(S02E01) What's the buzz? The buzz is bees and bees were the main topic on tonight's season opener. Frankly, I really don't like bees, so I found the sight of the dead body -- Kentucky Fitz -- covered in pus-filled bee bites rather repulsive. However, you got to hand it to Pushing Daisies for production values.

Everything about the show remains top-notch. The look, the feel, the essence remains as precious as the Emmy-award winning pie-lette (for direction). In fact, that's the only problem with PD; it is precious. For some people that's too much. For me, this is TV that's just too good to care about the delicate balance between surreality and satire, fable and a far-out acid trip.




So, all that aside, tonight's show picked up the threads from last year's all too brief season. The major developments, amid all the biz about the bees and French Stewart as a honey king named Woolsey Nichols, were many. Vivian and Lily made it out of the house because they missed the special pies that Olive was delivering for Chuck. That outing proved to be a catalyst. Olive had it with all the secrets and did a human version of Edvard Munch's The Scream which led to her being sequestered -- thanks to Lily -- in a convent. Chuck then decided to create some space between herself and the Pie-man by moving into Olive's apartment.

As Pushing Daisies usually does, the case requires way too much attention to detail, but in the end Betty gets her bees back and Woolsey goes to jail and Chuck gets a new home which Ned makes even more homey by filling it with everything from her room at Vivian and Lily's house, and Emerson Cod seems to have a secret about his new avocation, a pop-up book called Lil' Gum Shoe ("the tale of a little girl who's father couldn't find her").

Other points of interest

-- The art direction remains superb, all the variations on hives and bits about bees and bee-girls and honey.

-- The homage to The Sound of Music was perfect, with Kristin Chenoweth on the verge of bursting out in song as the camera swooped down on her on a mountain top. It's amazing what they can do with CGI, isn't it?

-- The teal blue/green habits reminded me a bit of The Flying Nuns' colors, although it was more about The Sound of Music. As Olive said, "Unless you can tell me a flibbery-gibbet is a title of respect," which is a term from the lyrics to "How Do You Solve A Problem Like Maria?"

-- Poor Olive, just when she tries to rid herself of being the secret keeper, Lily laid another one on her; she's Chuck's mother and Chuck's father was Vivian's boyfriend! Oy vey!

-- Bryan Fuller wrote this episode and it was filled with great lines. This is the kind of show you really should watch more than once to catch them all!