The delighted, Conga-leading Mitchum Brothers buy Sonny Jim a garden gym, gormless Dougie is the subject of another (sadly, unsuccessful) assassination attempt and Evil Coop flexes his muscles.

We’re into the final third of the Twin Peaks return and yet it still stubbornly refuses to shift up a gear in recognition that there’s limited time left. There’s still a large number of lengthy scenes that either outstay their welcome or just seem to exist to slow things down.

Starting with the good stuff, it’s nice to see that Evil Coop still has his bite after being shot and resurrected a few episodes back. He’s come to settle a vendetta and get the same coordinates that Diane was sharing last week. There’s a great scene where he takes on a bully in an arm wrestling contest and you can feel the evil and power behind those dead eyes. Just wait till he goes in for the sucker punch! And the compound that they’re in has a ridiculously large view-screen that would only exists in Frost/Lynch world.

Big Ed (Everett McGill) finally makes his return, and his drape-crazed wife, Nadine, impresses Doctor Jacoby with her shit-shovel window display. It’s these moments with the original Peaks residents that keep the show ticking along; we also get moments with Audrey, Shelly, Norma, Bobby and James.

And then there’s Dougie. If ever a single-joke one-note character was stretched to the limits, it’s Cooper’s simpleton Dougie. A blinking idiot (literally) that stumbles from one success to another while doing practically nothing, this gag has now been flogged to death. It’s no longer funny that he is attributed to solving matters, to gaining confessions or exposing secrets – it’s tedious.

Minutes are devoted to Sarah Palmer watching wrestling while fixing up a Bloody Mary, or we find out that Norma’s cherry pie is at risk. And the Roadhouse act is James Hurley singing that sappy ‘Just you…and I’ song that he barely got away with as a loved-up teen.

Verdict: I tentatively approach every episode hoping that this will be the one. This isn’t that one. 6/10

Nick Joy