I've just read the pilot script for the new David Milch show JOHN FROM CINCINNATI. Or, as it's called on the cover page, JOHN FROM CINCINNATI MEETS THE SURFING YOSTS.

My mind is a little rattled by it, to tell you the truth. While the baroque curlicues of DEADWOOD are gone, except in the stage direction, oddly enough:

Mitch's look, leaving room for his wife to give her query context, conveys as well that in the area of difficulties in communication, they're not without expertise. Cissy grabs a fly swatter off the kitchen table...

There remains a very Milchian through-line to the thing, a kind of come along or fuck you sort of vibe to the way the thing moves. A defiant internal logic, an intuitiveness. Surely this all means something. Even if that something is: sometimes characters float. Or freak out at Costco. Or surf, as is the Yost family's deal. They surf.

And then there's John from Cincinnati himself, a kind of curling question mark that connects Rain Man to outer space: title character as notional aberration and echolocative reflection of theme. Without blowing it, that's maybe the best way to describe him. At least it is here, in this draft, as John meets the surfing Yosts.

Surf's up, mm mm, mm mm. Were I a betting man, I'd bet that as that first end-title card rises up, there'll be a collective WHAT THE FUCK that maybe TV hasn't seen since Dale Cooper carved his wooden whistle. This is Milch's TWIN PEAKS. Come along or fuck you.