One look at any frame of any episode of Pushing Daisies was enough to tell you the show was doomed.
Because if you took a single frame, you could, well, frame it. It's one of the best looking shows to air in the last few years. And looking like that costs money. These days, what network is going to spend money on a quirky, little-watched mystery/comedy/fantasy?
Not ABC, which decided to quietly air the final three Pushing Daisies episodes over the last few Saturday nights. (The show's old Wednesday timeslot was reserved for Wipeout, a gameshow that's basically Doubledare with grownups.)
And I'll miss it. I'll miss it a lot.
I'll miss Jim Dale's narration. I'll miss the clever dialogue, the bright colors. I'll miss deadpan Chi McBride and Lee Pace, paired up with energetic, adorable Anna Friel and Kristin Chenoweth. I'll miss the way the show -- like all great TV, or movies, or books -- created its own world.
But as much as I loved the show, knew this was coming for a long time: not enough viewers, too much money, too weird, too quirky, too cute, cut short by the strike.
Still, I would have liked a proper ending. Not that the show went out with a cliff-hanger: Chuck's aunts found out she was alive, Olive got over Ned, and Emerson was -- we assume reuinted with his daughter. But a real ending would have provided us with some closure on the Ned/Chuck front. I'd always though the show would end with Ned losing his power but gaining the girl, so to speak.
(And yes, they were of course deeply in love throughout the entire show, but the knowledge that accidentally bumping into your boyfriend will kill you has to strain a relationship.)
I complained on Twitter a few weeks ago about how whenever a show goes off the air, people begin speculating about whether there will be a movie version of the show. In this case, I wouldn't complain. I'll be happy to read the comic book version of Pushing Daisies that Bryan Fuller has planned (let's hope it's as good as the Buffy the Vampire Slayer comic has been). Like the things Ned touches, I want these characters to live on.
Tom Coombe
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