Twin Peaks

How can ‘Twin Peaks’ be considered postmodern?

The term ‘postmodern’ describes an approach to culture which sees all texts as being intertextual and having meaning shown in a media conscious way, rather than representative of a realistic state. As reality is increasingly mediated, the boundaries between reality and media-reality are blurred. ‘Postmodernism’ can be referenced to describe a number of concepts such as visual style over content, fragmentation, genre blurring and confusion over time and space.

            One particular American television drama called ‘Twin Peaks’ can be described as postmodern due to many of the characteristics it contains. Audiences would describe this cult classic as ‘confusing’ but that is a major element concerned with postmodernism, and confusions over time and space is a recurring feature that is pushed to the limits. There are very sudden cuts between scenes throughout episodes of ‘Twin Peaks’ meaning that in some places they are stopped short and there becomes a jump to the next one. This alone causes confusion for the audience over what is happening at what time, and whether all of these situations are taking place at once, it also disrupts the audience’s viewing. Lyotard’s postmodern theory concerning meta-narratives can be applied to ‘Twin Peaks’ because in this instance they do not work. The meta-narratives that appear in the television drama are not believable or viewed as particularly realistic which links to the postmodern characteristic of confusion and blurring boundaries.

            Intertextuality appears in ‘Twin Peaks’ frequently. Intertextuality describes the inclusion of texts that refer to or reflect each other, in other words a text within another media text. However in this television drama it might not be obvious to the audience when intertextuality appears. It is introduced mostly through character names which are taken from existing beings, for example the series murder victim Laura is loosely based around a character from the 1950’s noir film ‘Laura’. Despite just the name being the same, a number of their characteristics are also similar. Another example is the brothers Ben and Jerry, named after the ice-cream called ‘Ben and Jerry’s’ and ironically these brothers are food-obsessed. A character called Audrey Horne, who is used to getting her own way, has a style and appearance which reflects that of Marilyn Monroe. She is only supposed to be a teenager, so for a girl of this age to be dressing in such a way and having that particular style is not something that is recognised in many other television dramas in different eras. ‘Twin Peaks’ was broadcast in the 1990s; a long time after Marilyn Monroe was on our screens.

            Other ‘postmodern’ characteristics appear throughout the episodes such as taking a dream and making it appear to be real. FBI Agent Cooper dreams about who murdered the character Laura Palmer, but the whole thing is very fragmented and confusing because none of it makes much sense, however it is still realistic to an extent. The concept of visual style over content can be applied to the brothel scene because there is no actual content, but the flesh-baring women are visually pleasing for the viewer, particularly men, which is why only male characters enter the brothel in the scene. The music is repetitive with only slight changes that keep returning to the same part which is typically ‘postmodern’. This can either become boring for the audience or they get drawn into it and forget about the music, in some ways it enhances the action because of the general feel of the programme and the music matches this. Early on in one episode when Laura Palmer had recently been murdered, Agent Cooper was trying to solve the crime by throwing rocks at bottles. If he hit the bottle, then whoever had been associated with it was a suspect. This is a completely unrealistic and ridiculous way to solve a murder, especially when it is such a serious crime.

            Most people would say that ‘Twin Peaks’ is confusing, strange and not realistic at all, but that is just due to the charming ‘postmodern’ qualities and characteristics it contains. Media texts which have these ‘postmodern’ elements within them are becoming increasingly more popular with audiences after the creation of other television programmes such as ‘Lost’, ‘X Files’ and ‘Mighty Boosh’. In essence these characteristics are almost expected by the audience because we are so used to seeing them; this just was not the case for ‘Twin Peaks’ at the time it was broadcast so they were not appreciated.