Episode 29 (Twin Peaks)

"Episode 29", also known as "Beyond Life and Death", is the 30th and final episode of the mystery television series Twin Peaks. It first aired on June 10, 1991.^[1]

Plot synopsis

Andy and Lucy console each other after the chaotic Miss Twin Peaks contest where Annie was kidnapped by Windom Earle. Cooper, Harry, and Hawk stare at the map, as Cooper mumbles "Fire, walk with me." Pete Martell enters the police station and says the Log Lady stole his truck and drove off toward the woods. Cooper informs Pete that was Windom Earle in disguise. The Log Lady arrives, and says her husband gave her a bottle of oil from a gateway in the woods. The jar smells like scorched engine oil. Hawk brings in Ronnette Pulaski, who recognizes the smell from the night of Laura Palmer's murder.

Earle arrives in a dark, wooded grove with Annie, who is quietly reciting part of Psalm 141.^[2] They reach a circle of trees and vanish behind a red curtain.

At the Hurley house, Ed, Norma, and Doc Hayward bandage Nadine Hurley and Mike Nelson's injuries. Nadine suddenly regains her memory, and is horrified to see Ed with Norma. She hollers about the missing drape runners and bursts into tears, very upset over Ed and Norma, while Mike apologies to Ed for letting his tryst with Nadine go too far.

At the Hayward house, Donna is distraught, having learned Ben is her blood father. Ben and Donna's mother try to console her. Doc Hayward arrives and orders Ben out of his house. Ben's wife arrives and begins arguing with him. Angered, Doc Hayward punches Ben. Ben slams his head on the fireplace and he collapses, twitching and bleeding.

At the Blue Pine Lodge, Andrew grabs the safe deposit box key and sneaks off, while Pete finds him and wants in on what he plans to do.

Cooper and Harry find Pete's truck in the woods. They walk partly into the forest when Cooper says he must continue alone, leaving Harry behind. Cooper hears an owl and sees the pool of oil ringed by rocks in a circle of small trees. Harry watches Cooper disappear behind a red curtain which magically appears and then disappears.

Cooper walks into the mysterious red-curtained room from his dream. There are couches, a zig-zag pattern on the floor, and some statues. The Man from Another Place dances into the room and sits in an old chair. Jimmy Scott sings a sad jazz tune as a strobe light flickers.

Andy arrives in the forest to join Harry. They wait all night, and after over 10 hours, Cooper does not emerge.

Meanwhile, Audrey walks into the Twin Peaks Savings & Loan bank and chains herself to the bank vault, in protest of the Ghostwood project and its environmental effect on the forest weasel. The old, senile, and slow-moving bank president, Dell Mibbler, fetches Audrey a glass of water, but is slow to understand what Audrey is doing. Just then, Andrew and Pete arrive with the safe deposit key, intending to open the box left by Thomas Eckhart. Andrew asks the bank president for help in identifying the proper box in the bank vault. The elderly bank president walks away as Andrew opens the box to find a bomb, which is triggered by the safe deposit box opening. Along with the bomb is a taunting note reading: "Got you, Andrew! Love, Thomas." It explodes, blowing out the bank windows. The clerk's glasses and some money fall on a nearby pine branch.

At the RR diner, Bobby and Shelly smile at each other. Bobby proposes marriage to Shelly, while she asks to think about it considering she is still married to Leo, who at that moment is still holding out in Windom Earle's spider trap. Nearby, Major Briggs and his wife are at a table, happy to be back together. Dr. Jacoby arrives with a dazed-looking Sarah Palmer who delivers a message to Major Briggs, recanting in a garbled voice: "I'm in the Black Lodge with Dale Cooper." "I'm waiting for you."

In the Black Lodge, the red-suited, backwards-talking Man from Another Place tells Cooper they are in a waiting room and offers Cooper some coffee. The Man from Another Place tells Cooper, "when you see me again, it won't be me." Laura Palmer appears, saying she will see Cooper again in 25 years. The elderly and senile bellhop appears and brings coffee to Cooper. He is replaced by the giant who sits down, saying, "one and the same." The Man from Another Place rubs his hands. Cooper starts to drink the coffee only to find it frozen solid. He tips the cup, and some of it pours out. The last time it is like syrup. The Man from Another Place says "Wow, BOB, wow. Fire walk with me." Cooper leaves the room, entering another one that looks exactly the same. He returns to the first room, where The Man from Another Place says "wrong way." Cooper goes back to the second room. He sees The Man from Another Place laughing saying, "another friend". Maddy appears, says "watch out for my cousin," then disappears.

Cooper returns to the first room to find it completely empty. An evil-looking Man from Another Place appears, with his eyes carracted white, says "doppelganger" and twitches. An evil-looking Laura doppleganger appears says "meanwhile" and screams. Scared, Cooper runs out of the room, returning to the other one. He is bleeding from the chest and has trailed blood on the floor. He stumbles back to the first room, and sees a woman lying on the floor beside his own body. The woman is Annie, bloodied by a chest wound.

