There are differing opinions about the Coordinates that were so preciously desired by Mr. C in Season 3 of Twin Peaks. A Facebook post over the weekend got me thinking about exactly what we do and don’t know about the coordinates, and it took me here, where I will go so far as to explore their purpose.

Mr. C Wants the Coordinates

He wants them. He doesn’t need them (but he sure acts like he does). He’s not unlike a toddler that needs to do This One Thing right now, or needs a blue spoon not a red spoon (how dare us?) and therefore throws a pout and now they don’t want anything because the whole thing’s ruined. It’s that kind of tunnel-visioned want. It’s as if Mr. C has an organ of pure appetite inside him pushing onward with the fury of its own momentum.

Mr. C (who I’m going back to calling DoppelCooper from here on) doesn’t seem to care about any collateral damage, or if he offends or scares off the folks helping him. He merely has an image on a playing card that he’s searching for (the big black dot with the Captain America wings). And as far as Judy goes, he’s only mentioned Judy by name to the only other person we know he’s heard mention the name, so it’s hard to know if he knows anything at all about Judy beyond what we (don’t) know, if he connects the playing card and Judy quests together, or if they’re separate quests from each other.

But we do know he’s after the coordinates. And there are three sets leading to two places. One place is the rock where Richard Horne was cooked in an electrical fire, and the other is heavily implied to be Jack Rabbit’s Palace, where he was sucked into a vortex upon arrival.

The Final Dossier connection

Per Tamara Preston’s account in the The Final Dossier, DoppelCooper (who she likes to call the Double) was looking for a demon, and possibly a grand central station of portals.

She writes “[DoppelCooper] desperately wanted the Coordinates from Briggs. He pursued him across a quarter century, even after an official public finding that the major had died in that car crash, and he never relented.” And she later writes “What if the Double was looking for the most important location in this alleged system, a Grand Central Station, if you will, on the other side?”

Further still, she specifically mentions that the coordinates led to the boiler room of the Great Northern Hotel, where Gordon accompanied Dale Cooper much as he did in Part 17:

“And we know that no sooner had Cooper appeared to “defeat this … whatever it was … [in the Sheriff Station] than he almost immediately appeared at the location of the coordinates that his damn double was after from the start — and you went with him, Chief — and from there Cooper promptly disappeared again and hasn’t been seen since.”

So we have a discrepancy to deal with as far as any 100% accuracy goes. C’est la vie en Twin Peaks. I chalk this up to Mark Frost having written this part before he saw how it was actually filmed in Part 17, but I am also forgiving of the inconsistency because the following scene with Phillip Jeffries can easily be seen as a grand central station just as easily as the Fireman’s location, due to Jeffries and Fireman both having a giant bell (Jeffries’ is the “tea kettle”). The important part with Lodge travel seems to lie much more with intent of desired goals rather than physical location.

Physical location is only important as the site of the desired goal

What we have for sure is the list of things DoppelCooper wanted:

Coordinates

Judy

A Grand Central Station

He wasn’t concerned with an actual physical destination per se. I think he (and/or his parasite, you know, BOB) wants to meet a demon creature and, in regards to the coordinates, the where is unimportant as long as this happens. They probably think the demon creature is Judy, and that he (they) may believe the story goes kind of like the utukku Armageddon-like scenario described in The Final Dossier that results from the coming together of Ba’al and Joudy (or at minimum there would be a massive increase in power for BOB and DoppelCooper).

I still think this was a ruse that a power-hungry appetite chaser would want to hear and thus it’s a red herring that’ll probably trap DoppelCooper so that BOB will be expelled from him, but that’s in my memory theory or the one where I think Jeffries planted the Judy story in Gordon’s memory, not here. The folks who don’t think it’s a ruse? BOB and DoppelCooper.

They want to find the place where they can make this meeting with Jow Day happen, or at least find the place that can get them to that place. As I think a grand central station would direct someone to their desired destination based on want and desired result rather than needing to know a physical destination, I bet he’d be happy to find a grand central station. I think the Fireman’s black and white home fits the bill nicely.

