Sweeter Than a Strychnine Lollipop
Even in these blighted times for TV, there’s a refreshing abundance of shows out there that want to engage their viewers’ brains. (Some of them aren’t on cable, even!) But surprisingly few current series even try to touch their viewers’ hearts in anything more than the slickest, most superficial ways. I’ve written before about the heart-leaping wonder that Doctor Who can invoke, in spite of (and sometimes because of) its frequent cardboard-and-construction-paper silliness. And I’ve sung the praises of The Venture Bros., the rare Adult Swim offering with more than just nonstop non sequiturs and ’80s pop culture references on its mind.
But this fall’s ushered in a new king of heartstring-tugging, and not a moment too soon. Amid stupid spinoffs, cookie-cutter procedurals, and Pottery-Barn-catalog family dramas, Bryan Fuller’s Pushing Daisies, aptly enough, feels like a tiny miracle.
There’s no way this show ought to even be on the air, much less doing respectably in the ratings. Fuller’s cockeyed tale of a piemaker whose touch can revive the dead, with its lavish Tim Burtonesque production design and undeniable air of whimsy, can’t be compared to anything else on television. (Movies are quite another matter; the show wears its immense debts to Jean-Pierre Jeunet’s Amelie and Burton’s Big Fish on its sleeve.) But five episodes in, the show’s still going strong, and even the increasing signs of a hastily reduced budget can’t diminish the rosy glow of sweetness permeating the show.
Ned the piemaker (Lee Pace) can revive the dead — but only for 60 seconds, lest something else nearby of approximate size and vitality drop dead to take their place. And should Ned ever touch anything he’s revived a second time, it’s snuffed out for good. Since discovering his gift as a child, when he reanimated his lovable dog Digby, Ned has grown into a shy, isolated man, whiling away his days making pies out of once-rotten fruit at his restaurant, the Pie Hole. Emerson Cod (the great Chi McBride) is a greedy P.I. who stumbles upon Ned’s secret and blackmails him into a partnership; Ned touches dead bodies to ask them who killed them, Emerson cracks the case, and both of them split the reward.
The fun begins when Emerson’s hired to solve the murder of Charlotte “Chuck” Charles (Anna Friel), Ned’s long-lost childhood sweetheart. Ned brings her back to life, but once reunited with the adorable spitfire he’s pined for all his adult life, he can’t bear to send her back to the grave. And if their newfound relationship weren’t complicated enough, what with their inability to kiss or touch each other, Chuck’s arrival has stirred up jealousy in Olive Snook (Kristin Chenoweth), Ned’s waitress at the Pie Hole, who carries an immense and unrequited torch for her boss.
Sure, the character names are goofy, and the cases Ned, Chuck, and an increasingly grumbly Emerson tackle are even odder. A murderous crash-test dummy, a one-armed plane crash survivor, and the vengeful ghost of a dead jockey have all popped up thus far, and the season’s barely begun. (Thankfully, the show’s tendency toward overly mannered screwball-style dialogue seems to be levelling off.) But the delightfully nasty vein of pitch-black humor bubbling just beneath the show’s surface balances out all that fluffiness, keeping the the series from pitching headlong into treacle territory.
From the dour coroner who demands a taste of the action in exchange for Emerson’s access to the morgue, to the lovely, brokenhearted model with a rampant eating disorder, to the delightfully dour and avaricious Emerson himself, Daisies is full of weird, damaged, and occasionally just plain nasty people. Gruesome deaths and devastating cruelty litter the corners of this series. Chuck’s suffocated with a plastic bag and dumped over the railing of an ocean liner; as a child, Ned accidentally revives and re-kills his mother, and later gets ruthlessly abandoned by his father. There’s poison under the rainbow-colored veneer of this lollipop, and hooray for that.
Without those hints of pain, the show might lack its genuinely poignant punch. While the show never jerks us around about whether or not Chuck and Ned love each other — they do, quite madly — it also doesn’t hesitate to give them realistic obstacles both practical (how will they hold hands?) and emotional (will Ned ever tell Chuck about how, by reviving his mom, he kinda sorta accidentally killed her father in exchange?) Given that instant death for the immensely likeable Chuck is always at stake, and given just how empty Ned’s life is without her, every little victory for the couple packs surprising emotional power.
Chenoweth is a surprising standout here, too, even if I personally can’t quite get past her vaguely terrifying ravenous-Muppet appearance. Though Olive’s goals run directly contrary to the viewer’s — the absolute destruction of Ned and Chuck’s relationship — she’s ultimately not a bad person, and we end up liking her all the same. Her Broadway talents also get a workout through the show’s penchant for spontaneous musicial numbers. Actual singing. Occasional dancing. You have been warned.
Again, this is something that shouldn’t even remotely work — just look at Viva Laughlin. But the level of energy and imagination Daisies brings to its musical interludes somehow wins you over. After all, when’s the last time you saw a big production number — on TV or anywhere else — involving a lovelorn waitress, a golden retriever, and an oblivious janitor dancing around as he power-buffs the floors? (It doesn’t hurt that the show’s not afraid to have other characters complain about all the singing, either.)
My favorite aspect of the series is how cleverly it upends its central brought-back-to-life metaphor. Ned may be the one who literally raises Chuck from the dead, but look at him. He barely speaks above a mumble, he dresses exclusively in funereal shades of gray and black, and he’s the only character in the entire show who doesn’t even have a last name. As played by the luminous Friel, Chuck’s a walking ray of sunshine in a series of colorful outfits, and her presence is slowly coaxing Ned out of the self-dug hole in which he’s long hidden. So who exactly is bringing whom back to life here?
Pushing Daisies is like nothing else on television. Sure, it’s still a bit too in love with its own cleverness, and sure, sometimes it threatens to get a bit cloying. But it tugs at my emotions in a way few shows have ever done, and it does so episode after episode, without fail. It’s the only show I’ve seen in ages that has me not only impatient for next week’s episode at the close of each installment, but actively interested in going back and watching the same episode again. Heroes may have begun royally sucking when Fuller left its writing staff, but Tim Kring’s loss is most definitely our gain. Daisies is hands down the best show on network TV right now, new or returning, and I can’t recommend it highly enough.
But if you happen to be diabetic, consider watching it with a vial of insulin handy. You know, just in case.
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