Transcribed by Emily June.
[THEME MUSIC]Missy
Hello and welcome to Fake Geek Girls, a podcast looking at nerdy pop culture from both a fan and critical perspective encouraging the things we love to do better. I’m Missy, I’m a writer, and I am just a pie maker in this world aspiring to be a Charlotte Charles.
Merri
I’m Merri, I’m a marketer, and I don’t know why, but I always get confused and think Bryan Fuller did Glee.
Missy
Thank god no.
Merri
I always – for some reason – it’s the other guy who’s a dumb. Maybe that’s –
Missy
It’s uh, Ryan Murphy?
Merri
Yeah.
Missy
Is that his name? The American Horror Story?
Merri
Yeah. I think because he does American Horror Story –
Missy
Because he’s gay.
Merri
Imagine – imagine American Horror Story if Bryan Fuller did it.
Missy
Oh, it would slap!
Merri
Yeah. So I think that’s why I get confused. But I always am like, “No, he did not do Glee.” Although – would have been really interesting.
Missy
I would have watched it.
Merri
It wouldn’t have been children, it would have been adults and it would have been with Kristen Chenoweth.
Missy
Pushing Daisies is a 2007 show by Bryan Fuller who you may know from Hannibal, as well as Dead Like Me – we talked about Hannibal, so –
Merr
One day we’ll probably do Dead Like Me.
Missy
Oh, god, I love Dead Like Me, Dead Like Me was my introduction to Bryan Fuller.
Merri
I remember when you became obsessed with that.
Missy
I was obsessed. Anyway, he did Dead Like Me, Wonderfalls, and American Gods current- well, he left, he leaves a lot of shows after one season.
Merri
Maybe he understood – maybe he has the JJ Abrams issue where he doesn’t know how to end it but he also knows how to stop.
Missy
You know what I think it is? Is he leaves almost entirely, from my understanding, over creative differences. And I think he’s really like – he has settled on his vision and studio –
Merri
And that’s it.
Missy
Yeah, studio meddling, he’s not about it. Pushing Daisies is one that he actually was with it for both seasons. But he left Dead Like Me after one season, Hannibal I think he was with it through the whole thing. Wonderfalls only got one season and like half of it didn’t air. Anyway, Pushing Daisies –
Merri
He’s doing Star Trek now though.
Missy
He was.
Merri
He’s not doing it anymore?
Missy
He left after one season. He’s still a producer, but he’s not the show runner anymore.
Merri
Ohhh, okay. What is he doing now?
Missy
I don’t know.
Merri
He’s just living his life, being gay.
Missy
He’s posting a lot about horror movies, as he always does. In all caps! I don’t understand why he’s always posting in all caps.
Merri
I would love for him to do like a HORROR horror movie.
Missy
Yeah, I know it would be –
Merri
Oh, he would do such a good folk horror.
Missy
Yeah, I would love it. So… Pushing Daisies follows Ned the Piemaker, who doesn’t appear to have a last name. He has the –
Merri
Oh, I never thought about that.
Missy
It’s “The Piemaker.” Middle name, “the” last name, “Piemaker.” He has the unusual ability to touch a dead person and return them to life for 60 seconds before another person will die in their stead. He uses this ability along with Emerson Cod, a private investigator, to solve murders or strange deaths, to make enough money to keep his pie shop open. On one case, he discovers the murder victim is Charlotte Charles, his childhood neighbor (and like, first kiss and first love) and he chooses not to touch her again. They fall in love, but they can never touch or she will die for good. Along with Olive Snook, who works at Ned’s pie place, The Pie Hole, the characters solve mysteries, have interpersonal drama, and are generally charming and wonderful and I can’t be objective about this show because it’s my favorite ever!
Merri
But you will be.
Missy
No, I won’t be objective Are you kidding me? Fuck objective – can’t do it. One thing to note about this show is that it was in no small part of victim of the (necessary and good) Writer’s Guild of America strike in from – I think 2007 to 2008, in which all members, which is about 12,000 people, working in screenwriting went on strike for higher pay, among other things.
Merri
Also affected the television industry forever.
Missy
Forever, yeah. With screenwriters on strike, new episodes of TV were not being produced which – no joke – is why we have so much fucking reality TV today. Reality TV existed before but the writers strike, but not like this.
Merri
Yeah, we had like, Real World, Road Rules.
Missy
Real Housewives of the OC existed because of Desperate Housewives.
Merri
And the popularity of The OC.
Missy
Yeah, so this reality TV can be produced without writers, and after the strike it could theoretically be cheaper because you didn’t have to pay the writers’ increased pay. What is now the first season of Pushing Daisies would have originally been the first half of the first season.
Merri
Oh really?
Missy
But it was interrupted by the strike. When it came back, its momentum seemed to have slowed, and it was canceled before the final three episodes were shown –
Merri
Because it was problematic!
Missy
Because it was problematic. Cancel culture strikes again! Those episodes were eventually aired elsewhere and provide… like, not a conclusion in any real sense. But there’s at least some narrative satisfaction at the end. It’s all very strange, but it ended up with a large cult following. Bryan Fuller has repeatedly said he would continue if he could, and he keeps asking if he can, and it hasn’t happened yet.
Merri
I’m surprised. I feel like we’re in a good place to –
Missy
I think it’s just too expensive.
Merri
Then just don’t.
Missy
And people don’t want to take a risk on it again.
Merri
But Netflix will take a risk on 5 million bad shows.
Missy
Yeah, but only for one season.
Merri
They are… they are getting the – they are – Netflix is finally
Missy
They are reaping what they have sown.
Merri
Yeah, they’re finally feeling the bad decisions they have made.
Missy
The first thing I want to talk about is something I’ve been sitting on for years, which is that Pushing Daisies is inverted noir.
Merri
Have you ever seen this, like anyone also argue that?
Missy
I have seen people write about Pushing Daisies as noir, and it’s in the noir influences, but not in the way that I’m going to talk about, which I think is quite specific.
Merri
So here’s your –
Missy
Here’s my master’s thesis, I will accept your honorary degree at any time. I say “inverted” as opposed to “reversed” deliberately, “reversed” implies a flip-flopping, whereas I think many of Pushing Daisies’ features actually align very neatly with noir just in a way that puts a fresh spin on it. There is no simple – like, femme fatale reversal, like you don’t have suddenly a man leading a woman down a path of destruction. We’ll get into what these things mean in a minute. But it’s not that easy, right? They don’t just simply flip-flop and call it good. It’s doing something, I think, very clever. And it’s not as simple as the show being about solving murders with a bright and cheery aesthetic, rather than a dark and dreary one. It goes – the like, playfulness with the idea of noir goes a lot deeper than that, in my opinion. Because not everybody is as obsessed with film noir as I am, I’ll give a very simple primer. Film noir arose in the early to mid 20th century, largely in American film, and was derived from film techniques pioneered in German Expressionist film as well as popular hardboiled crime novels of the time period.
Merri
Love the idea of “hardboiled.”
Missy
Yeah, it’s just like the really –
Merri
Eggy.
Missy
Eggy, yeah. Really intense and gritty style of crime writing that was popular at the time.
Merri
I don’t think of hard boiled eggs as gritty.
Missy
I know it’s hard to explain like, it makes sense to me. But I can’t –
Merri
You’re very entrenched in it.
Missy
Yeah, I’m entrenched in it, so I can’t explain why.
Merri
Eggy.
