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at other times it is changing from green to yellow to red. Visually, it seems to serve as an interlude between scenes. Metaphorically, it serves as an indication of the intensity of the story.

Its strategic location and variations in color suggest this role. It does play a significant part in the series as the place where James Hurley last saw Laura Palmer. She jumped off his bike and disappeared at the stoplight at Sparkwood and 21.

The image of the waterfall at the Great Northern Hotel is less easy to interpret. We see it whenever the story takes us to this particular location and it also serves as the introduction to each episode. However, it also seems to play a role as an interlude image. It is at times such as these that it seems more important as an image than as a reference point for a specific location. One is tempted to contrast this image with the fire image and draw particularly meaningful conclusions from this comparison though the evidence which would lead us to these formulations is mostly circumstantial. It seems best to leave such a task to the imagination.

Because of the compactness of the series (there are only 29 episodes) Twin Peaks invites a great deal of analysis and interpretation. I have left this task largely untouched preferring instead to examine the visual imagery of the series. I think there is something instructional in this inquiry quite apart from the imputation of meaning. The viewer needs as many clues as possible regarding exactly how to watch the series and what connections lie just below the surface. Twin Peaks works on many levels and it is this fact which makes watching this television show uniquely difficult, but no less entertaining because of this. Like any good work in mass media this series lends itself to repeated exposure. This is true both because it is entertaining to watch more than once and it is necessary to watch more than once to begin to get a clear sense of all the subtleties of the story. The visual imagery is what unites many of the disparate elements in the series into a coherent unity I am confident that watching Twin Peaks with this in mind will make it a more enjoyable place to visit.

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