PUSHING DAISIES
Season 1 Episode 5
“Girth”
Written by Katherine Lingenfelter
Directed by Peter O’Fallon
(WARNING: SPOILERS)

Being the Halloween installment of Pushing Daisies, this one plays like one of those apparently supernatural revenge deals that turns out to be a Scooby-Doo episode.
Hmm. Now that I think about it, this plays like Tim Burton’s Sleepy Hollow, minus the overly Gothic Hammer touches and the flying heads.
Despite that less-than-flattering description though, this turns out to be another great episode, and certainly a better viewing experience than Sleepy Hollow.

The whodunit plot involves Olive’s past as a prize-winning jockey (winner of the… wait for it… Jock-Off 2000), and the unfortunate death by trampling of John Joseph Jacobs (Groove’s Hamish Linklater, also seen on The New Adventures of Old Christine).
When the other jockeys from the Jock-Off 2000 wind up getting trampled by what they believe is the ghost of John Joseph Jacobs (complete with fire-breathing horse), Olive begins to fear for her life.
As it turns out though, and no big surprise here, the real killer is Mamma Jacobs (Barbara Barrie, from TV’s Barney Miller, Suddenly Susan, and Bryan Fuller’s past show, Dead Like Me), long embittered by her son’s ruined career.
And John Joseph isn’t really dead, though he is taller now…

Meanwhile, the episode’s subplot involves the childhood event that traumatized poor Ned into the Halloween-o-phobe he is today.
Halloween was when he found out that his father had moved on after his mother’s death. Moved on quite literally, to a new home, and a new wife, and a couple of new sons. (The scene with little Ned and Digby in make-shift ghost costumes made from blankets, as they stand outside Ned’s dad’s new home, while Ned’s dad walks away with his new family, is heart-breaking.)

Sure, this one’s got some hiccups: Mamma Jacobs actually took the time and effort to rig a horse with some fire-breathing apparatus? And in the climactic chase sequence, Olive and Chuck run out of the house? The killer’s on a horse, for Pete’s sake. This would have been a wonderful time to ignore Sidney Prescott’s words of wisdom and run up the stairs.
But hey, some of the best bits of Pushing Daisies are the personal bits after all, and here, we see Ned coming to terms with his Daddy issues (as Lost has proven, there’s always a lot of dramatic traction to be gained from Daddy issues).
And you gotta admit, Emerson’s imaginary phone call with the money is a riot.

(Image courtesy of pushing-daisies.com.)

PUSHING DAISIES
Season 1 Episode 4
“Pigeon”
Written by Rina Mimoun
Directed by Adam Kane
(WARNING: SPOILERS)

This could very well be the best episode since the Pilot.
Opening with another flashback to Ned’s private school days, we see the faithful Digby make the three-day journey to find his master, “guided only by the compass of his heart.” He even saves lives and property along the way. It’s a nice, moving little sequence that sets up an episode that delves into the power of love, and how it can overcome any obstacle.

Even as Chuck bakes another pie (tart apple filling) for her aunts—a pie that Olive again intercepts, planning on delivering it so she can continue to lay her plans of exposing what she believes is Chuck’s faked death—a one-winged carrier pigeon smashes into the Pie Hole’s window.
In the bustle around the dead pigeon, Ned inadvertently touches it, bringing it back to life. (“It’s a miracle bird!” shouts Olive.) There’s some panic as Ned and Emerson wonder what will pay for the pigeon’s return (another bird, as it turns out), followed by a crop duster crashing into a nearby building.

What follows involves several symbolisms and parallels—a birdcage as metaphor for the house Chuck’s aunts live in; a one-winged bird, a one-armed man, a one-legged woman; love that is meant to be, but only at a distance—as most of the show’s characters (save Emerson, perhaps) witness and experience the potency of love.
There is even the (heh) daisy chain of Digby loving Ned who loves Chuck who loves her aunts, while Olive also loves Ned, and then comes to love Chuck’s aunts too. Emerson, of course, loves money…

This one’s directed by Adam Kane, who also directed the first episode of Heroes’ sophomore season where the story is actually allowed to breathe, “The Kindness of Strangers.” It’s the episode where I feel Season 2 took its first genuine step towards rehabilitation, getting past that awfully cluttered sensation that pervades the first three episodes. And though I am aware that a big reason for that is the script, I’d like to think that Kane also had something to do with this welcome turn-around.
Kane began as a cinematographer (he worked on the Heroes pilot), then went on to his directorial debut with “.07%” from Heroes’ first season.
Kane’s an excellent choice for Pushing Daisies, which is, by its very nature, a very visual series. Kane’s experience as a cinematographer clearly serves him well here, as this episode looks gorgeous.
Here’s hoping we see more of Adam Kane the director, not just here or in Heroes, but elsewhere on the cathode ray—or silver screen—landscape as well.