Missy
Eggy. They’re often both literally and figuratively dark using a specific style of lighting to create stark shadows that came to define the genre visually as time went on. Film noir often deals with corruption in many forms – the protagonist, who are often anti-heroes at best, run into police corruption, manipulative women, wrongful death, and typically end up worse off than they started.
Merri
Kinda like we are now.
Missy
Yeah. It’s commonly associated with private investigators, beautiful women who lie called “femme fatales,” which means deadly women, smoking, slatted blinds, and fast talking characters with lots of double entendres (largely to dodge the Hays code). The Hays code restricted a lot of things that you could portray on TV, which is why when you watch film noir, they all talk very fast, and they use a lot of slang. And it’s because they were talking about things that if the Hays – like, the board that judged whether a film was acceptable or not, if they knew what they were really saying, it probably wouldn’t make have made it past, so the dialogue is very clever. Some of the most popular examples are the Maltese Falcon and The Big Sleep, later on getting into things like Kiss Me Deadly and Vertigo – which is actually directly referenced in Pushing Daisies. Like, there’s an extended scene referencing Vertigo, which I think is in the episode, “Bitches.” There’s obviously some surface level referencing of film noir, right? The show follows unconventional investigators solving murders – that tracks with film noir – there is in fact a lot of death. There are visual references, such as Mr. Emerson Cod’s office itself – feels very film noir, the slotted blind shots in “Girth,” where you have Oliver kind of approaching Emerson for – to investigate these deaths. And you have the repeated Vertigo references – and I think it’s “Bitches” where Emerson gets – yeah, Simone drugs him and he has like, that spinning into the void. That’s a reference directly to Vertigo.
Merri
Ohhhh.
Missy
It’s clear that film noir is an influence here, but if you just looked at Pushing Daisies screenshots, noir would not be the first genre to come to mind, right? If you go a little deeper, there are still resonant themes, but they’re all twisted in different directions. One of my favorites is that Chuck is literally a femme fatale – literally translates to fatal woman – a woman in this case, a woman returned from the dead. Emerson’s nickname for her, Dead Girl, is essentially a literal, somewhat mistranslated term for her role in a film noir, right? He’s literally like, askew, but literally calling her a femme fatale, a dead girl. And if you zoom out, she does serve the typical femme fatale role in that her entrance into the protagonist – in this case, Ned – in her entrance into the protagonist’s life pushes him out of the realm he’s comfortable with and into a radically different one. It just so happens that in film noir, this is usually the woman subverting the expected role of a woman and dragging him into the path of death and destruction.
Merri
Women are bad.
Missy
Because women are bad. In this case, you know, just happens that it’s a better place for him to be than you would expect from a film noir. It plays straight with the tropes, and it doesn’t quite subvert them because it doesn’t lead you to believe that it’s a noir at all right? It makes visual reference to noir. But when you’re looking at it, you’re not like, “Oh, this is a noir parody, or this is a noir subversion.” Instead, it’s playing on noir, pretty straight. It’s just taking you in new directions.
Merri
It’s really interesting, because I know we’ll talk about this later – like, with the queer stories – but it feels like noir is the perfect example. Like, the perfect way to tell those queer stories because –
Missy
It is!
Merri
I mean, the talk like – getting past the Hays Code, and the way that you speak and all that, it really, really does track.
Missy
Noir is like – it’s… noir is a really complicated genre, because you really kind of have to get into it to appreciate how much of it –
Merri
You really gotta love it –
Missy
– is deeply queer. Yeah, it’s not – when I say it’s deeply queer, I don’t mean necessarily in a positive sense. I mean, it’s literally about like, male anxieties about attraction to maleness. At its deepest, that’s happening there. Noir is also usually a very cynical genre, which is obviously not true at all with Pushing Daisies, which is sometimes so quirky and cute and bright that it puts people right off.
Merri
Yeah, there were times when I was like, “I’m really sick of Chuck.”
Missy
That’s how I felt the first – I didn’t like Chuck the first time I watched the show.
Merri
Yeah, she got a little too much.
Missy
I love her now. I would – I love her so much.
Merri
She’s good, but I came out of it absolutely loving Olive.
Missy
That’s fair, you’re very Olive.
Merri
I love Olive, like, justice for Oliver sooner.
Missy
Pushing Daisies is not optimistic, given that there is no way out of Ned and Chuck’s predicament. Like, there’s just no way out of it. Murders will always happen, not everybody can have the happy ending that they want, etc. But it’s not cynical, right? I don’t think that it’s relentlessly optimistic, but I also don’t think it’s cynical.
Merri
Glass half full?
Missy
Yeah.
Merri
Full of dead.
Missy
Yeah. Noir often explores estrangement and distance from the norm or society as a whole. Usually, as the protagonists become increasingly disillusioned. They typically start out quote, unquote, “normal” or “normal-ish,” but stray increasingly far from that space as they’re exposed to more and more kinds of degeneracy, crime, and so on. In Pushing Daisies, the characters all begin in a place of distance from the norm – Ned is just like, all kinds of messed up, Emerson is quite cynical and closed off, Chuck is literally back from the dead and unable to connect with her family, Olive also had a difficult upbringing and has unrequited love for Ned, the aunts are in mourning and distant from everybody, etc. Like nobody is in a good place here. Instead of going further from society, as we expect from noir or instead of coming back to society, as we might expect from a fairy tale (and in the Hollywood sense, not in like the Grimm Brothers sense) – fairy tales are another genre with a huge influence on Pushing Daisies – neither of those things happen, right? The characters come together, but really in their own group or in subgroups as opposed to back to society as a whole.
And this is a quote from A Guide to Film Noir Genre by Roger Ebert, and this is part of a 10 point list, so this is just points nine and ten. “Nine: relationships in which love is only the final flop card in the poker game of death. Ten: the most American film genre because no society could have created a world so filled with doom, hate, fear, and betrayal unless it were essentially naive and optimistic.” And this is extremely funny to me in the context of Pushing Daisies in which arguably death is only the final flop card in the poker game of death. I’m sorry, death is only the the final flop card in the poker game of love. For context in poker, in poker that uses community cards, so like Texas Hold’em and a lot of other –
Merri
I know nothing about poker.
Missy
That’s okay. There’s different varieties of poker. Five card is the one that I grew up playing, where you don’t have community cards. In Texas Hold’em, you have your own hand, but the community also shares a series of cards. And that’s what the flop is. The flop is the community cards –
Merri
The stack of cards?
Missy
It’s not the stack, it’s in the – like in the center of the table, there will be a series of cards that everybody is playing with –
Merri
Oh okay –
Missy
As well as what’s in your hand.
Merri
And that card is –
Missy
– those cards in the center are the flop. And that’s shared. So for – in poker with community cards, the flop consists of the cards that everybody plays with, in addition to their own hand, the final flop card is the last card the dealer flips. So that determines how the play is going to go essentially. So to say that love is only the final flop card in the poker game of get death, is to say that love may win or lose you the hand, but the game is still death, right? That’s what – that is what Ebert ascribes to noir.
Merri
Do you agree with him?
Missy
I think that that’s a fair interpretation of noir. In Pushing Daisies on the other hand, death is the thing that may win or lose you the hand. That’s literally how Chuck and Ned get together. Her death is what brings her back into his life, but the game itself is love not death. Death is – again, death is the final flop card that determines the direction of the game, but the game itself is love not death.
Merri
So…
Missy
Inverse noir!
Merri
Yeah, interesting…
Missy
Likewise, Ebert writes the only a country is naive and optimistic as America could come up with a genre as cynical and doomed as Noir. Tell me this show about death and grisly murder and greed with the relentlessly twee tone isn’t this description inverted?
