The Most Beautifully Weird TV Show: Pushing Daisies

Pushing Daisies is a whimsical mystery-fantasy series about a pie maker named Ned who has a very unusual gift: with a single touch, he can bring dead things back to life. But there are rules : if he touches them again, they die permanently, and if they stay alive for more than a minute, something else nearby dies in their place.

The show begins when Ned reunites with his childhood crush, Chuck, under not-ideal circumstances, but it is a romantic situation. From there, the series becomes a mix of romance, murder mysteries, dark fairy tale humor, and visually colorful storytelling.

Most episodes revolve around solving strange murders alongside a private investigator, while the bigger emotional story focuses on love, loneliness, secrets, and the consequences of trying to cheat death.

What makes the show special isn’t just the plot; it’s the atmosphere. It feels like a living storybook: bright colors, quirky narration, eccentric characters, and dialogue that sounds almost musical. Even though it deals with death constantly, it’s oddly comforting and charming rather than grim. 

Click for more about: Pushing Daisies : The creator and some facts

Even after a third, fourth or fifth rewatch, Pushing Daisies never feels old. Instead, it feels like revisiting a cherished place, it's like walking through the doors of The Piehole and finding everything exactly where you left it.  Which is why fans keep asking if a different streaming service will pick it up and bring it back to life. New actors, new episodes, the same premise. 

The main characters of Pushing Daisies and the actors who portrayed them are:

Character	Actor
Ned	Lee Pace
Charlotte 'Chuck' Charles	Anna Friel
Emerson Cod	Chi McBride
Olive Snook	Kristin Chenoweth
Lily Charles	Swoosie Kurtz
Vivian Charles	Ellen Greene

Recurring and Notable Characters

• The Narrator — voiced by Jim Dale
• Digby — Ned's beloved dog.
• Young Ned — portrayed by Field Cate.
• Young Chuck — portrayed by Sammi Hanratty.

One reason the show became a cult favorite is the chemistry between Ned and Chuck, the quirky detective partnership with Emerson Cod, and the scene-stealing performance of Olive Snook by Kristin Chenoweth, which earned her an Emmy Award.

If you want to know more about this show click here

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An Artist’s Journey

 

Hello, and welcome. If you’ve discovered this blog—a project I began in 2016—you’ll see a record of my life as an artist and thinker. My writing has been "on and off" over the years because life beyond the screen is demanding. I have traveled, studied, and navigated various career paths in search of my place in this world.

Like many, I have faced the challenge of leaders who view people as disposable. Through those trials, I have fought to keep art at the center of my life. I am still here, and I am still creating.

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A post-mortem examination of Pushing Daisies.

 I say: #PushinDaisies #ReWatch !!! PD Quotes HERE !

You can watch it again on HBO max 

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Many people really don't think about the message and the story of a TV show, does it mean something? Maybe this is because  99% of the shows that people watch are meant to entertain, distract us and just give us a good brief time. There still are a few TV shows about doctors who live a constant drama and at the same time are having sex with a coworker, or what about Upper East Side teenagers living in a big city ... they have sex too ( all the time),  how about reality shows of women getting married with excons ? There are a bunch of shows like that.

I can name many other shows that are all the same or almost  just with different actors and different plot but basically doing the same things.

 Pushing Daisies was among the few TV shows that had a message, a different one. The whole show is sort of a metaphor or allegory for pure, eternal, faithful and undying LOVE with a necrophiliac twist. The question was: Are you capable of loving someone after he or she is gone?, when there is a big distance between lovers, can love survive?, when there’s an absence of physical affection is it worth loving that person? Would you love someone who you can't touch?

Ned (the pie maker) has the ability to bring people back from death, back to life. Ned has a complex life hiding this secret but it's a simple man overall, a hopeless romantic. The show doesn't talk or show any of his previous relationships, but probably he didn't have any meaningful relationships before Chuck ( The Lonely Tourist and best friend who is revived by him ). I believe that Ned was obsessed with Chuck (who represents the idea of what love is supposed to be) because she was the only person in Ned’s life who knew what It meant to lose someone and feel lonely.

The shows often talks about Ned’s childhood, which is similar to Chuck’s youth. They both had a good life overall, but they were trapped in different ways. Ned wasn’t supposed to get out of the Longborough School for Boys but he escapes and Chuck had the option of leaving her aunt’s house but she never did, until she was brave enought to do so. 

