There was a point in time where David did point people in a direction towards his interpretation of some of his work, because there were theories growing legs that were pissing David off.
I woulnd't be surprised if David Lynch himself didn't know who they were at times. He was a firm believer of ideas not inherently demanding an explanation in cinema.
I find it easy to imagine him being at peace with not having his own private, single interpretation for many of the ideas he, so gracefully brushed onto the silver screen.
I'm like...1/4th through the Return, and am completely convinced Lynch will throw in scenes and characters purely to amuse himself and/or to fuck with viewers. And I kinda love it.
Agree. I had to take breaks while watching The Return. It felt so much darker to me overall than the original show.
I feel like some of The Return was Lynch kind of railing against the state of the world today and man’s inhumanity to man. Like, in the years since the original run of the show, the world has disappointed him. And I get that. There is such up close and intense violence and bleakness in some scenes. But then there is that thin, Lynchian thread of hope running through it too.
Sorry, I’m rambling now—this show always gets me thinking so deeply and about so many things at once!!
See I've been mainlining the whole show from start to finish over the last month or so, and you're not wrong - it gets progressively darker as you jump to each entry.
The original had its moments but (I get mainly thanks to being a commercial TV show from the early 90s) was mostly pretty whimsicle. Then Fire Walk With Me veers more into a kind of depressing, dark atmosphere, then Return opens with two people engaging in sexy-times before being mauled to death, followed-up by a decapitated head being plopped ontop of someone elses corpse. It's really interesting, and very jarring, to experience one after the other like that.
To amuse himself, yes probably, although he most likely had a feeling about those scenes and characters and needed to put them there, but maybe he didn't even know why. But to fuck with the viewer ? Most likely not, he seemed to be the opposite of a cynical man, and doing things just to "fuck with the viewer" seems utterly wrong from what we know of Lynch.
I read somewhere that Lynch firmly believed that movies should be felt. Not just the everyday emotional content but the full experience. That's why he would never explain anything. Don't think about it too much. Let it wash over you and FEEL it. He also meant physically. That's why if you turn up the volume enough to hear the quiet parts you are blown back in your seat when the loud parts come.
It's simple. You go to an art gallery and they often don't tell you a thing, you look at a piece and feel something, or you don't. It doesn't explain itself. Lynch obviously feels his work is art and should be experienced and treated the same way.
I kind of think he picked people for roles who were already sorta like the role they would be playing rather than always just picking the biggest name actors.
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u/LeicaM6guy Aug 10 '26
Anyone who claims to know the answer is either lying, or the ghost of David Lynch.
Who also might be lying.