Merri
Yeah.
Missy
You can’t! Like, if it came out that Bryan Fuller read this description was like,”[Maniacal Laughter] I’m gonna write the opposite of this!” I would not be surprised. I’m introducing all of this to you now, so we can talk about film noir broadly and how it relates to the show, but much of this is going to come back later. So just like –
Merri
Just store it away.
Missy
Just store it away. Before we get –
Merri
In a little box.
Missy
Yeah, before we get too far in, I do want to address that much like film noir and just TV in the mid to late 2000s, Pushing Daisies is not without flaws. Orientalism and fatphobia in particular are both unfortunately pervasive in the show.
Merri
The orientalism is like hardcore!
Missy
It’s so bad!
Merri
It’s hardcore.
Missy
So when it comes to Orientalism, I don’t just mean the presence of like East Asian clothes or decorations. The term as defined by Edward Said, refers to how the West treats the East using cultural signifiers to suggest that the East is inferior, underdeveloped, and backwards. In the case of Pushing Daisies, I feel like the use of use of East Asian clothing (typically in the aunts’ wardrobes but also in Dim Sum Lose Some) serves to mark something as particularly kooky or exotic. That seems to be what it’s signaling.
Merri
It’s – there’s so much of it. I’d be curious, if the show continued, if that didn’t become a plot point.
Missy
Yeah, it’s really strange.
Merri
It is, in this – yeah, like you said, it’s not just in one place.
Missy
No, it’s repeated.
Merri
Especially when you see – when they go to the water show and the –
Missy
The pagodas on the head!! Like what the f –
Merri
– and just the juxtaposition of the Americans, the two American swimmers –
Missy
Yeah!
Merri
It just seemed – that’s when I – I noticed that through the whole thing – but a part that like, really stuck out to me was that part. Like, they are dressed often in those types of clothing. And then here we have two other synchronized swimmers who are straight up American, right? Also the – I almost said the devil. That’s how I feel about America right now. They’re also like the villains in that, in the story.
Missy
Yeah, it feels like – I think the intent is to use the East Asian clothing and decorations as a means of signifying the interesting other as normal, and the hyper America patriotism shit is like, disapproving. But at the same time, you can still – you can attempt to do and that still be racist about it, you know? I don’t think these – oh, and also it’s just deeply weird to have Fambing Woo become a Confederate soldier????? That was weird. What the hell?
Merri
I never even thought about that, and as I was reading the outline, I was like, “What?!?”
Missy
What the fuck! I don’t think these things come from a place of malice or intentionality, trying to make Asian cultures look weird. But it is so pervasive in Pushing Daisies that you cannot not remark on it, right? Like it’s a glaring issue!
Merri
Especially with the aunts.
Missy
What is going on with the using and abusing of Chinese clothing? And I say that – I say using and abusing deliberately because okay, the aunts are wearing like, Asian influenced outfits and we can, you know, we can talk about cultural appropriation there, and what’s meant by it, and whether it is appropriation, and what the context of 2007 was, etc, etc. That’s all one thing, but hey, what the fuck is going on with Chuck and Olive’s outfits in Dim Sum Lose Some.
Merri
I remember seeing that and going, “OOf!”
Missy
The makeup in particular!
Merri
It’s so bad! Like it’s so – that part, when that happened? I was – I just, I couldn’t even believe it.
Missy
It really tarnishes my feelings about that episode, which otherwise is a pretty solid episode.
Merri
Yeah.
Missy
Like the concept is really fun. I love Emerson and Ned’s disguises, they’re so fucking funny. But, yo, what the fuck?
Merri
Yeah, that was –
Missy
– with those outfits! Um, why are we still drawing lines between Chinese immigrants and illegal gambling? Like, no. Why is Vivian wearing a pagoda on her head? They’re both wearing a pagoda on their heads? I wrote that before I got to the episode where they were both wearing the pagodas on their head. Like what the fuck?
Merri
Like why? They can’t swim in that!
Missy
Yeah, it’s so weird! And I think the thing is, they’re aiming for whimsy here, but painting the East as whimsical is Orientalism. It may not be conscious, and Fuller and all the people that worked on the show – costume designers, writers, etc., they may not have had any ill intent but it’s worth asking why they felt the need to do this with East Asian symbols and traditions and characters over and over and over again. If it was one time, it would be like, “Oh rough,” but it’s – it’s over and over and over and it’s just kind of like, buddy, you don’t have to do this! You can come up with a different symbol!
I think fatphobia is maybe less visible visibly present especially because Chi McBride is a big dude and is a likable, if prickly, character in the series. But there aren’t a lot of other fat characters and when they do show up, it’s not great. So one of the early episodes does have Emerson getting stuck in the window a la Winnie the Pooh in a scene that is not super offensive, but is a little distasteful. It’s kind of just like –
Merri
Why.
Missy
It’s funny that Emerson would get stuck in a window and be compared to Winnie the Pooh because it’s Emerson, right? But it’s also literally about his body. And he had made a disparaging remark, I think, about fatness earlier in the episode, if I remember correctly, I could be wrong, so don’t quote me on that. But, it just feels distasteful. And later on, you have the episode Comfort Food, in which a man on a scooter – who I assumed was disabled – was in fact a murderer because the Colonel Sanders stand-ins’s chicken made him fat.
Merri
That was the worst… that was really bad.
Missy
Yeah. You also have the part when Ned starts like – when he decides not to use his power anymore. And he starts using regular fruit in his pies and he starts eating them himself, and he says, “I’m gonna get fat,” but then he says that with this look of excitement on his face!?!
Merri
Super doesn’t surprise me.
Missy
So I was very like –
Merri
It doesn’t surprise me because, like, I see this so often people obviously fat people will get stigmatized or just treated terribly. But when a thin person eats a lot of food like, “Oh, I’m a fat kid today.” I see that so often. It’s –
Missy
That’s true, but he seems – it seemed to me like he was genuinely excited at the prospect of becoming fat.
Merri
I don’t think it was that, I think he was just really happy to eat his food and – yeah, the idea of being able to do that. But that whole mentality super doesn’t surprise me, because I see it so often of like, “Oh, I’m gonna do a fat kid thing,” or –
Missy
That’s true, but that’s not –
Merri
Oh, I feel so fat –
Missy
– but that’s not what he’s saying. Because that’s like coming from a place of being down on fatness and he seems like genuinely excited at the prospect of becoming fat.
Merri
I’ve seen people be like, “I’m doing a fat kid thing,” and be genuinely happy about the things they’re eating.
Missy
But I think that’s still coming from a different place. To say, “I’m doing a fat kid thing,” is intentionally to distance myself from fatness, right? It is saying, “I am doing a thing that is not me.”
Merri
Hmm.
Missy
That’s different from saying, “I’m gonna become fat, aren’t I?” with a smile on your face?
Merri
Yeah, I still feel like that doesn’t surprise me.
Missy
Yeah. Fatness in media, and in film noir specifically, is often used to suggest criminality and excess. There simply aren’t a lot of fat characters in Pushing Daisies, but when we do see them, the messages being sent are typically criminality, undesirability, or foolishness. It just falls into these tropes about fatness in general that go unquestioned in a show which otherwise is very kind about difference. And I think that makes it stand out to an even greater degree. The point here is that this is my favorite show of all time, but it’s not immune to criticism. It could do better, even as I really really really enjoy most of what’s happening in it. I enjoy the majority of both Dim Sum Lose Some and Comfort Food.
Merri
Did you recognize in Comfort Food who the Muffin Girl is?