 In this show the thing that keeps Ned and Chuck physically separated is his gift. This gift (touching the dead and bringing them back to life) nowadays could represents a distance of physical or even emotional, but I guess there are 3 big elements that define the fate of most relationship are:

 

 -Distance: When lovers are apart, when they live in different cities, countries or even continents.

-Time: The years, months, weeks, days, hours and minutes they spent apart or together. When distance is not a problem, the time they spent apart or the other way around . When there is no distance, time is ticking away…”will he/she change? When? Will we move in together? When? How long will this last?” Or the relationship last too long and the lovers get sick of each other.

 -Place: In this case it means the psychological/mental state of mind of the person according to a person's personal situation, employment status, economic status, maturity, the expectation that our family and society puts on us. etc.

Ned and Chuck's "only" problem is that they can’t touch, they can’t show their affection in a traditional, normal way: Holding hands, hugs, kissing, and sex. The show asks the viewers: Is it possible to love someone you can’t touch? Can love last through time? Or are you so desperate for physical affection that you are capable of losing the love of your life because of the lack of physical contact?  Ok, this is not what the creator of the show has said but, it is a good question. There are so many tv relationships that wouldn't be consider real enought if the characters on it wouldn't have sex. 

When I think about romance now, I think about Ned opening Chuck’s coffin at the graveyard, literally returning Chuck to the world of the living. Dead people, cemeteries, coffins... romantic or not ? part 2 soon.

Pushing daisies is a forensic fairy tale, which is full of romanticism and melancholy of the past and the things that are and can never be. Pushing Daisies is a show that is a feast to the eyes! Colors and combinations, a mix of the 50's style with the modern world in a city where we wish we could live, a perfect aesthetic that plays with somber and dismal issues in a world where love is worth waiting for, worth the sacrifice and it’s worth dying and returning to life for.

 Quotes and Caps Here!

The World of Pushing Daisies: Quotes

If you haven't noticed yet, I am in love with Pushing Daisies (aired on ABC from October 3, 2007, to June 13, 2009). The TV series was canceled by a stupid television network. The show was described as an American fantasy comedy-drama and the creator; Bryan Fuller is a genius! He created and wrote shows like Dead Like Me, Wonderfalls, Heroes, Hannibal, Mockingbird Lane, etc.

Starring Lee Pace as Ned, the series is about a pie-maker who has the ability to bring dead things back to life with his touch, an ability which comes with stipulations. Before 1 minute runs out the thing he brought back to life needs to be touch again (kill it again) or something else has to die. Once he touches a thing or a person, he can't touch it again or the person will die forever.

 The cast also included Anna Friel, Chi McBride, Kristin Chenoweth, Ellen Greene, and Swoosie Kurtz. The series was narrated by Jim Dale, who sets a special mood for the stories.

 Labeled as a "forensic fairy tale", the series is known for its unusual visual style (perfect), quirky characters, and fast-paced dialogue, often employing wordplay, metaphor, and double entendre.

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I pledge my allegiance to The Moon.

If you watch the Moon for too long, you will begin to feel that you are getting lost in her shine and probably you will never come back. People of some cultures often fear the Moon because there are many myths that involve her. The most popular one : the werewolves and the vampires, free during the night to kill everything they want but slaves of the sun. We cannot deny that -She- is the silent witness of everything that happens in the realm of darkness. Another quiet witness of mankind's history. The Moon appears to be the only constant thing in our lives, in the lives of those who walk at night and thru time.... unchanging, loyal and reliable, the only ones that will keep our secrets save forever.

 There is such a fascination with her that we can find movies, books and art with The Moon as a main character.

 

-Myths about the queen of the night........

 

Werewolves are one of the creatures that we often see depicted in films about myths and legends of these "monsters". This creature is, of course, affiliated with the full moon. Typically it is believed that these are creatures that have human form but  morph into a wolf-like (typically violent) creatures when the full moon is in the sky. There are many different variations on this because of all of the books and movies that have been made about werewolves.

 

Various methods for becoming a werewolf have been reported, one of the simplest being the removal of clothing and putting on a belt made of Wolfskin, probably as a substitute for the assumption of an entire animal skin (which also is frequently described). In other cases, the body is rubbed with a magic salve. To drink rainwater out of the footprint of the animal in question or to drink from certain enchanted streams were also considered effectual modes of accomplishing metamorphosis. The 16th century Swedish writer Olaus Magnus says that the Livonian werewolves were initiated by draining a cup of specially prepared beer and repeating a set formula. Ralston in his Songs of the Russian People gives the form of incantation still familiar in Russia.

