Around the dinner table, the conversation was lively. Thank you but for now, the forum has been archived.
I've been thinking a lot about the whole Dougie/Cooper plotline, and to be honest, it didn't make a lot of sense... until I watched part 5.
The back of Coop's Great Northern key reads "Clean place, reasonably priced", exactly the phrase he used to describe his ideal lodgings way back in the season 1 pilot. Given Ben Horne's pride in the Great Northern as the jewel in his empire's crown, it's unlikely that he would use a phrase like this (which would be more suited to some cheap roadside motel).
My hypothesis is that all of the events that are taking place in Las Vegas are all happening in Cooper's imagination, or maybe as a dream. People in this plotline just don't behave in any recognisably human way. Dougie walks around like an escaped mental patient and nobody seems to think anything is amiss. Nobody - not the casino staff, not the casino manager, not the chauffeur, not his work colleagues, not his boss, not even his wife(!).
I think that Coop is still in the lodge and that the first scene in part one with the Giant (the "Eraserhead" scene) is actually a flash-forward and that the "Dougie" plotline is Coop dreaming (like Diane Selwyn in Mulholland Drive)
Of course I could be totally wrong...
Good theory. I've considered something similar myself.
At least in ep. 5 a few people acknowledged his goofy behavior. As for the key, I thought it was weird that saying was on there as well. But then I thought it was weird that the Great Northern was considered simply "clean and reasonably priced" back in 1990. I guarantee there is NOTHING reasonably priced about that place.
But yes, the key is the key in my hypothesis. Now they key needs to make the trip to TP and into the hands of someone who can make the connection to Cooper.
"It's not about the bunny"
.......but is it about they key?
All shall be revealed. I'm so excited to find out. I can't wait!
Hilarious Snappo: that would be so cool! (And at the same time frustrating for all us amateur sleuths...)
I kinda feel this theory makes some sense, and it would help explain why everyone is so willing to walk him through every situation. The only thing is: it's very likely that Dougie is real, and he really was pulled back into the lodge instead of Mr. C. Also, the two hit men seem to be real. They call a woman at the beginning of Episode 5 who then calls the same black box Mr. C calls at the end of the episode. However... I also noticed that none of the people Cooper personally encounters have any connection to anyone else, so far. The one hit man sees Jade leaving with what "could be" two people, but even he wasn't sure, so it's plausible that she did in fact leave alone, and Cooper is still inside, dreaming. But the key IS important, so if it's real, it will end up in TP soon. We'll just have to wait and see.
There was also a (blue box) key in MulHolland Drive (2001): that key was crucial for the story...as was Naomi Watts (Janey-E, Dougie's wife), like Snappo already said in the opening post of this thread
There was also a (blue box) key in MulHolland Drive (2001): that key was crucial for the story...as was Naomi Watts (Janey-E, Dougie's wife), like Snappo already said in the opening post of this thread
I was just about to make this very same point. The blue key was the object that snapped Diane out of her reverie and back into the real world.
I kinda feel this theory makes some sense, and it would help explain why everyone is so willing to walk him through every situation. The only thing is: it's very likely that Dougie is real, and he really was pulled back into the lodge instead of Mr. C. Also, the two hit men seem to be real. They call a woman at the beginning of Episode 5 who then calls the same black box Mr. C calls at the end of the episode. However... I also noticed that none of the people Cooper personally encounters have any connection to anyone else, so far. The one hit man sees Jade leaving with what "could be" two people, but even he wasn't sure, so it's plausible that she did in fact leave alone, and Cooper is still inside, dreaming. But the key IS important, so if it's real, it will end up in TP soon. We'll just have to wait and see.
I agree with a lot of what you say, but what fascinates me is that the concept of "real" in this case is pretty flexible. Think back to Philip Jeffries' brief appearance in FWWM. About the only thing he manages to communicate before he disappears is the revelation that "we live inside a dream". Coop's first experience of the Red Room back in episode 3 was in a dream. Now, he only physically "visited" the room in the final episode of S2 ... or did he? If we assume that he wasn't just dreaming about the Red Room the first time around, but was actually physically there, then it could be argued that the "dream" world is actually as real as the supposed "real" world and that travel "between two worlds" can be achieved either via the subconscious mind, or via a number of gateways (Glastonbury Grove in Twin Peaks being merely one of them). Jeffries uses physical gateways to instantaneously travel between Buenos Aires and the FBI office in Philadelphia. Chester Desmond vanishes from the Fat Trout Trailer Park
In our "real" world, gravity, space and time operate just as we expect them. In the "dream" world (separate, but no less "real"), nothing applies. People talk and move backwards, coffee is solid or viscous, there is no such thing as future or past. Coop does things that are impossible in the real world: he falls through time and space, he passes through solid objects (the glass box) and is sucked through a power socket. Point is - he's still in "dream world".
