Twin Peaks: Season 2, Episode 16 "The Condemned Woman" Review

 "There's an epidemic of multiple gunshot wounds following this chick around."

-Albert Rosenfield

"The Condemned Woman" begins with Agent Cooper (Kyle MacLachlan) and Sheriff Truman (Michael Ontkean) bringing in Pete Martell (Jack Nance) to make the next chess move in the game against Windom Earle (Kenneth Welsh). 

Josie Packard (Joan Chen) returns home to discover Andrew (Dan O'Herlihy) is still alive and faints in shock.  Andrew and Catherine (Piper Laurie) encourage her to go and see Thomas Eckhardt (David Warner), especially with the murder investigation closing in on Josie.  Catherine even lets Josie have a gun.

Hank Jennings (Chris Mulkey) tries to trade information on the supposed murder of Andrew Packard in exchange for his freedom.  Sheriff Truman isn't interested, so Hank taunts him that Josie was behind it.  Hank is charged with the attempted murder of Leo Johnson (Eric Da Re).  He tries to get Norma (Peggy Lipton) to lie and give him an alibi.  Norma declines and asks him for a divorce so she can marry Ed Hurley (Everett McGill.).  This enrages Hank and he yells at Norma, but she just leaves him to rot in his cell.

Jack Wheeler (Billy Zane) arrives at the Great Northern and is reveled to be a local kid who grew up to be a very successful business man, but who also cares about the environment.  Ben Horne (Richard Beymer) helped Jack get started and asks Jack to help turn fortunes around for the Horne family.  Ben's new plan is to stop Catherine's development of the Ghostwood project by campaigning to save the endangered pine weasel with the hopes that stalling the project will allow him to wait for a chance to get the development back in his hands.  Audrey (Sherilyn Fenn) is cold to Jack at first, but warms up to him.

Norma gets word that her sister, Annie (Heather Graham) is coming to visit.  

Truman overhears Cooper and Albert (Miguel Ferrer) talking about the evidence against Josie in the shootings of both Cooper and Jonathan (Mak Takano).  He heads off to confront her, but Pete and Catherine tell him that Josie is at the Great Northern with Thomas Eckhardt.

Donna (Lara Flynn Boyle) and James (James Marshall) have a picnic and talk about everything that has transpired.  Donna decides to go back to Twin Peaks and James decides to travel for a while, but he promises to come back to her.

Later, Donna, Shelly (Mädchen Amick), and Audrey all receive the torn poems from Windom Earle with a note asking them to meet at the Roadhouse to save the one they love.  They put the poem together and try to figure out what it means as Earle watches them.

Andrew reveals himself to Eckhardt and lies that Josie helped him fake his death.  Catherine gives Cooper a call and tells him that Josie is in Eckhardt's hotel room.  Cooper goes to Eckhardt's room, with Truman just behind him, and hears a commotion and a gunshot.  They find Josie has shot Eckhardt and he dies.  Josie apologizes to Truman before suddenly dying.  Cooper has a vision of BOB (Frank Silva), who taunts him, and The Man From Another Place (Michael J. Anderson), who simply dances.  It's revealed that Josie is trapped inside the wooden knob of the drawer next to the bed.

What Works:

My favorite part of the episode is probably the antics of Andrew and Catherine.  They are so cartoonishly evil in this episode as they set up Josie and Eckhardt perfectly.  I love how much both actors chew the scenery and they make being evil look so fun.

Josie has never been my favorite character on the show and I think most people share that opinion.  Her lies and evasiveness get tired as the show goes on, so I'm not sad to see her get killed off.  However, I do think her storyline ends on a strong note.  Joan Chen gives a good performance as the world collapses around her.  Josie's life was just one long tragedy and the way her storyline ends is one of the most insane moments in the show.  It's good to have BOB back and I like getting another really dark ending for a character.

Another storyline that ends in this episode is the James/Donna arc.  I think it's brought up once more on the show, but we don't see James again for the rest of the season.  Good riddance.

This is also the last time we see Hank Jennings, who was a fun villain on the show.  It's nice to see him finally reveal his true, nasty self to Norma when she doesn't give him what he wants.  I love that she just leaves him to rot.  Sending him back to prison is the perfect ending for his character.

What Sucks:

I don't hate Jack Wheeler like a lot of people do, but he's not very interesting.  His interactions with Audrey in this episode just don't really work for me.  It's not necessarily bad, but it's mostly meh.

Platinum Polar Bear:

The Platinum Polar Bear goes to the most competent character of the episode.  For this episode, the Award goes to Catherine Martell for manipulating Josie into going to see Eckhardt and getting both Truman and Cooper to go to the hotel room as well.  This results in both Eckhardt and Josie dying in one fell swoop.  Honorable mention goes to Andrew for his role in the plan, but I'll give Catherine slightly more credit because she gave Josie the gun.  I don't think she could have predicted BOB would trap Josie in a drawer knob.  I'm guessing she thought either Cooper or Truman would shoot Josie or that maybe she would shoot herself, but it worked out nicely for her either way.  This is Catherine's 1st time winning this Award.

Verdict:

I think this is one of the most underrated episodes of Twin Peaks with satisfying conclusions to both Hank's storyline and Josie's, even if it is completely bonkers.  This episode also gets rid of James and has solid and even fun performances from Joan Chen, Piper Laurie, and Dan O'Herlihy.  I don't love the introduction of Jack Wheeler, but this episode has still got it going on.

 9/10: Great