In Italy, France and Germany, it was said that a man or woman could turn into a werewolf if he or she, on a certain Wednesday or Friday, slept outside on a summer night with the full moon shining directly on his/her face.

This is only one example of some of the powerful stories that people across time and across the world associate with the moon. Using many different forms of symbolism, the moon itself has become a symbol for love, desire, change, passion, fertility, and violence.

Vampiric Connection (Wikipedia)

 In Medieval Europe, the corpses of some people executed as werewolves were cremated rather than buried in order to prevent them from being resurrected as vampires. Before the end of the 19th century, the Greeks believed that the corpses of werewolves, if not destroyed, would return to life as vampires in the form of wolves or hyenas which prowled battlefields, drinking the blood of dying soldiers. In the same vein, in some rural areas of Germany, Poland and Northern France, it was once believed that people who died in mortal sin came back to life as blood-drinking wolves. This differs from conventional werewolfery, where the creature is a living being rather than an undead apparition. These vampiric werewolves would return to their human corpse form at daylight.

 

Mayan Moon Goddesses. 

The Mayan people have several stories about different moon goddesses. One goddess frequently associated with the moon is Ixchel who is associated with the moon because she is a fertility goddess. However, it is believed that she may actually be the “grandmother of the moon” and represent aging and the drying up of fertility in old age so she is most commonly linked with the waxing of the moon and not the moon at all times.

Selene / Luna. 

These are the names of the Moon Goddess in Greek and Roman mythology respectively. In the myths associated with these goddesses, the goddess is paired with the god of the sun. He travels throughout the day and she takes over the journey at night. She is typically considered to be a passionate goddess who takes many lovers and who represents the desire associated with the moon.

The face of Halloween

Far from an activity for children to do with their parents during October for Halloween, the original Jack-o-Lanterns, of the Irish myth, were actually quite terrifying looking and I can’t imagine children would have want to come close to any of them. This essential Halloween decoration item has a purpose and a story behind it. 

  

They were carved from turnips or beets rather than festive orange pumpkins, and were intended to ward off unwanted visitors; spirits, goblins and demons. When the Irish and Scots emigrated to America, bringing the tradition along, they found that pumpkins, native to America, made perfect fruits for carving. Pumpkin Jack-o-Lanterns have been an integral part of Halloween festivities ever since. 

The name “Jack O’ Lantern” was originally one of the numerous names given to ignis fatuus (Medieval Latin for “foolish fire”), another of which is “Will O’ the Wisps”, basically the odd light that can occasionally be seen over marshes, swamps, and the like.  “Jack O’ Lantern” first popped up being used this way around the mid-17th century in East Anglia, UK and spread from there through parts of England, Ireland, and Scotland. 

  

Also this name could originally derive from the practice of calling men generically “Dick, Jack, Tom, etc.”  In particular, men who were lower class, were often called generically “Jack” beginning around the 14th century in England. (This practice popped up again in the late 19th century in the United States where “Jack” was used for the name for a man where his real name is unknown).  Thus, when you see someone carrying a lantern in a distance at night that you see is a man, but you can’t make out who exactly it is, he is literally “man with a lantern”, a.k.a. “Jack of the Lantern” or “Jack O’ Lantern”. 

The truth is that the jack o’ lanterns and pumpkin carving are probably going to be around for a long time, at least that is what I hope so. I could not imagine a Halloween season without this mysterious folks. 

Even though the pumpkin is a simple vegetable, carved with a scary face and that alone makes it trick and it’s a perfect decoration for a spooky night; nowadays it is more commercialized in different ways. Just like masks changed from scary to sophisticated and expensive. The pumpkin has changed. 

Before, the image of the jack o’ lantern alone was commercialized in cards, masks, plates and different decorations items. Today, the pumpkin itself has suffered a major transformation.  Apparently to get the attention of the new generation, new stencils with images of Disney characters, Movie characters, Music Idols were created to carve on pumpkins. We can also count with light and sound effects.  Don’t get me wrong. I’m all about this cool new designs, there are very creative people out there BUT I just hope kids learn first to carve the original face of our beloved jack so this tradition won’t disappear completely. But the question is: the Jack -o-Lanter face,will it disappear?