is now in jail, having been found with firearms and drugs in his wrecked car. This turns out to be the Cooper that the FBI locates, not Dougie. They have an interview with him, in which the jailed Cooper does a very leaden impression of the real Agent Dale Cooper, with obviously rehearsed lines, which fools the FBI not one bit. In the meantime, we're given a major reveal about who this Cooper is (although it's been pretty strongly hinted). It's Bob.
He is Bob! Eager for fun. He wears a smile. Everybody run.
- One-Armed Man, Season 1
Somewhere back in Twin Peaks history there was a scene where Cooper stared in a mirror and suddenly thrust his forehead right into the glass. In the cracked, bloodied mirror, his reflection is Bob. We also see the two of them together in the red room, laughing maniacally together like satanic frat brothers. So the conclusion is that Bob took over Cooper's body, trapped Cooper's real identity in the Red Room, and has been running amok for the last 25 years. Something's doesn't line up, though; Bob isn't inhabiting a being for evil (such as killing one's own Prom Queen daughter), he's more of a hit man for organized crime.
Andy Brennan, Wally Brando and Lucy Brennan
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