1st “proof” for grand central station status: the bells

The same bell shaped things, of which we see a multitude in Part 8 off to the side in the Fireman’s place, has a suspiciously similar look to that of Phillip Jeffries’ “tea kettle.” A “kettle” Jeffries used to manufacture a portal to a place. Specifically, he formed an owl ring symbol into an 8 and then like a turning dial he tuned it to a specific slippery point as if it could send Cooper to many other places.

2nd “proof” for grand central station status: the screens

The Fireman’s main screen shows a destination point where a saxophone tube line sends a golden orb and one DoppelCooper. Screens as portals is interesting all by itself, but then there’s the tuning aspect again: the Fireman swipes away the Palmer House and brings up the Sheriff Station. The same screen, or portal, can send to multiple locations, not just time frames. We see it here, and in one other interesting way.

The #6 telephone pole

The #6 pole has been seen in three different places:

In the midst of Fat Trout Trailer Park in Deer Meadow where Special Agent Chet Desmond spends his final minutes of investigation.

At the intersection in Twin Peaks of the hit-and-run between Richard “my dad’s from the Lodge” Horne and an innocent child from purely physical reality.

Just outside of Carrie Page’s house in Odessa.

Deer Meadow at the time of FWWM was in a different part of Washington State than Twin Peaks. Odessa is part of Texas. We see three #6 poles in Andy Brennan’s Fireman-given vision, one right after another. Though all three appear to be of only one location, to me this says the three locations (all with the same pole) are connected. I’m not going to connect them thematically here, but it probably means you can get to these locations with the swipe from a screen somewhere on the other end of the line. Either it could mean that these different locations are in three parallel universes (which I don’t personally subscribe to because you’d think the geography would otherwise remain fairly similar), or that “swiping the screen” would actually move the location of the #6 pole through physical reality, as if you’re turning the stars as you change screens until a time presents itself, and that’s where the pole lands.

It’s a rough metaphor that I’m basing on how the Earth in relation to the sun is roughly the same on a given day, but its actual location in space (both of the sun’s and Earth’s) is slightly different from its exact location from exactly one year before. Which can mean the location on Earth of the pole is dependent on what literal moment in time you are looking for. This is place-holding pseudo science, but hopefully you get what I’m trying to say about a stationary electrical grid and a constantly orbiting planet moving through it.

Assuming this is generally correct, it could make sense that one screen could be swiped from the Palmer House to the Sheriff Station from one single portal point if the portal destinations are separated by time. Which means the Palmer House on the Fireman’s screen was likely to be not in the present, but in some other time frame entirely.

Which Palmer House was on the screen?

Is it the Palmer House from Part 18?

Based on theories around multiple realities, and the contingents for Judy Pocket Universes, that would make a ton of sense that the Fireman could move multidimensionally from one reality to another through his screens. The destination being the Part 18 house where Dale and Carrie go to scream the lights out would be a giant step in proving any of those cage universe theories. But that’s a question not meant to be asked because Jonathan Gaskill (in the Twin Peaks: Between Two Worlds Facebook group) checked screen captures, and based on the shrubs in front of the house the answer is no. The house is not the same as the Alice Tremond house. DoppelCooper was not potentially intending to cut off Dale’s final nebulous plan at the pass.

Is it the Palmer House from Fire Walk With Me (or at least the flashback sequence from Part 17?)

This would also make a ton of sense. I’ve made the case for almost a year now that BOB takes on aspects of his host, singing showtunes as Leland or using Coop’s crack shotgun skills. Dale has a sense of unfinished business with the Lindbergh case or the Laura Palmer case, so he tries to travel back in time. DoppelCooper’s passenger BOB still wants to taste through Laura’s mouth after all this time? That’s some unfinished business. Dale goes to Jeffries to travel back in time to save Laura, DoppelCooper could have the instinct to go back in time and get BOB where he really wanted to go the whole time. Maybe Laura was Judy and BOB couldn’t get over her and this was a connection destined in the stars even if DoppelCooper had to sacrifice his connection in the process. We’ll never know if that’s a concern though, because again, the hedges rule out the Fire Walk With Me iteration of the Palmer House.

