Pushing Daisies: ABC

"In a time when it is too easy to show too much, it is quite the most romantic thing on TV." (LA Times)

"Pushing Daisies" is easily the most audacious, most ravishing new show in prime time, but there are some concerns. Namely, can the producers sustain the delicate tone from week to week without veering too far into preciousness? Moreover, will the show’s kooky, "Beetlejuice"-like vibe be a hard sell for too many viewers?" (San Jose Mercury News) "By the end of this first sweet slice of Pushing Daisies,you can’t wait for the next. It’s an anticipation mixed with the fear it can’t possibly be as good as the first, and the hope that it will be." (Dallas Morning News) "Still, set against a TV landscape dominated by gross sexual situations and innuendo, there is something genuinely beautiful - almost spiritual - about the first night Ned and Chuck spend together after her joyous rebirth.

"Together" means sleeping in separate rooms with a common wall between them, but Lee Pace, as Ned, and Anna Friel, as Chuck, communicate a desire that seems hot enough to melt the wall. And, yet, they stay apart." (Baltimore Sun) "The zaniest novelty on any network’s fall schedule and, if only because it will be all the buzz by tomorrow, the show you least want to miss. But the series may prove to be a bit like Ned’s supernatural abilities: one exposure, gratifying and mesmerizing; any more, possibly deathly, or at least maddeningly repetitious and excessively adorable." (Washington Post) "Granted, quality is no guarantee of success, as fans of ABC’s Invasion and The Nine well know. But where those equally excellent shows were dark, hopeless and confusing, Daisies is bright, hopeful and easy to follow. So don’t be afraid of getting hooked again just because you were burned before." (USA Today) "But then, that’s the cynical view of "Pushing Daisies." As is true of any TV show, what happens with the premiere isn’t as important as how the show evolves from that point. A show like this gives people who love television hope for its success; if it makes the cut, "Pushing Daisies" will stand as proof that unique vision still has a place on broadcast television." (Seattle Post-Intelligencer) "Pushing Daisies" stakes out a brave, broad swath of storytelling territory, and a potentially fertile one. But one episode is all ABC provided critics for review. Where tone and style are as crucial as in this peculiar tale, a snazzy pilot doesn’t necessarily promise a series success." (Newsday) "The debut is a luxurious beast of a fairy tale that finally brings "Amelie’s" French-daydream rhythm and soul to the small screen. If viewers take to "Daisies" the way critics have — I can’t imagine this won’t be at least a cult hit — a field of copycats may bloom next fall, and American TV would become a Frenchier landscape of fresh fantasies." (Chicago Sun-Times)"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." (NY Times)

You can watch a  preview clip of Pushing Daisies, which won the B&C Fall Critics Poll, at B&C’sfall preview section.