Missy
Of course! Of course, absolutely. She’s in a lot of things.
Merri
She is in lot of things! She’s the girl from she’s the teacher – the teacher and the dance teacher in Donnie Darko.
Missy
Yeah. Yes, I can’t – she’s in a bunch of stuff.
Merri
She is in a bunch of stuff. Also, Taylor Townsend’s in this show. A lot of people are in that show!
Missy
Yes. Notably, a lot of queer actors are in this show, which I am going to use to transition to the majority theme of the episode which is queerness. So we’ve established Pushing Daisies as an inverse noir. Do you think that’s a fair interpretation that I have made?
Merri
I think so, of my very little knowledge and the things that you have said, I would say that’s accurate.
Missy
It tracks, at least? The fact that its inverse noir itself is interesting to me, but I think we can go a step further by bringing in some outside knowledge. First, Bryan Fuller’s gay, this is not a secret. I don’t know how long Bryan Fuller has been out, but an article from – in an article from The Advocate, which is titled “It took Bryan Fuller 14 Years to Get a Clearly Gay Character on TV,” which is written by Daniel Reynolds. This article outlines how every one of Fuller’s original shows – the ones that he pioneered, because he also worked on Star Trek Voyager and Heroes and that kind of stuff, which were not his original IP. It outlines how every one of Fuller’s original shows had been as queer as the studio’s would let him make them. I actually regretted reading this article because it stole my thesis right out from under me with this quote, “You don’t know how gay Pushing Daisies was – you didn’t know how gay Pushing Daisies was because the gay was never sexualized. It was simply queer,” said Fuller, who credited gay icons like Kristin Chenoweth, Susie Kurtz, and Beth Grant for quote, saturating every fiber unquote with queerness. Fuller said Pushing Daisies was quote, systemically gay, aesthetically gay, but not narratively gay, unquote.”
Thankfully for me, Fuller did not elaborate so we will take it from here. The show Pushing Daisies comes from a lot of places. I’m sure there’s a lot of influences on it. We’ve talked about noir, we’ve talked about – briefly about fairy tales. But Fuller, in later years, has actually talked about how it was directly inspired by the AIDS crisis. And this is a quote from “10 Years Later, Bryan Fuller Would Drop Everything to Make More Pushing Daisies” which was by Jennifer Still, who writes, “A metaphor for what, exactly? Though viewers may not have picked up on it, Fuller was partially inspired by his experience as a gay man living through the AIDS epidemic. Chuck and Ned can’t have skin to skin contact; for a generation of people quote, unprotected sex meant death for so long, says Fuller. Quote, there was an interesting gay metaphor in Pushing Daisies that was at the root of my understanding of these characters. 10 years ago, there was danger associated with intimate touch. I think a lot of those things were probably at the back of my mind as I was creating a universe where something so simple, something that is common in heterosexual relationships, was something that would kill you,” unquote.
So this doesn’t make the show itself an example of queer representation, right? When you look at the show, there are gay characters on the show, how out they are –
Merri
You never know.
Missy
– is debatable, but there are gay characters on Pushing Daisies. But the core cast does not read on first glance, as gay or queer in any form. But what I want to challenge all of us to do with this episode of the podcast is to understand queerness as something that is present in Pushing Daisies without being explicit. This is ostensibly a show about heterosexual relationships, with the main cast not being texturally queer, right? But when you really pay attention to what’s happening, and how the characters feel about it, this show feels an awful lot like a queer experience, not like the queer experience, because I don’t know that there is such a thing as the, like, “definitive queer experience,” right? But I still see reflections of my experience in it, I see the experiences of my friends in it, and so on. I think a lot of people watching the show would not have jumped straight from Ned and Chuck’s situation to the AIDS crisis, but that reading is there. And when you have that, it’s like the potential of the show opens up for you.
Merri
Yeah. When I read that, about halfway through watching it, it totally changed the way in which I consumed and read things, and gave a lot more context. And you like – even just the things that they say, I picked up on in a way that made more sense.
Missy
Did you like the breeder joke? Because I did.
Merri
Yeah. There were a lot of like – it got really sexual. It got really sexual! Especially with Emerson and the one lady. She said, “Come.” I was like, “Wow, they’re just fucking saying it!!”
Missy
It was very, again, very film noir with how much you were able to execute under the guise of just wordplay.
Merri
Yeah, I love when media is like, able to fly under the radar in their –
Missy
-Great news for you about film noir!
So that’s what I want to explore in this episode, the potential readings of the show as queer without being texturally queer, in the sense that it’s not a show about gay characters, right. But it might be a gay show.
Merri
Confusing!
Missy
Yeah. So to return to film noir for a moment, one of the many anxieties that shaped the era – that particular era of film, was masculinity. Men returned home from World War II to find women working and holding more authority in daily life
Merri
Absolutely abhorrent.
Missy
Yes. War itself no doubt broke down assumptions of what masculinity should be, right? Because we’re talking about the return after World War II, which was, you know, horrific.
Merri
Also, totally a lot of men had sex with other men.
Missy
Yeah, of course. In noir, the femme fatale figure is often constructed as dangerous because she acts as we expect a man to act. That is where the like – kind of where the femme fatale comes from.
Merri
Absolutely abhorrent.
Missy
She is typically aggressive – sexually and just in her personal life. She is cold, she doesn’t love, she’s not nurturing. Those are the features that you expect to find in a femme fatale.
Merri
Is Gone Girl?
Missy
Gone Girl is – I think that Gone Girl… I haven’t really analyzed it through this lens, but I think you could definitely make an argument for Gone Girl as neo noir.
Merri
Yeah, he definitely ends up worse than he started…
Missy
It’s such a good movie. I love Gone Girl.
Merri
It was really good.
Missy
Despite the fact that the woman is betraying gender conventions, the male protagonist is attracted to her in spite of that, threatening his masculinity because men should not be attracted to maleness. This attraction is what leads him into danger, darkness, and often to death. You can read film noir that follows that very traditional structure as almost a parable against homosexuality. Except! One of the most famous film noirs, Double Indemnity, was originally intended to feature a queer love story at its center.
Merri
Interesting.
Missy
The relationship between Walter Neff and his boss Barton Keyes. Neff is seduced by the dangerous Phyllis Dietrichson, and in the original ending, Neff is sentenced to death and his boss Barton Keyes, watches and leaves very sadly. Not just like, “Oh my employee-“
Merri
“- my lover.”
Missy
Really. While they couldn’t depict an actual gay relationship due to the Hays Code, Neff has consistently shown lighting Keyes’ cigar for him, which is an intentional invocation of phallic imagery! Like in the cut ending, Keyes leaves the building where Neff has just been killed and pulls a cigar out of his pocket and looks at it sadly –
Merri
Throws it down his throat!
Missy
– he has no one left to light his cigar for him.
Merri
Awwww.
Missy
In the actual ending – it’s been a while since I’ve watched Double Indemnity – it’s not quite so forlorn, but it’s still like – I think one of his last acts is to light the cigar for Keyes, if I remember correctly. I could be wrong on that, it’s been a while. So in one sense, queerness is deviant and degenerate in that it leads to death. But in another, the femme fatale leads the male protagonist away from a healthy relationship and towards death herself, right? It’s his attraction to her femininity that leads towards death. Billy Wilder, the director of Double Indemnity was – for everything I know about him and I think for what the general public knows about him was straight – but he’s also the director of Some Like It Hot, a movie about two men in drag falling in love and one of them – not with each other, falling in love with Marilyn Monroe. Well, there’s a lot going on in that movie –
Merri
A poly relationship!
