‘Twin Peaks’ Lost Ending Was So Good, David Lynch Rewrote the Show Around It
Twin Peaks was a seminal, groundbreaking mystery-horror series that was unlike anything shown on television before, when it debuted on ABC in April 1990. Believe it or not, there is a lost ending to the original pilot movie of Twin Peaks that was not available in the U.S. until years after it was made. The alternate ending, produced for the European video release, was created to sell the project directly to video in Europe as a standalone feature film if the television series was not picked up. The alternate ending solves the macabre mystery surrounding Laura Palmer’s (Sheryl Lee) murder right off the bat! Although the ending was constructed for a completely different audience, once Twin Peaks received a series television order, co-creator David Lynch was so pleased with the European version that he ended up rewriting the show utilizing the footage. It’s time to unpack the lost ending of Twin Peaks!
How Laura Palmer’s Murder Was Originally Solved
Before ABC gave Twin Peaks the green light for a series order, the production shot additional scenes and footage for the pilot movie, which included an alternate ending that immediately solves the murder of Laura Palmer. As co-creator Mark Frost explained to Entertainment Weekly in an oral history of Twin Peaks, the alternate ending was the result of the production making a separate deal with their distributor, who wanted a two-hour closed-end version of the pilot for a European video release and a potential theatrical release as well. The murder of Laura Palmer became the driving force of the series and catapulted Twin Peaks into a global television event, but the European ending quickly resolves her murder, revealing the mysterious Bob (Frank Silva) as Laura’s killer! The sequence depicts the one-armed man, Philip Michael Gerard (Al Strobel), aka Mike, summoning FBI Agent Dale Cooper (Kyle MacLachlan) and Sheriff Harry S. Truman (Michael Ontkean) to the hospital. Mike identifies the demonic Bob as Laura’s killer, as well as Bob’s whereabouts in the hospital basement.
The trio then confronts Bob, who appears to be performing a ritual in his basement lair, promising that he will kill once again. Cooper and Truman watch as a furious Mike guns down Bob before collapsing. The scene then transitions to a mysterious dream with Agent Cooper in the Black Lodge, with a subtitle that reads, “25 years later.” An older Cooper sees the mysterious figure, The Man From Another Place (Michael J. Anderson), sitting next to Laura Palmer. The European ending immediately solved Laura’s murder, but it still raises more questions than answers through Mike and the enigmatic Bob. Since Twin Peaks eventually received a full television series order, it allowed Lynch and Frost to utilize the footage they shot for the overseas video release to reshape their television masterpiece.
The Alternate Ending Becomes Part of the Ongoing Mystery
The creation of a closed ending for Twin Peaks inspired Lynch and Frost to take a path they never originally intended. As Lynch explained to Entertainment Weekly in the Twin Peaks oral history about the alternate ending, “Sometimes being forced into a corner is not a bad thing.” The footage Mike and Bob shot for the European video release was re-edited and reincorporated into later episodes of the first season. The scenes were recontextualized for the later episodes in the first season after the pilot. The scenes from the hospital instead depict Mike and Bob speaking to Cooper in his dreams. Additionally, the epilogue scene portraying an older Cooper with Laura Palmer and The Man From Another Place in the Black Lodge’s “Red Room” became one of Cooper’s dreams he seeks to understand in investigating Laura’s murder. Although Bob appears as a creepy flesh-and-blood human being in the European ending, the television series reimagines Bob as an incorporeal, demonic spirit. Bob, aka Killer BOB, is later revealed as a malevolent spiritual entity who haunts and preys on the innocent throughout history. Later, the series reveals BOB as the spiritual demon that possesses Leland Palmer (Ray Wise), influencing Leland’s sexual assault and murder of his own daughter, Laura.
The “Red Room” or “Waiting Area” of the Black Lodge became a crucial aspect of the mythology of the series. The murder of Laura Palmer gave way to even deeper and more intricate mysteries involving alternate dimensions and metaphysical entities, beyond human understanding. Essentially, the ending Lynch conceived for the European release enabled one of the show’s most famous and striking images, depicting the red-curtained room with a zigzag black and white patterned floor. All the footage that was shot to give the series a more definitive, closed ending for the European movie release instead became integral to the grander mystery for the remainder of the series. The epilogue of an older Cooper in the Red Room 25 years later in the Black Lodge pays off once again near the end of the series, setting up what would eventually happen in the third and final season with Twin Peaks: The Return.
What If Twin Peaks Never Became a Series?
It’s interesting to imagine what if Twin Peaks had never become a television series. Would it still possess the same enduring power as it enjoyed with its short-lived run as a television series and its later prequel movie, Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me? Rather, fans would’ve had an eerily strange, yet unique, direct-to-video movie, with Laura Palmer’s murder solved immediately. Bob is revealed and killed by Mike, and it still ends with that strange dream sequence of older Agent Cooper in the Red Room meeting Laura’s spirit and The Man From Another Place. Despite resolving Laura’s murder, the alternate ending still raises numerous questions that are left unanswered.
In the early 1990s, everyone wanted to know, “Who killed Laura Palmer?” However, the true strength of Twin Peaks lies in its mystery rather than the resolution. The murder of Laura Palmer only served as a gateway into deeper, more bizarre events that still capture the imaginations of television viewers to this day. Sadly, Lynch passed away earlier this year, but he created something indelible with Twin Peaks that will continue to be discussed, debated, and analyzed for years to come. The ending Lynch conceived for the European release also proves that sometimes artistic roadblocks inspire even greater, more fascinating creative solutions.
Twin Peaks is available to stream on Paramount+ in the U.S.
