POP! Television – Twin Peaks: The Log Lady

“One day my log will have something to say about this. My log saw something that night.”

In a show that’s already studded with mysteries, riddles and bizarre characters, the Log Lady still stands out as one of the most enigmatic.

Derided as crazy by most of the town of Twin Peaks, we quickly learn that the Log Lady does have some kind of psychic insight into the strange events occurring in the town. But as with everyone else who’s got something useful to say (The Giant, The Man From Another Place, Laura Palmer et al) it’s couched in highly cryptic terms. Major Briggs comes closest to getting a straight answer out of her – and probably not coincidentally, he’s the character who treats her with the most respect.   

The POP is a solid recreation of her look on the show. If I had to pin down her style to four words, I’d call it “frumpy Sally Jesse Raphael”. Back in Stranger Things week I commented on the disparity between how people now view the 80s, versus how they actually looked. Twin Peaks was set in 1989, at the tail-end of the decade, and again, the clothes look dated – but not outrageously gaudy. So really, it’s pretty typical of what more conservative middle-aged women wore at the time.

Paint is mostly neat, though make sure you check the hairline and the log – these are the likely trouble spots. It’s an all-round solid POP. But with all of this said, I suspect the Log Lady will probably be the lowest-selling figure from the Twin Peaks line. Laura Palmer and Dale Cooper are the obvious pickups, and the rest of the characters scale down accordingly. I’m all in personally, but for more casual collectors, Log Lady is easier to pass on.    

Though Catherine E. Coulson passed away in 2015, the Log Lady will reappear in the 2017 revival as she had apparently already finished filming her scenes. She wasn’t my favourite character from the ensemble, but she was always entertaining. Who knows what the Log will have to share this time?   

POP! Television – Twin Peaks: Dale Cooper

Spoiler Alert: This review contains spoilers for Twin Peaks and Fire Walk With Me. 

“You know, this is - excuse me - a damn fine cup of coffee. I've had I can't tell you how many cups of coffee in my life and this, this is one of the best. Now I'd like two eggs over hard. I know, don't tell me, it's hard on the arteries, but old habits die hard, just about as hard as I want those eggs.”

Kyle MacLachlan should be a much bigger star than he is today, up there among the George Clooneys and Brad Pitts of the world. He’s handsome, he has charisma in spades and he can act too. But as we know, things don’t always go the way they “should”*. A few dud films in the mid-90s (like The Flintstones and the notorious Showgirls) meant his star began to wane right as it really should have been ascending. Nonetheless, he’s still carved out a career that plenty of other actors would kill to have – and next month he’s going to be back on our screens in his best-loved role, Agent Dale Cooper!  

I normally loathe using the word “quirky” to describe things, but I’d say that it’s probably a fitting descriptor for Dale Cooper. He’s relentlessly cheery without being annoying, far more capable than the average man but never condescending, and totally weird without being alienating. We need more characters like him on TV. And though I love The X-Files, Mulder – the more famous FBI agent of the two – pales in comparison.

In POP form, Cooper is (naturally) depicted with a mug of coffee, and giving the thumbs up. If they ever do a second version, he’ll hopefully be holding a piece of cherry pie and/or tape recorder. Nonetheless, they’ve definitely made a good choice by going with this pose. Paintwork is solid (though check the hairline before purchasing) and the sculpt is excellent. All these factors boil down to a must-buy for fans of the series; you could pass over the others if your budget or space is limited, but Agent Cooper is essential. To paraphrase the man himself – every day, once a day, give yourself a present. Don't plan it; don't wait for it; just let it happen. It could be a new shirt in a men's store, a catnap in your office chair, or two cups of good, hot, black, coffee…or a Funko POP.

For myself, I’m planning to pick up the whole line; between these guys and the Stranger Things POPs, Funko is really delivering some of their best quality work in years. But even more importantly, I'm really eagerly awaiting season 3. When we last saw Cooper, he was the new host for BOB -- with his "good" side seemingly trapped in the Red Room. What's been going on since then? David Lynch is not really known for giving straight explanations, but I'm sure we'll find out soon.

*Otherwise we probably wouldn’t have had to wait 25 years between Fire Walk With Me and season 3 of Twin Peaks, would we?  

POP! Television – Twin Peaks: BOB

Spoiler Alert: This review contains spoilers for Twin Peaks and Fire Walk With Me.

"Head's up, tails up, run you scallywags. Night falls, morning calls, I'll catch you with my death bag. You may think I've gone insane, but I promise, I will kill again!" 

Even accounting for it being a show oriented around a murder mystery, Twin Peaks touches on some surprisingly dark territory. And there’s no character that exemplifies it more than the show’s big bad, Killer BOB. 

A demon from the mysterious Black Lodge, BOB’s motives – or the full extent of his powers – are never really revealed throughout the series. But you can piece together bits and pieces; BOB and his fellow Black Lodge spirits seem to feed off the emotions generated by terror, and that terror is largely created through rape and murder. Using the human host of Leland Palmer, BOB has been able to carry on this way for a number of years – until, of course, FBI Agent Dale Cooper arrives in town. More mystically attuned than your average law enforcement officer, Cooper begins to realise there’s more at work in Twin Peaks than a simple serial killer.

Interestingly enough, the character of BOB was largely created by accident. While working as a set dresser on the pilot, Frank Silva’s reflection was caught in a mirror. On noticing the mistake, David Lynch decided he’d found his villain, and went from there – hence the street clothes. Coincidence? Perhaps in the real world…but in the universe of Twin Peaks, it’s just another example of synchronicity in action.  

BOB the POP is not quite as terrifying as his onscreen counterpart, but this may well be for the best. He’s got his hands clenched into claw-like gestures, and even without the snarling mouth you can pick up that he’s not a good guy. It’s an impressively cutesy take on a horrific character, and would fit nicely in with a horror collection even if you didn’t pick up any of the other characters from the line.  

Unfortunately, Frank Silva is unlikely to be appearing in this year’s revival of the series, unless it’s in archive footage – he passed away in 1994 as a result of AIDS-related complications. Whether BOB himself return remains to be seen, though I’d say it’s a safe bet he will. Perhaps the new host will even be Michael Cera? Stranger things have happened…