Coop couldn't find the answer to the original mystery until he understood the significance of his dreams. I think that he has to understand the significance of his new dreams before he is able to truly leave the lodge.
I think...
I kinda feel this theory makes some sense, and it would help explain why everyone is so willing to walk him through every situation. The only thing is: it's very likely that Dougie is real, and he really was pulled back into the lodge instead of Mr. C. Also, the two hit men seem to be real. They call a woman at the beginning of Episode 5 who then calls the same black box Mr. C calls at the end of the episode. However... I also noticed that none of the people Cooper personally encounters have any connection to anyone else, so far. The one hit man sees Jade leaving with what "could be" two people, but even he wasn't sure, so it's plausible that she did in fact leave alone, and Cooper is still inside, dreaming. But the key IS important, so if it's real, it will end up in TP soon. We'll just have to wait and see.
I agree with a lot of what you say, but what fascinates me is that the concept of "real" in this case is pretty flexible. Think back to Philip Jeffries' brief appearance in FWWM. About the only thing he manages to communicate before he disappears is the revelation that "we live inside a dream". Coop's first experience of the Red Room back in episode 3 was in a dream. Now, he only physically "visited" the room in the final episode of S2 ... or did he? If we assume that he wasn't just dreaming about the Red Room the first time around, but was actually physically there, then it could be argued that the "dream" world is actually as real as the supposed "real" world and that travel "between two worlds" can be achieved either via the subconscious mind, or via a number of gateways (Glastonbury Grove in Twin Peaks being merely one of them). Jeffries uses physical gateways to instantaneously travel between Buenos Aires and the FBI office in Philadelphia. Chester Desmond vanishes from the Fat Trout Trailer Park
In our "real" world, gravity, space and time operate just as we expect them. In the "dream" world (separate, but no less "real"), nothing applies. People talk and move backwards, coffee is solid or viscous, there is no such thing as future or past. Coop does things that are impossible in the real world: he falls through time and space, he passes through solid objects (the glass box) and is sucked through a power socket. Point is - he's still in "dream world".
Coop couldn't find the answer to the original mystery until he understood the significance of his dreams. I think that he has to understand the significance of his new dreams before he is able to truly leave the lodge.
I think...
LOVE IT!
"It's all a dream"
A: "DOUBTFUL, Andy."
The key: eventually it can get noticed, but I suspect not right away. It wouldn't mean much to Ben to have a key returned. Somehow it would have to come to the attention of Hawk.
The key: eventually it can get noticed, but I suspect not right away. It wouldn't mean much to Ben to have a key returned. Somehow it would have to come to the attention of Hawk.
That's a good point. I was also thinking about how the Double R has changed a little: the "Double R 2 Go" is seen on the food Hawk brings in. Is it possible the Great Northern has thrown on a new coat of paint on a few things? Ben's "secret door" isn't so secret anymore, a call back to his need to do good no doubt. I'm actually hoping it IS him that notices it, but unless they've changed the way the keys look, I expect it will have to be someone at the police department that notices the key missing... possibly an appearance by Audrey?
Another point to consider. Bill Hastings is arrested and charged with Ruth Davenport's murder when the police find his fingerprints all over her apartment. Bill swears blind that he never entered her apartment and that it's impossible his prints could be there.
Later, he tells his wife that he dreamt he was at her apartment. He doesn't know it yet, but his "dream" was not a the product of his imagination. Like Coop, he physically entered the "dream" world and physically left his prints there. He didn't kill her, but he can't explain how his prints were there.
I'm trying to think back to the Great Northern and whether it has links to Hawk's heritage?
I'm veering towards that being the thing that is missing.
Great Northern: It's possible they could have modernized & gone to the digital key cards for rooms.
In the real world, if you don't return a key the hotel will charge you for it.
Fire walk with 