Is it the Palmer House from Part 2?

Was it the first time we see the Palmer house in Season 3, right before we see Sarah Palmer for the first time in a stupor watching the violent nature documentary? This proposes that the Fireman moved the screen from a few days in the past to wherever the portal is located in the present. Which based on the Earth’s rotation and orbit is now the sheriff station. What could have happened a few days earlier in the Palmer house? In the same episode as Hawk waiting at the curtains in Glastonberry Grove where something should’ve happened but didn’t, we see Sarah Palmer sitting at her TV when something should have happened but didn’t. Was DoppelCooper supposed to blink through that TV but couldn’t because of interference from the Fireman (and therefore neither Cooper appeared where they wanted to that episode, due to their Other’s counter-planning)?

If this is the case, what most likely happened right after that scene cut is that Experiment Model, fresh from New York, blinked through that TV (it is both a screen and an electrical thing not majorly different from a telephone pole or an electrical outlet in Vegas). If DoppelCooper and BOB were trying to reach this Palmer House, they were supposed to be there waiting for Experiment Model, striving for the meeting that the negative forces wanted: the utukku myth from The Final Dossier born into the Season 3 version of the story. The demons BOB and Experiment Model would have converged on a space in time as the stars aligned and it was supposed to make something happen. Instead the merger happened with Sarah Palmer and her matured FrogBug.

If only this were precisely true. The shrubs in the establishing shot is a wrong match for the house on the Fireman’s screen. The honor goes to the Part 12 Palmer House.

Why That Palmer House?

The Palmer House swiped away on the Fireman’s screen has the exact shrubs of the Part 12 establishing shot (per Kylee Karre, also from the Twin Peaks: Between Two Worlds Facebook group).

It’s the house when Hawk is speaking to Sarah and someone’s moving glass in the kitchen. The shrubs are spot on the same kind of growth. Could DoppelCooper have been the sound in the kitchen, or was he intended to be? Could the real Sarah have been in the kitchen and Hawk is dealing with the demon that DoppelCooper wants to meet?

Is the sound in the kitchen Alice Tremond or her husband? Were they there already to keep Judy/Experiment/Experiment Model bound inside the house? I assume not because the truck driver incident happened in Part 14. Also, I suspect the Tremonds weren’t part of the picture until after BOB was separated from DoppelCooper and the bait no longer needed to be bait.

Is DoppelCooper the one who should’ve knocked on that door much as Hawk should’ve been the one on the other side of Cooper’s red curtains in Glastonberry Grove? I suspect the answer is yes. I posit that Sarah was possessed by the Experiment Model at the point Hawk knocks on the door, or it was in the kitchen waiting for BOB and DoppelCooper to come knocking, messing with some glass that reminded it of the box it broke through in New York.

My gut tells me the Part 12 scene went like this:

Experiment Model was in Sarah’s house.

Sarah had one last chance to accept help—from Hawk—and didn’t take it.

Sarah caved to the darkness then and was further possessed by Experiment Model as a result.

Why do I think Experiment Model came through Sarah’s TV set sometime after Part 2 and before Part 12 (rather than Sarah being possessed since 1956)?

The countless connections fan research has found between Experiment Model and the creature behind Sarah’s face comes up 50/50 that it’s Jumping Man or Experiment/Experiment Model. It would make sense (and is thematic to the show) if Sarah’s demon is a hybrid between two Lodge Denizens/demons.

I think Experiment Model came into Sarah then through the television by way of New York as described earlier, and instead of being merged together utukku myth-style as some BOB/Experiment hybrid creature inside the vessel known as DoppelCooper it’s contained in the nearest shell available. Which happens to be the weakened Sarah Palmer, who literally gave up to the darkness in this moment. Here’s possible evidence why this works:

The TV is working fine in that Part 2 scene.

The next time we see that TV in Part 13, Sarah is frantically making drinks while the TV is glitching and looping, making a strange electric crackle that could easily signify it was somehow influenced by the Lodge (which is also known to loop—looking specifically at Audrey and Cooper’s repetitious natures).

