Pushing Daisies (2008)

"What's your plan? To bring him back and ask him where she is?"
 "..."
"That was a joke."
"Heh-heh."

Season 2 kicks off some time after the season 1 cliffhanger. The Pie-Hole waitress Olive is crumbling under the weight of the secrets she now knows, private investigator Emerson Cod continues in his quest for a certain missing person, alive-again Chuck wishes to reconnect with her past and The Pie-maker Ned wishes to stay connected to his can-never-touch sweetheart Chuck even as circumstances force new changes on them. All that digging into their collective pasts though may dredge up things that they didn't expect and may even be dangerous. All while continuing to solve bizarre and outlandish murders by reviving the victims to ask who killed them.

With the extended episode count, the show was going new and interesting places. But then it is quickly and hastily shoved into a mostly unsatisfying conclusion in the end due to cancellation. Having never recovered the lost audience from the writer's strike the previous year, ABC decided to not renew the show despite some mail-in efforts of daisies and pies by fans as well as petitions and the remaining episodes were sporadically burned off. Which is a pity because the aforementioned new stories were looking to be exciting and what is there is still wonderfully entertaining with colorful and fantastic aesthetics, strange and original murder mysteries and snappy banter. There is also a cadre of wonderful guest performances from many well-known actors throughout the episodes that bring great characters and stories to a bittersweet end.

Buyer's Guide:
Available in DVD and Blu Ray box sets and on iTunes, Netflix and Amazon.

4½ Alliterative names and gratuitous cleavage out of 5 

Pushing Daisies (2007)

"You can't just touch someone's life and be done with it."
"Yes I can. That's how I roll."

Ned is The Pie-maker, a bakery owner who learned at a young age that he could revive dead things with a touch. The caveat is he can only keep what he touches alive for one minute or something else will die in its place. If he touches a revived thing again it will return to being dead forever. He uses this gift to help his business partner who is a private investigator by reviving murder victims to ask who killed them and collect the rewards. This becomes a problem when the case involves his childhood sweetheart being murdered on a cruise. Ned revives her, but is unable to re-dead her because of his love for her and ends up letting her live and she becomes the newest crime-solver. Ned also begins a relationship with her. One in which they cannot physically touch lest she die again in addition to an amorous third party in the bakery waitress and Ned's own neuroses.

Bryan Fuller created an odd mix of a show here. It is both very upbeat with its lighthearted soundtrack, bright, saturated colors and borderline saccharine romance, but also with a foot in the grim with it's gruesome murders and black comedy. It is by design reminiscent of a fairy tale (complete with a great narration by Jim Dale), but not the happily ever after kind. The old, uncensored and very adult tales before they were watered down into kid's bedtime stories.

Despite there being at least one dead body per episode, the show never veers too serious. The likeable characters are full of jokes and witty banter about the often very odd and hilarious deaths around them that range from the typical guns and strangulations to death by scratch n' sniff and being run over by monkeys. Add a cup of romance, relationships, jealousy and secrets for an entertaining and original mix of a show that despite its jumble description of a comedic detective fantasy drama is very coherent and very watchable. Season one's writer's strike truncation to 9 episodes is the only real problem as there should have been more of a season.

Buyer's Guide:
Available on DVD and Blu Ray box sets and on iTunes, Netflix and Amazon Instant Video.

5 "Bitch, I was in proximity!" out of 5

Wonderfalls (2004)

A quirky drama about a young woman who is dissatisfied with her crappy retail job in a Niagara Falls gift shop, especially after her coworker is promoted over her despite him still being in high school. While fuming about it, she somehow manifests the ability to speak to the inanimate animals she sells that begin to ask her to perform odd requests that encourage her to help people, sometimes at her expense and often in funny and oblique ways.

Caroline Dhavernas plays the caustic and anti-social Jaye who at first only reluctantly goes along with the animal's requests while questioning her sanity, but eventually starts to soften up to the people around her like her overbearing parents, lesbian sister and pretty much all people she tries to actively avoid. Eric, played by Tyron Leitso, is the love interest and new bartender at Jaye's favorite bar as he was recently married, but ran off from his honeymoon after catching his new wife cheating on him with a hotel staff member. He drank and cried for three days until the owner gave him a job. His kindness and good nature is the antithesis of Jaye, but he finds her interesting nonetheless and sees her as not as uncaring as she thinks usually because of the good deeds the animals force her to do.

Creator Bryan Fuller continues his trend of shows revolving around special young women in an odd situation except this time he has the added benefit of executive producer Tim Minear who also worked on another great and cancelled FOX show, Firefly. With a cast full of great actors and a fresh and original premise, Wonderfalls gained critical praise and a loyal fan-base despite only airing 4 episodes before being cancelled by FOX. There is great character development especially a noticeable shift in Jaye and weird comedy bits. Plus it's just nice to have a show that isn't a medical drama or police procedural for once.

Episodes to See:
Ep. 8 Lovesick Ass - A quite hilarious plot about a mail order bride with an excellent guest performance by a young Spencer Breslin.

Buyer's Guide:
Thanks to a grassroots petition, there is a DVD set available of all 13 episodes made for season 1 though it is only available in Region 1 so far. Also now through Netflix.

5 smooshed-face lions out of 5