Missy
There’s a lot going on in that movie that’s difficult to articulate. But one of the characters is known for being shy and very closed off, until he starts dressing in drag, at which point he comes out and becomes a much more full version of himself. Later in life, I guess Billy Wilder made some not so great representations of queer people.
Merri
So interesting.
Missy
But he also got very cynical in his old age. He was – so Billy Wilder was – is – was Jewish. And so he, from my understanding, identified a lot with the stories of outsiders.
Merri
Oh, I see.
Missy
And so he may have been making – intentionally making films that reference queerness without being queer himself simply because the idea of outsiders was something he identified with. So this is a quote from “Nobody Loves a Fat Man”: Masculinity and Food in Film Noir, which is by Christopher E. Forth. “In such films, male control is often more aspirational than actual, and, as Abbot puts it, on the page and on the screen hard-boiled masculinity requires, quote, constant maintenance and reconstitution, unquote. Sexuality is often identified as the chief cause of potential male collapse. The notorious figure of the tempting ‘fatal woman’ is usually viewed as consciously or unconsciously enabling an otherwise constrained male desire, thus precipitating the hero’s almost inevitable loss of control. The inner turmoil of the hero was often mirrored in the grotesque villains whose bodies bear and represent not only their own corruption but also the potential collapse of the protagonist as well.”
So again, we have this inversion of what is expected in film noir and what happens in Pushing Daisies. In the case of Pushing Daisies, the femme fatale does in fact cause the collapse of the protagonist’s construction of masculinity, but it’s for the better. Ned is clearly better off by the end of the series than he was in the beginning.
Merri
He looks less and less sick. He looks like he constantly has a cold.
Missy
Yeah.
Merri
Like he’s – maybe he’s in cold sweats?
Missy
Yeah, he’s having a bad time.
Merri
His eyes are red sometimes.
Missy
Yeah. Chuck enables Ned’s constrained desire to actually live his life and get close to people. He is resistant to it, but it happens over time. I actually read this essay because I was curious about the representation of fat bodies in film noir. So that’s what it is referring to with the phrase, “grotesque villains.” But in the case – even in the case of Pushing Daisies, there are “grotesque bodies,” the bodies of the people that he brings back to life, which are usually disfigured or mangled in some way.
Merri
Sometimes I couldn’t look at them. I think the worst one for me was the chicken-fried guy.
Missy
That’s pretty bad.
Merri
That one was [gag sound].
Missy
I think, for me, it was the bees.
Merri
That’s pretty bad, too. That’s pretty bad too. But the guy – ughh – I can’t even think about it.
Missy
It was pretty bad.
I think you can read into this as well. Ned lives a very closed-off life without being close to anybody. And I don’t know that he fears death necessarily, but each one of these people has a story that is cut dramatically short – they serve as a sort of “memento mori” for him. I think the fact that their bodies are mangled is also interesting, since Ned’s ability makes him unwilling to touch people. The fact that Chuck comes along and gives them dignity and humanity after they die is good for Ned, too, who thinks of himself as damaged and separate from humanity.
Merri
Even if sometimes she’s just getting in the way.
Missy
Establishing these people as human even after they have died and their bodies are grotesque is one of the many important things that Chuck does to bring Ned out of his shell and just more generally improve the world. Because she brings humanity to these people who have died and whose very humanity has been extinguished.
Merri
Which Emerson’s like, doesn’t give a shit.
Missy
Emerson does not give one shit at all. I would not identify noir as like, inherently a queer genre, especially because a lot of it is homophobic. But Double Indemnity is just one example of where queerness is a potential reading of the events, even if it can fly under the radar. Likewise, Pushing Daisies isn’t about queer relationships in the most literal sense. Ned and Chuck are the primary couple. Olive loves Ned, and Emerson has relationships with women. I’m hesitant, as I always am, to say that Ned, Chuck, and Olive are straight. Ned clearly says he’s had girlfriends in the past, which I would like to draw attention to, as I’m pretty sure that’s literally what Lee Pace said when questioned about his sexuality as well! Chuck hasn’t been with anybody but Ned, and Olive ostensibly only has feelings for Ned, initially, but I don’t know… She didn’t seem opposed to the Norwegian lady hitting on her!
Merri
That’s true. I’m pretty sure Digsby and Pigsby are in love.
Missy
Yeah, they’re – they’re in it. Emerson does tell his mother that he’s not gay. He says that specifically. And he also doesn’t notice the double entendre when she says that someone is a “Cosmo-drinking shopaholic.” Pause, “Queer.” And Emerson replies, “You’re right, it is odd.”
Merri
Those are the types of things that I’m like, “Oh, okay.”
Missy
Yeah. And his mother gives him this weird look in response as if she knew what she was saying, but Emerson doesn’t get it.
Merri
So she’s queer.
Missy
That was – that was kind of what I got from it.
Merri
Or she really thought her son was and would get it.
Missy
Yeah. And that comes back later because she’s like, “What do you-” or maybe it’s before that, she says, “What were you implying with this? Are you implying that I made you gay?” When she sees that the protagonist of his book is a girl.
Merri
Oh, yeah.
Missy
I don’t think that you have to be queer to pick up on this. But the fact that Emerson doesn’t pick up on it leads me to believe that he is both the “straight man” in the comedy sense – which is usually the person in a comedy duo who doesn’t react to the partner’s eccentricities and who sets up the jokes, or in this case the person who behaves without whimsy in a very whimsical world. So it leads me to believe that he is the straight man in the comedy sense, and literally the straight man as in heterosexual, in this wonderful array of –
Merri
Token straight man.
Missy
Yeah, that’s how it feels to me! I choose to interpret the other characters lack of explicit statements about their sexualities to mean that they’re whatever flavor of queer makes most sense for them, but again, that isn’t me saying that the show is great queer representation. Because it’s not, right? There is no – like among the main cast, there is no explicit queer representation. But representation isn’t the be-all, end-all of what queer narratives can be. And while Pushing Daisies could have had both a queer narrative and queer characters in a different world (meaning not the world that we live in), I think the queer narrative angle is plenty interesting.
Merri
It would have just been impossible to create at that time.
Missy
Yeah!
Merri
Like literally they wouldn’t have – literally not able to –
Missy
Literally they wouldn’t let him if he tried!
Yeah, so this is a quote from Pushing Daisies Used Quirkiness to Bridge Time and Queer History, which is by Kyle Turner, who writes “As Richard Dyer writes in his book Pastiche, the term is used to describe “a kind of imitation you are meant to know is imitation.”… works of pastiche “interrogate the truth value of the medium [they’re] working in,” and “[acknowledge] the emotional truth” of “past forms” as well as their “reprehensible lies.” Additionally –
Merri
Can I ask a question really quickly?
Missy
Uhuh.
Merri
What is pastiche?
Missy
Pastiche is that idea of imitation that you are meant to know is imitation.
Merri
Okay, okay, okay.
Missy
It’s distinct from parody. It’s distinct from –
Merri
Is it a simulation?
Missy
Maybe!
Additionally, he writes that Todd Haynes’ Sirkian melodrama Far From Heaven “sets in play our relationship with the past” and “suggests the way feeling is shaped by culture.” I believe that’s the last series of “quote, unquotes.” Dyer’s unpacking of pastiche, particularly in relation to modes of queer art making, suggests that replication of form but a subversion of tone or context puts it in conversation with those original works while asserting its own aesthetic voice. Pastiche is often critiquing the more-normative source texts that are reflective of restrictive social and political norms. Throughout the book, Dyer stresses the occasional difficulty in identifying pastiche and delineating it from sister terms like parody and plagiarism. But its closeness is the point; to be the thing and yet apart from it, to infiltrate, is a cornerstone of queerness.”