Parting shot: Kane was also the cinematographer on Jim Isaac’s Skinwalkers (review in Archive), and also shot Isaac’s upcoming feature, Pig Hunt.

(Images courtesy of pushing-daisies.com and gregbeeman.blogspot.com [Adam Kane on the set of Heroes].)

PUSHING DAISIES
Season 1 Episode 3
“The Fun In Funeral”
Written by Bryan Fuller
Directed by Paul Edwards
(WARNING: SPOILERS)

We kick off with a flashback to Ned’s time in private school, immediately following his mother’s death, where he quickly establishes the whole one-minute window deal by experimenting on some CGI fireflies.
We then settle down to the heart of this episode’s matter: Louis Schatz (Brad Grunberg, real-life brother of Heroes’ Greg), brother of Lawrence (also played by Grunberg), suspects foul play in his brother’s death, and hires Emerson to get to the bottom of it.
Here are the facts: the dead Schatz brother was caught pilfering family heirlooms from the funeral home’s clients, a crime which was made public, causing a furor and an avalanche of hate mail demanding items back. Louis suspects that Lawrence was murdered by one of the disgruntled family members.
What no one knows, except for Emerson and Ned, is that Lawrence was the unfortunate living being-in-close-proximity when Chuck was not returned to her deceased state after the one minute window.

Emerson tries to get Ned to interview Lawrence without Chuck present, but she manages to be at the morgue. When Ned sees who the dead body is though, he panics and rushes out. Annoyed, Emerson makes it clear to Chuck what keeping her around cost. Chuck, confused and guilty about the circumstances of her return from the dead, keeps her emotional distance from Ned.
Later on though, Chuck says she’d like Ned to talk to Lawrence, and she’d like to be there too, so Ned can apologize, and she can say “Thank you.” (Emerson, of course, wants to be there so he can find out where all the family heirlooms are, so he can make some kind of profit from all of this.)

When they talk to Lawrence though, it turns out that it’s Louis who knows where the heirlooms are, and the whole investigation was to throw suspicion off him. Chuck also finds her father’s watch in Lawrence‘s possession.
Emerson is just getting down to planning Louis‘ surveillance, hoping he’ll find out where the loot is, when Louis is discovered in The Pie Hole’s refrigerator, now just as dead as Lawrence. In a panic, Ned calls Emerson, who says someone’s framing Ned, and that that someone already probably called the cops.
Cue cops knocking at The Pie Hole’s door.
So Ned touches Louis, and they tell him he’s gotten into Heaven, but Heaven’s about to close in a minute, so he’s got to hustle. Ned, Chuck, and the reanimated Louis scramble to Emerson’s car, which he pulls into the Pie Hole’s back alley. They also manage to find out that Louis choked on his food when he was once again accosted by an irate family member demanding a Civil War heirloom be returned. The minute runs out though before they can find out where the loot is hidden.

Upon hearing about a Civil War heirloom, Chuck recalls one of the hate letters mentioning just that, a letter written by Wilfred Woodruff. So they know who inadvertently caused Louis‘ death, and who attempted to frame Ned.
First though, they attempt to get Louis‘ body back to the funeral home, where he died. The place is all locked up though, and they break in through a basement window. Emerson however, gets Winnie the Pooh-stuck, much to Chuck’s amusement.
There’s minor panic as Ned bumps into a number of cadavers in the basement, though he quickly touches them again.
There is, however, someone else in the basement: Wilfred Woodruff (That ‘80’s Show’s Eddie Shin), who has found his family’s Civil War saber (there’s also a funny flashback to show us how an Asian-American connects to the Civil War).
Apparently, Woodruff was there the day Lawrence died, and seeing Ned run out of the funeral home, simply assumed Ned had murdered Lawrence (thus, the frame-up). A duel ensues, Woodruff armed with the saber, Ned, with some funeral home equipment.
With a little help from Chuck and Pooh-stuck-in-the-window, Ned wins the duel, and finds the loot.

Chuck then takes it upon herself to match hate letters to missing family heirlooms, and sets about gift-wrapping each item so it can be returned. Emerson also sees the error of his ways… and vows to lose some weight.

