I am – Hercules!!


Five things you need to know about ABC's “Pushing Daisies” if you don’t know them already.

1) It’s a very dark supernatural comedy about a pie-maker who can raise the dead, but only for one minute. If the subject is not re-killed in less than 60 seconds, dire consequences ensue. While grim and often gory, these short-term resurrections turn out to be extraordinarily useful to anybody trying to solve homicides.

2) A whopping 63% of TV critics polled by Broadcasting & Cable last month chose “Daisies” as the best new show of autumn. Runner-up was “Reaper” with a comparatively meager 15%.

3) “Daisies” is masterminded by Bryan Fuller, who created “Dead Like Me” and “Wonderfalls” and wrote some of the best episodes of “Heroes” last season, including "Company Man."

4) Barry Sonnenfeld, who directed the “Addams Family” and “Men in Black” movies, helmed tonight’s pilot.

5) All the characters get sharp lines, but I’ll confess particular affection for Emerson Cod (Chi McBride), the weary, leery and opportunistic private detective who puts the pie-maker to work solving crime. “Daisies” is not only the best new show of autumn, it is the funniest.

USA Today gives it four stars (out of four) and says:

Tonight, a fall too short on joy gets an enchanting lift: Pushing Daisies. … wildly inventive … Solid gold from top to bottom, the cast is almost an embarrassment of riches. Shifting from more serious roles, McBride is a true comic find, while theater veterans Chenoweth, Kurtz and Greene are such constant delights, you have to hope the show will make enough room for them. …

The New York Times says:

… sweetly odd, but also oddly charming. … The series’s saucy tone and bizarre conceit may prove hard to sustain, but the pace is quick, the dialogue is clever, and the casting is perfect. …

The Los Angeles Times says:

… lovely … In a time when it is too easy to show too much, it is quite the most romantic thing on TV. … It is luminous and numinous and ominous, to create a heightened sense of life, and of death. You may forgivably be reminded of Tim Burton, David Lynch and the Coen brothers -- for whom executive producer and pilot-director Barry Sonnenfeld worked as a cinematographer and with whom he shares a taste for altered reality. It is all very beautiful. …

The Washington Post says:

… the show you least want to miss … not only TiVo-worthy but veritably On-Demandable.

The Chicago Tribune says:

… a pilot that seems far more like the first half of an expensive, hollow Hollywood movie than a TV show viewers are expected to care about. Truly, it gives me no joy to rain on the parade of praise for "Pushing Daisies," which has been greeted with wild enthusiasm in many quarters. The broadcast networks should be taking chances and supporting risky, innovative, visionary ideas. In this case, however, ABC may have gone too far. …

The Seattle Post-Intelligencer says:

… all the praise heaped on "Pushing Daisies," and every declaration about the dramedy's originality, is merited. There isn't anything else like it on the schedule. …

The Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel says:

… along with the CW's equally busy "Reaper," it's one of the two best network series premiering this fall. … Creator Bryan Fuller got the fantasy genre almost right a few years ago with Showtime's bleakly comic "Dead Like Me" and again with Fox's whimsical, short-lived "Wonderfalls," but here he and producer Barry Sonnenfeld nail it. The production's bright colors offset the black comedy; the tart dialogue prevents the kooky characters from becoming cloying. "Pushing Daisies" shouldn't need a magic touch to keep it alive.

The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette says:

… Easily the most distinctive pilot episode for a TV series this fall, ABC's "Pushing Daisies" captivates with an emotionally resonant story and dazzles with its bright visual imagery. …

The Boston Herald says:

You’re either going to love or hate ABC’s “Pushing Daisies.” The most overhyped show of the fall season will draw few yawns. … recommended only for those who aren’t getting enough sugar in their diets. …

The Hollywood Reporter says:

… a masterful mixture of life, romance, optimism and youthful exuberance, all played out under the threat of instant death. It is so unique and has such an uncanny charm that it is impossible to watch the premiere without wondering whether succeeding episodes can come even close to the pilot. …

Variety says:

Standing head and shoulders above this fall's other seedlings, "Pushing Daisies" is whimsical, romantic, funny and visually distinctive -- such a delicate mix of ingredients, frankly, you fear for its longevity in the cold, cruel world of primetime. The producers are seeking to offset that fragility by incorporating a procedural element into this tale of love and death, but that only invites skepticism the souffle will collapse by episode four or five. Such commercial considerations, however, shouldn't detract from this beguiling pilot, and credit ABC with taking the season's boldest leap in hoping that love conquers all.…

8 p.m. Wednesday. ABC.

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