Merri
I think this is part of the reason why a noir genre is perfect for this.
Missy
So in academic queer theory, to queer as in to verb – the verb –
Merri
To queer, or not to queer –
Missy
To queer or not to queer! To queer – as in the verb – to queer means to take something and look at it through a new lens that makes it strange or unusual in some way. In the case of Pushing Daisies, what Turner is arguing here, along with Dyer, who writes about pastiche is, that the show queers noir through the use of pastiche. The intentional invocation of noir tropes and visual styles draws your attention to it. And this is to quote that, “interrogates the truth value” of the genre as well as their “reprehensible lies.” The truth value could include things like anxieties about masculinity in Ned’s and Emerson’s cases, right? They’re both men, but Ned can be read as weak and even effeminate at times. And Emerson comes off as strong and brash, but loves to knit and deeply misses his daughter, both of which subvert mainstream masculinity and racist assumptions about black fatherhood. When you have, you know, a daughter without a father, the cultural assumption is that the father has left or been imprisoned. In this case –
Merri
– been kept away.
Missy
Gina Torres’s character –
Merri
Who’s also in everything!
Missy
Yeah, she has kept Penny, their daughter, from him. It is not – he has not left. He cannot find her.
Merri
He cannot find her, despite being a private –
Missy
A private detective. Well, nobody’s dead, so he can’t – he can’t have Ned touch somebody and find out what happened to Penny. Putting these two characters at the center of a noir is both subversive of the genre and a bit playful, making it a form of pastiche, which by nature of the subversion, being about gender, sexuality, and so on, makes that action one of queering. And I mean this with all sincerity, once you read the show as queer, all of the triteness, the things that feel like cliched dialogue, take on a new tone.
Merri
It’s totally true, I totally, totally agree.
Missy
Yeah. When Chuck and Ned have the conversation in the trunk of Lila Robinson’s car about their relationship being hard, Chuck brings up that it’s difficult that they can’t touch one another. And she wonders why do people fall in love even though it’s so hard and it’s so vulnerable and so scary? And Ned replies, “Why love something? Because we can,” that no longer reads as trite to me when I’m considering it as an expression of one queer character to another. It didn’t before either, because I’m a fucking sap. But you know, when I look at it through a queer lens, it reads quite differently.
Merri
Well, it reminded me – when I was reading through this outline, and I got to that part, it reminded me of the conversation we had, my dad was worried about us going to pride because he… violence. And I remember you saying like, “We have to go, because we can.”
Missy
Yeah, literally there’s – like, queer people have to worry about violence everywhere we go. You know, why should we avoid going to a celebration of our existence and an intentional retaliation against heteronormativity when we already have to fear violence, you know?
Merri
Plus you’ll be around people, too who would, maybe do something… my dad was terrified.
Missy
Yeah.
Queer people continue living and loving, even though it’s hard and sometimes dangerous and scary, because we can, because we have to, because trying to shove ourselves into a loveless box to please people who won’t accept us anyways is to choose death. Like maybe not literal death, but figurative death is bad enough, right? I’d also like to note that Lee Pace is a queer man who was – he was accidentally outed by Ian McKellen.
Merri
I didn’t know that!
Missy
Yeah, during the Hobbit.
Merri
Did they date?
Missy
No, Ian McKellen… I can’t remember what the question was. Somebody asked Ian McKellen a question and he said something about Lee Pace also being – I think he said he was gay. I’m not sure if Lee Pace – I don’t think Lee Pace has been explicit about his sexuality –
Merri
Just his attractiveness!
Missy
Just his attractiveness, and he has a handsome partner too, who’s a photographer. That’s why there’s so many hot pictures of Lee Pace these days.
Merri
Oh, that makes so much sense!
Missy
If I remember correctly, his partner is a photographer. And he has a beautiful dog! I was discussing this the other night, I don’t normally care that much about celebrities. And I wouldn’t be – I wouldn’t normally be starstruck by meeting a celebrity. But if I met Lee Pace, I think I would full-on Victorian faint, like, I would swoon.
Merri
That’s fair.
Missy
He’s so fucking handsome! Um… anyway. So again, I would like to note that Lee Pace is a queer man. And he was the subject of a whole bunch of scrutiny after he was outed. And I think again, I want to say in the 2016-2018 era, people were really nasty to Lee Pace about his sexuality and him not choosing – him not coming out with a label. People were like demanding that he gave himself a label. Lee Pace no doubt knew when he said, “Why love something? Because we can,” that it applied to him too. And in the context of 2006 to 2007, when the show first aired, this is a really strong statement. This is pre-marriage equality! As some of our listeners may be younger and don’t realize like, marriage equality is a really recent development! And –
Merri
It truly is! Like I remember marching in the streets!
Missy
Yep! And the thing with it is like, yes, marriage is a heteronormative construct, et cetera, et cetera. But marriage equality also grants rights to immigrants who are, you know, fleeing places that are not as friendly to queerness. It grants you the ability to see your partner in the hospital. There are – like, yes, we need to disentangle the idea of marriage from heteronormativity, and marriage should not be the be-all, end-all goal of every relationship.
Merri
But some people want that!
Missy
Some people want that. And in our society, it is so entrenched that to not have the rights of marriage equality is a denial of a number of other rights.
Merri
Just even like, property rights.
Missy
Yeah.
Merri
If you’re not married, and your partner dies, and there’s no will, you could be fucked. It could go to family that are horrible.
Missy
Yep. Absolutely. And so I understand the desire to push back against marriage as the end of the struggle for gay rights. I totally understand that and agree with it. But we also have to understand that marriage as a right, holds a lot of value in our culture. And before we had that, queer people did not have those rights.
Merri
I remember being a kid and just being flabbergasted that it’s illegal. I couldn’t understand. I literally – I literally still can’t understand it.
Missy
Yeah. It’s nobody’s goddamn business!
Merri
Yeah, [mocking the conservatives voice] “keep the government out of my fucking house.”
Missy
This is also pre-Pre-exposure prophylaxis, now commonly known as PReP, which helps prevent contracting HIV. We did not have that, prior to this. We had condoms.
Merri
Still do.
Missy
We still do have condoms. But while the world was becoming more accepting of queer people, the very fact that Fuller had to resort to making this queer love story about a man and a woman with a masculine name, he did that intentionally, based on the idea that they can’t be intimate or she’ll die shows how much of a different world it was in 2016.
Merri
Oh, it was truly, truly very different.
Missy
Yeah.
Merri
It truly was very, very different.
Missy
Like, I remember – and I’m sure this still happens today – but it was probably around this time that I came out to my friends. And, one, I don’t know that everybody heard me or they didn’t remember. And two, like two weeks later, one of them told me that she didn’t believe in bisexuality, and that was just a thing that you could voice without any pushback. You just felt okay saying something like that.
Merri
I remember when you told me and just being like, “I thought you just said you liked to kiss girls because you thought they were pretty, in like a well, that girl’s pretty –
Missy
I would like to respectfully kiss her on the mouth.
Merri
It all made sense, everything gets put into place.
Missy
Yeah, it’s just – it’s heteronormativity. Right? It’s not like I think that you’re homophobic!
Merri
No, I just – now all my, like literally all my friends are queer.
Missy
Yeah. You just been sipping – you just been sipping that heteronormativi-tea.
