I am – Hercules!!

Last week’s episode (teleplay credited to Rina Minmoun, the girl who rescued “Everwood” from mediocrity) about the pigeons and the windmills and the little birdcage in your soul made me laugh so many times I lost count.

For those who missed the news last week, ABC has given "Daisies" a full 22-episode order for the season, so you needn't fear that Chuck, Ned, Olive and Emerson will abandon you anytime soon.

I was not able to get up to Canada this week; happily, “L-Prime” was already there and took notes:

What’s it called?
“Girth”

Who’s responsible?
Words by Katherine Lingenfelter, pictures by Peter O’Fallon.

What does TV Guide say?
“Jockeys are dying in mysterious trampling incidents, so Ned, Chuck and Emerson decide to investigate. Meanwhile, Ned deals with difficult Halloween memories.”

Anything missing in there?
Not especially, though Olive plays a much more central role to the mystery than that lets on. Interesting that they proved that the mysteries can go on practically without Ned, as he spends a decent chunk of the episode taking care of his own business, showing up in the mystery pretty much just to undead and redead the series of corpses.

Last week ended with Olive starting to believe that she discovered something unseemly about Chuck. Is there lording over heads?
A little, but for a show so fundamentally skewed and exaggerated, the handling of the secret and the emotional problems therein is surprising grounded and mature. Not to say that Olive doesn’t enjoy having something in her back pocket, but she also is reminded about the cost and importance of some secrets through her role in the mystery of the week.

So Olive was a jockey?
Yep. Makes sense, don’t it? Leads to some fun flashback greenscreening and run-ins with vertically-challenged alcoholics.

What sort of memories is Ned involved with?
In keeping with the season, Ned is reminded unpleasantly of Halloween and what this particular holiday means in relation to damaging moments in his childhood.

How are aunts Lily and Vivian integrated?
Less with Olive/Chuck, more through Ned and his jaunt through nostalgia. There is a wonderful moment at the end though, wherein Ned realizes that we can’t just sever all ties with our past, no matter how much we may want to.

You complained that the mystery wasn’t up to snuff last week? Any bounceback?
Indeed so. As I mentioned towards the end of last week’s review, last week’s episode improved after the first viewing. But this week’s works nicely as it keeps the mystery tied to our main characters through Olive, lets us spend more time with them while we’re still getting to know them. Plus the jockey ghosts and flaming horses are a bit more compelling than carrier pigeons and windmills.

Those main characters still as delightful as ever?
Of course. This week’s highlight, though, even being Olive’s episode, was Emerson. Chi McBride was given all the best lines, and his comic timing is proving to be one of the bedrocks upon which this series can continually depend, like Lee Pace’s winsome and embarrassed glances or Kristin Chenoweth’s considerable talents.

What’s good?
“Think of it as in escro. between my thighs.”; “Don't try to act as if that’s a word everybody knows.; Emerson after promising not to laugh; “Hang on a second, let me ask the money.”; “My aunts thought of it as a form of birth control.”; “And he's going to kill ... agem.”; “I knocked the hors d’oeuvres plate into my lap and the brie was runny.” “I’d stick with the pissing my pants story.”; Jock-off 2000; “Olive said there was a bar.”; “Or, you know, real clues.; “Cuz an idiot might misunderstand what you’re saying and hit you in the head with a shovel.”; “Yeah, different like purple and mauve.”; Digby’s Halloween costume; “Knowing it was an accident, and that you were still single.”; “You wouldn’t need all that bait if your belly was full of fish.”; “That's ... terrible.”; “It's like a sex addiction ... I would imagine.”; the weird frankensteinery going on; “... and only another three until Mama let me.”; “I’ll need a ride home.”; “I love you, shovel.”; “Trick or treat.”

Not so good?
The first five minutes felt weaker, writing-wise, for some reason. The back and forth between Chuck and Olive, until the piemaker enters, feels especially expository and redundant when the flashback story is taken into consideration. Just feels like it could have been tightened a little.; the A and B plots, usually so effectively wound together, meander a little separately, causing Ned to be dragged from place to place a little arbitrarily, but both plots are strong enough that it’s a minor quibble.

Rating for 1.5 (out of five)
****.5 – the pilot still being held up as the best of this show so far, subsequent episodes have yet to meet up to it, but they’ve come pretty close, and against everything else on right now, forget about it.

8 p.m. Wednesday. ABC.

Alan Moore’s Gentlemen Return!!

FBI Special Agent Dale Cooper!! FBI Special Agent Albert Rosenfield!! FBI Special Agent Roger Hardy!! DEA Agent Dennis Bryson!! FBI Regional Bureau Chief Gordon Cole!! Sheriff Harry S. Truman!! Deputy Tommy “Hawk” Hill!! Bookhouse Boy Big Ed Hurley!! Judge Clinton Sternwood!! Major Garland Briggs!! Dr. Lawrence Jacoby!! John Justice Wheeler!! Jacques Renault!! Einar Thorson!! Leland Palmer!! Audrey Horne!! Donna Hayward!! Harriett Hayward!! Shelley Johnson!! Ronette Pulaski!! Claire Stansfield!! Annie Blackburn!! Josie Packard!! Lucy Moran!! Norma Jennings!! Pete Martell!! Julee Cruise!! The Log Lady!! The Cream-Corn Kid!! Senor Droolcup!! The Man From Another Place!!


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