An interesting thing to note (also brought to my attention by Kylee) is that the establishing Palmer House shot used in Part 2 is also the same one used before the looping boxing match scene, and also has the same shrubs and angle (though different lighting) as the establishing shot of the Part 18 Alice Tremond scene. Here they are side by side.

What does that mean to me? Experiment Model is meant to be described as inside the Palmer House in (or directly after) the Part 2 scene, is definitely inside Sarah by way of the TV during the boxing match scene, and is a future clue that Experiment Model is inside the house during the Alice Tremond scene as well. Though in Part 18 there is the presence of light…I liken that to the presence of the Tremonds.

What if the utukku myth is something to really worry about?

Regardless of the why of the final scenes with Alice Tremond, regardless of whether the Experiment Model was a fake-out to trap DoppelCooper and Bob or if it was the real thing, Experiment Model had to believe it was the real thing just as Windom Earle thought he was the big time magician that could bend the Waiting Room to his will. Whether it’s the full powered real deal Jow Day or not, it acts like it is, and therefore it’s going to believe it wants to meet up with Ba’al just like the utukku myth in The Final Dossier suggests.

I suggest Experiment Model strongly wants to meet a fellow demon (prefereably Ba’al) when it ends up at the Palmer House in a likely-similar want-fueled trip (rather than destination-centric) as DoppelCooper in Part 17. Not actually seeing BOB and DoppelCooper, it sees Sarah on that couch watching the boxing match with whatever the FrogBug matured into (I say Jumping Man all the way but know it can be many things) and thinks maybe this bloomed FrogBug was the BOB she was promised. Sarah’s FrogBug/Jumping Man could’ve easily been like Cary Grant in North By Northwest: wrong place, wrong time. A reason why I can see Experiment Model being a fake or reduced version of Experiment or Judy is that I would hope Judy could recognize Ba’al/BOB.

The other option is that Experiment Model is in the kitchen as described earlier, waiting it out for BOB to knock on the door only to lose patience and settle for Sarah and the grown FrogBug.

Either way, the combined creature inside Sarah intended to be a BOB/Experiment hybrid ready to wreak vengeance and hell upon the world is instead an Experiment Model/Jumping Man that only thinks it is tearing down the world. Which I guess they are, but they’re only doing it one truck driver at a time. It’s going to be one loooong Armageddon.

Or at least it would be until Dale and Carrie come knocking.

Does the house trap the Experiment Model so Laura can tie up a loose end?

If the Judy story is an Unofficial Version of events as I’ve been suggesting, was Experiment Model brought to life and modeled after Experiment by some combination of Fireman, Dido, Gerard, Briggs, Cooper, Tremonds and Jeffries as part of this Unofficial Version ruse (it needs to be made real in order to sell its validity to DoppelCooper and BOB)?

If so, Cooper is possibly bringing Carrie there in Part 18 to tie up loose ends and destroy the false Judy demon so that it can’t hurt any more people beyond Sarah, the somewhat-deserving trucker, Sam and Tracy. The Tremonds could have been residing in the Palmer house as complicit agents of the Fireman, caging the reduced-power-model-of-Experiment/Judy demon until Laura’s personified trauma tulpa (as I’m continuing to suggest is what Carrie is) can come there to explode the false demon with the scream that came from accepting the validity of the trauma she’d forgotten she’d endured. Thus the Model of the Experiment is destroyed and Laura Palmer is finally allowed to evolve.

It could actually be that simple:

Only one reality and one higher Lodge plane is necessary (rather than needing pocket universes).

The “demon” is created to provide the scenario for separating BOB from Cooper.

The coordinates provide the means for hooking the “trout” on the line.

The freed Cooper fetches the part of Laura that keeps her tied to the physical realm.

That personified trauma tulpa destroys the purpose-fulfilled “demon” while simultaneously freeing Laura to ascend for good.

The “demon” is the stone. Cooper’s BOB anchor and Laura’s trauma anchor are the birds. The coordinates are a trail of bird seed.

That’s my current take on the “two birds with one stone” thing, anyway. What are your thoughts on all of this?