Merri
It’s true.
Missy
That’s my joke. Thanks. I’ll be here every week!
Merri
Thanks for listening, guys.
Missy
Thanks, bye, that’s the end of the podcast! Anyway, all of this happened not that long ago. And as much as it feels normalized now, we still have to fight to hold on to these rights.
Merri
Particularly right now.
Missy
Yeah! That’s becoming increasingly clear that like, the rights that we have won so far are not entrenched. We still have to fight for them.
Merri
It’s awful. Awful! Absolutely –
Missy
It is awful!
Merri
– fucking awful!
Missy
I don’t even remember what that section was.
Merri
I don’t know.
Missy
It was queerness. But we’re gonna keep talking about queerness.
Merri
Yeah.
Missy
Uhhhhh…
Merri
We don’t stop.
Missy
We don’t stop.
Merri
Can’t stop, won’t stop.
Missy
Can’t stop, won’t stop. So this next section is about isolation. As we discussed briefly, all of the characters in the show experience some degree of isolation from other people, right? Nobody in the show is thriving.
Merri
Not even Digsby.
Missy
Not even Digsby! Even if they think they are, they’re not thriving.
Merri
Those – those strawberries he brings back, they’re thriving.
Missy
They’re thriving. At best, I think you could say that the characters are happy enough, like they’re content. But I also think that there’s some degree of self delusion there, right? I think probably the most deluded character in the show is Ned.
Merri
I would so agree with that.
Missy
He’s just like, “Yeah, it’s fine. It’s fine that I walk around with my hands in my pockets, and I can’t touch another living person. This is fine and normal.”
Merri
Yeah. I do love the stories of him accidentally touching dead animals.
Missy
Yes, it’s very good.
Merri
Like the bear skin.
Missy
Oh, God. They clearly – all of these characters clearly want things that they can’t have, right? So this is a quote from Pushing Daisies Away: Community Through Isolation by Matt Dauphin. There is a book – I didn’t realize when I said last week, in our last episode, that I wasn’t going to have to read a whole book of criticism about this. There is a whole book of criticism about Pushing Daisies and I did read it.
Merri
All of it?
Missy
Yeah.
Merri
Not surprised.
Missy
So this is a quote from Pushing Daisies Away: Community Through Isolation by Matt Dauphin, who writes “Analysis of Pushing Daisies reveals a form of this abjection, not to isolation, but to community itself. Each character displays an inability to exist within society to varying degrees, forcing them to find alternatives. The Pie Hole itself is an orifice that can take in and protect, interiorize and externalize through eating and consumption, as well as the process of enunciation and often fragile attempts to communicate. Though most of the main characters interact with the world at large, it is seldom without reserve or hesitation. This hesitation is not mere reluctance, but is more a moment of pure abhorrence, of externalized revulsion. For Ned, the prospect of integrating himself into a community, with its concurrent risk of rejection and judgment, prompts him to remain insular; it is too frightening to risk personal attachments. To apply the theory of abjection, community and belonging have become the objects of fear or repulsion, but community is not without its own allure. The characters come to function as surrogates for one another in the communal interaction they cannot have. The role of community, then, becomes increasingly important to understand.”
So abjection, just as a refresher, is that feeling of revulsion and attraction at the same time where it becomes quite confusing, because you want it and also you are disgusted by it.
Merri
Like enemies to lovers?
Missy
Yes. And that is how the community works in this show. They want it, they want community, but they are also deathly afraid of it. None of these characters can function in a normal society, right? Ned walks around terrified that someone will discover his secret. Chuck very publicly died. Emerson is a grumpy private investigator. Olive is maybe the most capable of interacting with normal people, but she’s also so wrapped up in her feelings for Ned, that nothing really else – nothing else seems to really exist to her. It really all comes back to Ned.
Merri
She also just has this issue, which I also have, just like starting to talk and people being like, “What?” and she’ll be like, “Nevermind.”
Missy
Yeah. She’s used to being the not special one in a group of special ones.
Merri
Yeah.
Missy
Predictably, over time, these characters come together to form their own community, right? That’s fine. I don’t think it’s particularly interesting, even though it does fold quite neatly into a lot of queer experiences to have that idea of found family. It’s not a bad thing. It’s just not itself particularly interesting. I do think it’s interesting though, that almost every character they come upon who gives off the appearance of normalcy or success is usually revealed to be lying, or disgruntled, or otherwise not what they appear to be. I think there is this sort of destabilizing of normalcy because of it. Like yes, it has the typical “found family” arc and feel. But I think it goes a step beyond that by questioning what normal is and whether it can exist at all, especially in this bizarro world that seems like it’s set apart from time. That idea of destabilizing normalcy is itself queering, that’s – like in the academic sense. That’s kind of what’s happening there. This is a quote from Consuming Grief and Eating Pie by Laura Anh Williams, who writes, “The series emphasizes the distinction between other characters and Ned and his abnegative lifestyle through his visual representation. He is slim-bodied and occupies very little space with his hands often crammed deep in his pockets, clasped behind his back, or arms crossed tightly across his chest. His wardrobe consists entirely of white, black, and shades of grays. The lack of color in his dress is emphasized by the abundance of bright colors and lush textures worn by each of the other principal characters, and typifying the technicolor mise en scene.”
All of the characters have very distinct styles of dress that do different things for them. Chuck is dressed quite feminine, but also more specifically, especially in early episodes, in fashions out of the 1950s. There was an essay in this book all about the fashion, which was quite good. I just couldn’t quote all of it.
Merri
Some of the fashion was so good. And sometimes I’m like, “Take that off.”
Missy
Yeah. In black and white, she might look more like our expectations for a femme fatale. If we just saw a black and white screenshot, especially in… I want to say it’s the third episode when she’s – or maybe it’s the second episode, when she’s wearing that very broad sloped hat, and the dress with a deep V that’s red. If you just saw that in black and white, you could mistake her for a femme fatale from a classic film noir. Olive at first is seen almost exclusively in Pie Hole uniforms, meaning that she lacks an identity outside of the restaurant and therefore outside of Ned. We just don’t see her in anything but her Pie Hole uniform. Emerson dresses in nice suits with bold patterns and colors, which gives him both a put-together appearance and a sense of eccentricity, like in our own world. As much as he might like to be the quote-unquote “straight man” of the group, his uniqueness shines through as well. Even though it is quite literally buttoned up, right? He wears the flamboyant ties and shirts under the more structured suit.
Merri
Just like he knits in his office.
Missy
Exactly. And interestingly, in this extremely colorful world, Ned wears almost entirely grays, blacks and whites.
Merri
I didn’t notice this.
Missy
I didn’t at first either. He only wears color when it’s to go undercover. Like when he goes to the bee company and he has to wear this cute little bee outfit. And in Comfort Food, when he wears the very bright vest and hat.
Merri
Stripes.
Missy
Yes. He only – so because he only wears color when it’s to go undercover and otherwise he wears grays and blacks and whites and so on, it visually signals his isolation not just from other people, who wear more colored outfits, but from the world as a whole, right? He does not fit in with the rest of the world, just visually. He does not even seem to belong to it at all, which I think reflects the “unnatural” status of his powers, but also his isolation from the world. But I also think it goes further than that. He is visually “duller” than the rest of the characters. It may be that he simply likes a monochrome wardrobe, but I also think there’s the sense that he is keeping some aspect of himself tamped down, like there is an intentionality to the way that he dresses which is so like, just nothing compared to everybody else, right? There’s an intentionality to it, to me that suggests he is saying to others, “Do not look at me, don’t perceive me.”
