Feminist Issues in Twin Peaks

Twin Peaks begins with an act of horrific violence and degradation against a teenage girl. Two of them, really, though we never do think much about poor Ronette. Other women in the show are beaten, drugged, trafficked, and nearly blown up. The women of the town of Twin Peaks have abusive fathers, husbands, boyfriends, and mothers. Crucial secrets are kept from them about their own identities. Several other women are murdered. And, yes, the running plot of the part of the show that people talk about involves that same teenage girl who was betrayed at every turn and led a complicated double life as a trauma response.

It only helps so much to tally things up and note that more male characters are killed than female ones, though that’s true. What I would say, however, is that the show is consistently on the side of its abused characters, not the abusers. If you don’t take some satisfaction in watching Leo suffer, you’re either a better or far worse person than I, and Leo does suffer. Shelley may not, all things considered, get a happily-ever-after, but she’s at least free of Leo and able to make her own choices, and you are intended to be happy for her.

What’s more, I never get the feeling that you’re supposed to blame Shelley or Norma for marrying the men that they do. It’s implied that Shelley’s home life before marriage wasn’t great, and she thought marrying Leo at sixteen and dropping out of high school would be a better life. Lots of women are fooled that way. Norma made a foolish mistake in the heat of the moment, and she spends decades dealing with the fallout. Also not uncommon. And other than that one mistake, Norma is consistently shown to be one of the most intelligent, practical people in town.

It’s true that there’s something charming about the slimy, duplicitous Ben Horne, but it’s a repellent sort of charm, if that makes any sense. You can see why Sylvia married him and why she came to hate him. And Hank Jennings is able to put on a facade of being a decent human being when he has to; presumably, Leo does, too, but we never see him when he has to. Bobby Briggs is, frankly, only a teenage boy himself, and most of his negative traits stem from that and from what Laura did to him out of her own trauma. He’s the most forgivable of the lot, even if he’s not as smart as he thinks he is.

What the women are given throughout the show, however, as their most satisfying moments is a choice. Lucy deciding she doesn’t care about genetics, she cares about Andy. Audrey standing up to her uncle when her father is off fighting the Civil War in his office. Heck, even Denise deciding to live her identity as Denise—not only is “fix your hearts or die” a defense of Denise’s validity as a woman but it is a defense of the validity of her choice to continue in her career.

An underrated moment is when Hawk is talking about his girlfriend, the veterinarian from Brandeis. She’s better educated than he is and probably makes more money, and the men of the sheriff’s office admire Hawk for having such a woman in his life. Major Briggs is shown to have a good relationship with Betty, even though she’s not terribly well defined. Horrible season two plot aside, Doc Hayward and Eileen are shown in season one at least to be equally caring and considerate of one another, and I forget that season two plot as often as possible.

While there is much to dislike about Catherine Martell, it’s undeniable that she’s a competent businesswoman—what’s more, she’s running a sawmill, traditionally a masculine occupation. Norma, of course, runs the diner, one of the hubs of the town. While Norma is one of the most nurturing characters on the show, she’s also savvy at what she does, employing any number of people in a business she owns and runs herself. It’s not seen as a contradiction; they are just aspects of who Norma is.

And, yeah, you’re supposed to dislike Catherine, though she’s awfully fun to dislike. But if all the women were paragons like Norma, that wouldn’t be better. There are women you dislike, and often, you see what made them that way. Blackie was, it seems, introduced to heroin by Ben Horne, and while she probably wasn’t a great person before then, being around the Horne and Renault brothers would be bad for anyone. Josie has a dark, difficult past, and she does what she has to in order to survive, and who can blame her?

Obviously, it would’ve been better had there been any options for mental health care in town that Doc Jacoby. He wasn’t equipped for Nadine or the Log Lady; it’s clear he didn’t even get near the root of Laura’s problems, even leaving aside the supernatural angle of them. It’s not surprising that we see Sarah Palmer become an alcoholic in the third season; she has lost everything and been so devastated that it would take quite a lot to help her, and no one in town can manage it. Probably they can get their bodies cared for, but who is there to care for their minds?

And then there’s the Miss Twin Peaks pageant. Leaving aside the fact that I cannot fathom what rules would allow Lana Milford and, honestly, Lucy to enter, it appears that one of the highlights of the town’s year is a beauty pageant where entrants suffer under an emotionally abusive choreographer. So okay, it’s a plot contrivance. And there’s the fact that any winner would have to know she was actually coming in second to the ghost of Laura Palmer. It’s still a demonstration of women being judged.

Twin Peaks was not a feminist show. I’m not even sure I’d consider David Lynch a feminist. Even by Tepid Nineties Feminism standards. Still, when you scratch the surface, the women of the show deal with a lot of real-world issues, for better or worse, and some even manage to come out on top of them. Probably more would were there not bad second season plots and supernatural shenanigans forcing unhappy outcomes on characters. Maybe it’s the simpler desires that are most likely to be fulfilled, but isn’t that often the case?