Yes, you are right, this is a bit too much for short notes and fleshed-out observations. At least I will give nothing away. A series backed by the rise of home computers and letting time go by till the world wide web is running our communication, is a bit far away from the mysteries of Twin Peaks and The Leftovers, yet these three peaks of modern TV history have more in common than first impressions suggest.
The Leftovers, Twin Peaks and Halt And Catch Fire are are all about systems of belief; it may be a version of the future made in Silicon Valley, it may be the loss and sadness and things left enigmatic in the small world of Twin Peaks. What are the things people turn to explain the inexplicable and why?
Whether you believe a giant egg in a volcano is going to hatch a monster that will end the world or that a series of aboriginal songs are the key to stopping the impending flood of the earth, belief systems help make sense of the narratives that we construct for ourselves and serve as a coping mechanism when we come face to face with things we cannot understand.
(There are people reading these lines believing there is a god, the great beyond, others think with dry sarcasm that the creator might not have a masterplan, but for sure, offshore, a decent amount of Paradise Papers.)
The four central characters of Halt And Catch Fire have to deal with similar riddles as the traumatized inhabitants of Twin Peaks and Miracle. The stories they tell themselves come with a prize, and will probably (I stay deliberately vague here) end up in tears. Or a quiet, knowing smile. Does anyone believe in a shining future? It‘s all about illusions lost, illusions found. It‘s all about that Lou Reed / Velvet Underground song Brian Eno covered at the end of The Ship, the end of another story about the end of a world different from the one we seemed to have known. To be honest, knowing smiles are rarely happening here. Jacks had one, different story, on his last motorcycle tour, in the final scene of Sons of Anarchy. Oh, and, if anyone thinks this all is about entertainment, then he’s riding the wrong horse.
K
(a remix of three texts, I saw two of these shows till the final curtain, I‘m waiting for Twin Peaks‘ Third season since 1990, and it will finally arrive at my Electric Cinema after Nikolaus. m.e.)