In the episode’s subplot, Olive sees Ned and Chuck kiss (through a sheet of plastic wrap) and gets light-headed, inadvertently becoming the object of Alfredo (Find Me Guilty’s Raul Esparza) Aldarisio’s attention. Alfredo’s a traveling salesman who sells homeopathic cures for all sorts of illnesses, including depression.
When Chuck is given some samples of Alfredo’s wares, and upon discovering from Louis Schatz that her aunts spiraled back into depression just as the Darling Mermaid Darlings were about to make a splashy comeback, she decides to anonymously bake them a pie, and mixes a few drops of happiness in the recipe.
But when The Delivery Boy (Malcolm In The Middle’s Victor Z. Isaac) sees the address is out of his regular area, he refuses to deliver it. Feeling sympathy for the pie and its intended recipients, Olive takes it upon herself to deliver the pie herself.
She then meets the Darling Mermaid Darlings, and is regaled of tales of their dead niece Charlotte, who happened to be the childhood sweetheart of the “Beaver Boy” next door, who grew up to be a Pie Maker.
That’s when it all clicks in Olive’s head: now she believes that Ned faked Chuck’s death, and that there’s some nefarious reason behind the conspiracy.
And in her fixation on Ned, Olive remains oblivious to the attention being paid her by Alfredo…

If you frequent the Iguana, you know I love Pushing Daisies, and this episode’s no exception.
Sure, this one’s got some defects (the motivation for the frame-up seems a little muddled, and just how did Chuck get into the funeral home anyway, given that the door was supposedly locked and Emerson Pooh had jammed up the window?), but the writing continues to be funny, and the romantic tension is still both taut and touching, and the stylized look of the show remains some of the best eye candy primetime TV has to offer.
Oh, and Jim Dale’s narration is just plain brilliant.

(Image courtesy of pushing-daisies.com.)

PUSHING DAISIES
Season 1 Episode 2
“Dummy”
Written by Peter Ocko
Directed by Barry Sonnenfeld
(WARNING: SPOILERS)

Chuck’s sudden arrival in Ned’s life may be great for Ned, but Emerson and Olive are less than thrilled. Olive feels a distance growing between her and Ned, and has taken to some snooping, noting the fact that there doesn’t seem to be much physical intimacy between Chuck and Ned.
Emerson meanwhile, has tried to deal with the stress by knitting, but really, nothing beats a murder (in Emerson’s book, at least): one Bernard Slaybeck (Jonathan Mangum, from The Drew Carey Show), apparently a hit-and-run victim.
But when Chuck gets all Jabberwocky with the revived Bernard (asking him if there was something that he left undone), the minute passes, and all they’re able to get out of Bernard concerning his death is, a crash test dummy killed him.

Fulfilling Bernard‘s last wish, Chuck and Ned take a pie over to Dandy Lion Worldwide Industries, where they must tell Jeanine from Promotions (Riki Lindhome, from Pulse and TV’s Gilmore Girls) that Bernard loved her. While there, we discover that Chuck speaks Japanese (aside from a bunch of other languages), and that the car of the future—the Dandy Lion SX—could very well run on dandelion weed.
When they find Jeanine though, she claims not to have known any Bernard. She does however, take the pie and, unseen by anyone, scarfs it down while crying.
Meanwhile, Chuck sneaks away from the tour and discovers a room filled with crash test dummies, though one, tellingly, lacks its mask and jumpsuit.

When they confer with Emerson, both he and Chuck agree that they need to break into Dandy Lion later that night. Not only do they find that the room with the crash test dummies now contains a whole bunch of dead people (which, when “interviewed” by Ned, don’t seem to have been murdered), but that Jeanine actually did know Bernard.
Moving to The Pie Hole, Jeanine wolfs down pies like there’s no tomorrow, then spends an inordinately long amount of time in the lavatory. Between eating and bathroom breaks, they discover that Jeanine couldn’t talk at work because she was being watched, and that, yes, she did have a relationship with Bernard. She also wants to show them something.
On the drive there though, Jeanine’s Dandy Lion SX explodes.

At hospital, Jeanine tells Emerson and Ned that she wanted to show them the “bodies in the big hole.” This turns out to be a massive pit filled with the crash test dummies that used to be in Dandy Lion; someone wants them buried to keep whatever data’s been recorded in them a secret.
Ned and Chuck and Emerson are unable to act on this knowledge though, as someone wearing a crash test dummy outfit tasers them into unconsciousness. The Crash Test Dummy Killer tries to murder all three by crashing an SX (already a potential death trap because of a design flaw, the big secret worth killing Bernard for) with them in it, but Emerson manages to get them free with his trusty knitting needle.
A car chase occurs, but the Crash Test Dummy Killer is caught by the cops, and Ned and company are saved from the SX exploding by none other than Olive herself, out giving Digby a walk.