A little later, Cooper walks into a room with a shrine-like table to see Annie. She says she saw the face of the man who killed her: it was her husband. She does not respond to the name Annie, it is actually Caroline: Cooper is confusing the two.

Caroline is replaced by Laura, and then Windom Earle. Annie watches as Windom and Cooper face off and then disappears. Windom laughs, and says if Cooper gives him his soul, he will let Annie live. Cooper says 'yes', and Windom Earle stabs Cooper. There is a burst of flame and Cooper's stabbing is undone. BOB takes control of Windom Earle, saying he cannot ask for Cooper's soul, and will take Windom's soul instead. After a burst of flame, Windom Earle goes silent, apparently dead. Cooper leaves the room and an evil doppelganger of Cooper appears from behind the curtain, laughing with BOB.

The doppelganger Leland Palmer, with brown hair, appears in the hall between the two rooms and says "I did not kill anybody." The doppelganger Cooper comes into the hall and laughs with Leland. He faces the camera and grins. The good Cooper tries to escape the lodge, but his doppelganger apprehends him. BOB's face briefly appears, laughing at the camera.

At nightfall, Harry finds Cooper and Annie's bodies lying in the forest by the circle of trees as the red curtained gateway to the Black Lodge disappears.

Cooper wakes up in his bed at the Great Northern Hotel. Cooper asks about Annie, and Harry tells him that Annie is at the hospital and will be all right. Cooper gets up out of bed and tells Harry and Doc Hayward that he needs to brush his teeth. Once in the bathroom, he begins to put toothpaste on a brush, but then squeezes the tube's contents into the sink. He slowly raises his head, looks into the mirror and smashes his head into it, bloodying the glass. BOB's face appears in the mirror. As Harry and Doc knock on the door in concern, Cooper maniacally repeats, "How's Annie?" and laughs uncontrollably.^[3]

Differences between original script and filmed episode

The officially-credited writers for this episode are Mark Frost, Harley Peyton, and Robert Engels. However, David Lynch revised their script significantly sans credit; he maintained the episode’s general structure but altered much of the dialogue and many scenes, most notably in the Red Room/Black Lodge sequences, making them more akin to the dream sequences in the first season. Lynch also expanded the cast, bringing back some characters who had not been seen in the series for some time.

In an interview with Chris Rodley, Lynch said that the last episode "was written, but when it came to the Red Room, it was, in my opinion, completely and totally wrong. Completely and totally wrong. And so I changed that part. A lot of the other parts were things that had been started and were on a certain route, so they had to continue. But you can still direct them in a certain way. But I really like that last episode."^[4]

The major differences between the episode as originally scripted^[5] and as actually filmed are as follows:

• The Log Lady and Ronette Pulaski, both of whom appear in the actual episode, do not appear in the original script.
• The confrontation between Benjamin Horne and the Haywards is generally the same, although there is more dialogue in the original script. Also, in the original script, Doc Hayward shoves Ben, who strikes his head against a coffee table; a distraught Doc Hayward rushes to Ben's aid and apologises to him. In the filmed episode, Doc Hayward punches Ben, who splits his head against the fireplace; Doc Hayward reacts with terror and does not rush to Ben's aid.
• In the original script, Hawk and Major Briggs find Leo Johnson in Windom Earle's cabin. Leo instinctively begins to speak when he sees them, setting off the spider-trap set by Earle. Lynch replaced this with the scene in the Double R Diner featuring Bobby, Shelly, Major Briggs, Mrs Briggs, Dr Jacoby, Sarah Palmer, and Heidi the German waitress. With the exception of Major Briggs, none of these characters appear in the original script. In the filmed episode, Leo is only seen very briefly, via footage from the previous episode; his ultimate fate is left unresolved.
• In the original script, Pete Martell does not accompany Andrew Packard into the bank. Instead, Catherine Martell rushes into the bank just before Andrew accidentally sets off the bomb. Catherine does not appear at all in the filmed episode, and in the original script, Pete’s only appearance is in the Sheriff’s station at the beginning of the episode.
• In the original script, Sheriff Truman sees a vision of a dark woman wearing chain mail, holding a sword and a shield.
• The sequences in the Black Lodge are almost totally different in the original script: Windom Earle has much more dialogue; there is no backwards-talking; Laura Palmer appears only for an instant and does not speak; and The Black Lodge Singer, The Man from Another Place, the Giant, the Elderly Bellhop, Maddy Ferguson, and Leland Palmer do not appear. Windom Earle’s fate is less abrupt; he ends up shackled to a dentist’s chair with BOB as the torturer.
• The revelation at episode’s end that Cooper is now inhabited by BOB is more subtle in the original script. In the bathroom scene, Cooper squeezes toothpaste onto his toothbrush, looks to the mirror and smiles, with BOB’s reflection smiling back; the episode ends at this point. In the filmed episode, Cooper squeezes the toothpaste into the sink, sees BOB’s reflection in the mirror, smashes his head into the mirror, says "How’s Annie?" repeatedly, and laughs uncontrollably.

References

External links

• "Episode 29" at the Internet Movie Database
• "Episode 29" at TV.com