Fresh-baked fun

Pie is the perfect food for the ever more sweet and delectable “Pushing Daisies” to revolve around.

The show follows pie shop owner Ned (Lee Pace), a man with the ability to bring dead bodies back to life with the touch of a finger. The conundrum, though, is that those brought back to life only live for a minute until someone else dies in their place.

That magic touch helped Ned hook up with a private investigator (Chi McBride) who uses his ability to reanimate murder victims and find out who killed them.

However, they only have a minute to talk to the victim before Ned must re-kill them. It’s not your standard “CSI:” style procedural. Eventually Ned gets involved with the murder case of his childhood sweetheart, Chuck (Anna Friel), who he decides to keep alive in an attempt to rekindle their romance.

The premise is pretty bizarre, but that’s only the start of the show’s lovable loopiness. The show’s style is completely different from any other TV series. It feels more like a movie (director Barry Sonnenfeld helmed the pilot episode) sprinkled with fantastic special effects, colorful costumes, picturesque landscapes and production design and fancy camera work.

The zippy dialogue and prominent narration bring a Dr. Seuss vibe to the fairy-tale world, which the actors pull off with ease, especially Kristin Chenoweth as pie shop server Olive Snook, forced to watch her not-so-secret dream guy, Ned, woo Chuck.

“Daisies” is one of the few shows that actually benefitted from last year’s writers’ strike. The shutdown only allowed nine episodes to be produced, which prevented the series’ quirky procedural premise from getting old too fast.

It will be interesting to see if the second season that begins this October can hold on to the show’s charm for a full year.

Each episode includes a few short making-of special features that show how the craziness all comes together, although seeing the process takes away from the fantasy vibe.

With only nine episodes, the season can easily be consumed in one sitting, much like a freshly baked pie. Do it before season two is ready to come out of the oven.