Oh, and Jeanine takes her first steps to overcoming her eating disorder…

There’s a lot of stuff that’s great in this second episode (particularly the theme of secrets, and how it’s pretty evident that the three main characters of Pushing Daisies hardly know anything about each other, just as we, the audience, hardly know anything about them… yet), but what seals the deal, making the case for Pushing Daisies currently being the most amusing, inventive, and yes, moving hour of primetime television, is Olive’s Musical Moment with Digby and Manuel (Omar Avila; The Punisher and TV’s Watch Over Me). Brilliant.
What else can I say? The writing’s funny and touching, the cast is amazing, and Jim Dale’s narration is spot-on. Check it out, people.

Parting shot: ABC has given Pushing Daisies a full season pick-up, pumping up the original 13 episode order to a full 22. I say again: Brilliant.

Parting shot 2: A review of the Pushing Daisies Pilot—TV Watch 2007 (3)—can be found in the Archive.

(Images courtesy of pushing-daisies.com.)

TV WATCH 2007 (3)
PUSHING DAISIES Pilot

I am in awe of Bryan Fuller.
Wouldn’t you be? Not only did he bring us the unjustly cancelled Wonderfalls, but he also worked on the first season of Heroes (having written “Collision” and the astounding “Company Man”)*, and brought The Amazing Screw-On Head (review in Archive) to zany animated life.
Now he’s at the helm of Pushing Daisies, one of the best new series of this coming season.

“This was the moment young Ned realized he wasn’t like the other children, nor was he like anyone else, for that matter. Young Ned could touch dead things and bring them back to life.
“This touch was a gift given to him, but not by anyone in particular. There was no box, no instructions, no manufacturer’s warranty. It just was.”

At a young age, Ned (Lee Pace, from Wonderfalls) discovers that he can bring the dead back to life with a touch. There are, however, rules to his “gift” (which I won’t disclose here to try and save the suspense; though said rules are outlined in the first five minutes of the Pilot, they do have long-term ramifications that serve to inform the Pilot and the series as a whole).
In the wake of Ned’s discovery, he is parted from his first love, Charlotte (though he calls her “Chuck”; Anna Friel, from the Goal! films and the upcoming Bathory, where she plays the Blood Countess herself, Elizabeth Bathory). Years later (but still as a direct result of that childhood incident), he opens a restaurant called “The Pie Hole,” where he bakes exquisite pies and has a lucrative partnership with a local PI, Emerson Cod (Boston Public’s Chi McBride).

To say any more would cheat the show’s potential audience of the poignant wonder Pushing Daisies holds.
I can say this though: Fuller’s script is narrated from start to finish by Jim Dale, in a very conscious fairy tale styling. And the look of the show—which recalls the technicolour Fantasia of Tim Burton, circa Big Fish—mirrors that fairy tale motif to a tee.
Small wonder then, that the Pilot’s director is Barry Sonnenfeld, whose Addams Family films proved that he could be Burton when you couldn’t have the real Burton.
And if that isn’t enough to tantalize and to pique your curiosity, the supporting cast also includes Ellen Greene (Sylar’s kooky mom on Heroes) and Swoosie Kurtz (Locke’s kooky mom on Lost) as Chuck’s aunts, and Kristen Chenoweth (Running with Scissors and Stranger Than Fiction; reviews for both in the Archive) as Olive Snook, waitress at The Pie Hole, who lives in the apartment next to Ned’s.

The Pushing Daisies Pilot is a wonderful, heartfelt hour of life, death, and what should, by all rights fall squarely in the middle of those two extremes, love.
It’s funny, and moving, and smart. It’s vintage Bryan Fuller, and you have got to see this show.

* Over the course of Heroes Season 1, Bryan Fuller wrote most of the Claire scenes. Anyone who’s checked the Iguana out in the past will know that Claire is one of my favorite characters on the show, who also had, I feel, one of the most satisfying character arcs in the first season. I’ve also long maintained that Hayden Panettiere is one of the best of the show’s ensemble.
So thanx to Mr. Fuller, for giving Hayden all those great scenes to work on, and for helping shape a great character.

Parting shot: I never got the chance to see Dead Like Me, Bryan Fuller’s other show, though I’ve heard lots of good things about it.

(Images courtesy of abc, about.com, and thepiemaker.com.)