Merri
He’s just handsome and tall.
Missy
God…god….god! Now, within the context of the show, right, he is tamping down his power, he does not want people to see him because he’s afraid of what they will discover about him and what effect that’s going to have on him. But if we’ve used his power as a metaphor, or like a sideways way of talking about the queer experience, it becomes a lot more interesting.
Merri
It does. It also feels like, he’s like, “Stop being stupid.”
Missy
Uh huh.
Merri
Because he – especially like when he’s like, “I don’t want to be a superhero.” Just like, stop! Just stop.
Missy
Just stop, man. This is a quote from Consuming Grief and Eating Pie by Laura Anh Williams, who writes, “Ned’s refusal to revive the dead is of note because it figured largely in the language of closeting,” sorry, “it is figured largely in the language of closeting. His desire for normalcy and to ‘fit in’ requires the denial and suppression of a significant aspect of his identity. In fact, the entire episode of ‘Window Dressed to Kill’ (and the series at large) is replete with characters and subplots that are easily read for gay subtext.”
Merri
This one was – yeah.
Missy
Yeah. Ned is quote unquote, “in the closet,” (however you want to view that closet) for much of the series in that he keeps his power under wraps for fear of what might happen to him if he doesn’t.
Merri
He literally keeps his moldy food in the closet.
Missy
Yep. But when he chooses, like – and what’s the reason? It’s already bad? It’s not gonna go worse!
Merri
He doesn’t want people to see how –
Missy
– I guess that’s true. He doesn’t want people to see it.
Merri
Yeah. Usually Olive.
Missy
Oh, yes.
Merri
Which he should’ve – like Olive should have known much sooner, they should have told her so much sooner.
Missy
I know!
Merri
What did they think was gonna happen?
Missy
I think that it was gonna get out. Olive’s not particularly good at keeping secrets.
Merri
That is true, but neither is Chuck.
Missy
That’s true neither is Chuck, but Chuck had to know! They couldn’t keep it from Chuck.
Merri
Yeah that’s true.
Missy
Cause she kind of didn’t know that she died.
But when he chooses not to use his power at all, Ned is actively choosing to deny that part of him – that part of himself and play normal. I don’t think the series aims to make a 1:1 metaphor between queerness and Ned’s power. Just like I don’t think this show is clear queer representation, right? But I do think it is informed by that idea. And when we look at it through that lens, it changes the tone of things like Ned, quote, unquote, “trying on” a relationship with Olive.
Merri
Ughhhh, I was so mad at Ned.
Missy
I know!
Merri
I was literally like, “You’re an asshole.”
Missy
I know, it was so awful.
Merri
You’re such an asshole. She’s trying so hard!
Missy
Obviously, it doesn’t work out and Olive feels used because it was never about Olive, and Ned plays with her feelings by doing that. Chuck also says that it hurts her that he’s flaunting this fake relationship with Olive’s family, when they have to keep their relationship a secret from her family, which again, calls to mind the idea of denying romance between people of the same gender, right? The idea that he has a fake girlfriend that makes – that lets him “try on” what it would be like to be out and proud, when he has to deny the relationship between him and the woman that he loves.
Merri
If this sounds interesting, then you should read The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo.
Missy
So with queerness in mind, Ned is denying that he is queer at all by not using his powers and trying to force himself into a normative relationship, and it makes everybody miserable! What makes this especially playful to me is that Olive’s family – in this case her, sort-of adoptive fathers – are themselves coded as queer, right? In that they’re two men who serve as partners (in crime), and who both play a caring father figure to her. With the queerness lens, Ned is effectively performing heteronormativity and denying his queerness to help his friend impress two queer men. No wonder it doesn’t fucking work out! Right? Like, it’s just kind of hilarious nonsense.
Merri
Yeah.
Missy
Do you anything else to say about that idea of isolation?
Merri
No.
Missy
Okay.
Merri
I don’t have too much to say cause I’m not queer, so this for me was a lot of learning.
Missy
Yeah.
So now I want to talk about time. This was not something I really thought about in advance. But the topic of queer time came up right before I watched the episode where Chuck’s father comes back and she tells Ned that they’re reenacting the teenage life they didn’t have. I’d also been thinking about why the show gets so specific with time periods, which there are a number of explanations for. So this brings up the question which people may not be familiar with the concept of queer time.
Merri
I was not familiar with this.
Missy
Yeah, it was just –
Merri
And we had this conversation at pride.
Missy
Yeah, this is because – this is why I was thinking about it. We were at pride and I was explaining the concept of queer time to Merri –
Merri
Because I feel old!
Missy
Because – yeah, because Merri feels old.
Merri
I’m 33 about to turn 34 in August.
Missy
Yeah, and I don’t feel old at all. I’m the same age as Merri.
Merri
Yeah – like a couple months apart.
Missy
Yeah, I’m like two or three months younger than Merri and I don’t feel old at all. I feel old in some ways in that like right now I have gastritis which means that I can’t stop burping and my stomach hurts.
Merri
But as we’ll – as we’ll hear, I feel old because I’m straight.
Missy
Yeah.
Merri
And that’s not a joke.
Missy
But it was so – it was so funny! It was so funny because again, I said remember when you were like – you said something like, “Well, I like Pushing Daisies. But I don’t like it as much as you do.” And then – and then you’re like, “Let me guess, it’s because I’m straight?” And I said yes! I meant that mostly as a joke. But after I watched that episode, where they talk about the idea of reliving their teenage years –
Merri
I can’t appreciate that the same way.
Missy
I was like, “Oh, shit. No, I wasn’t actually kidding, was I?”
Merri
Yeah, cause I literally just cannot, in the life I live, consume that the same way you can consume it.
Missy
Yeah. I mean, it’s still like interesting. It’s just –
Merri
But it’s different.
Missy
Because I think I appreciated that about the show before I had ever heard of queer time. So I guess we should explain what queer time is. So this is a quote from Queer Time: The Alternative to “Adulting” by Sara Jaffe, who writes, “Queer scholar Jack Halberstam’s 2005 book In a Queer Time and Place argues that “queer uses of time and space develop… in opposition to the institutions of family, heterosexuality, and reproduction” unquote. Queerness itself is -“
Merri
I was right when we were having this conversation!
Missy
“Queerness itself is, quote, an outcome of strange temporalities imaginative life schedules and eccentric economic practices, unquote. It is inflected by time-warping experiences as diverse as coming out, gender transitions, and generation-defining tragedies such as the AIDS epidemic. That is, queerness is constituted by its difference from conventional imperatives of time… It follows, then, that art and literature made by queer artists might explore, extol, or simply be the product of a queer relationship to time.”
So the journey from adolescence to adulthood is often defined by a number of milestones, right? Things like your first kiss, your first partner, graduating high school, attending college, getting married, having children, those are generally speaking milestones on the path to adulthood. For a long time, some of those things were not accessible to queer people, at all. Simply not – not available.
Merri
Not an option.
Missy
Even now those things may be accessible, but not in the same way or at the same time –
Merri
Even attending college. Like if you’re going to BYU… you could possibly be kicked out or even after you’ve graduated, take your degree away!
Missy
Yep, absolutely. So those things may be technically accessible, but not in the same way or at the same time as they are to straight or cis people. Because of this, queer people’s sense of time may be different from straight and cis people, not in the sense of hours passing – like time does not literally pass differently for me as it does to Merri, I’m not time traveling where Merri travels at normal speed –
Merri
Imagine!
Missy
Imagine. But in the sense of life development, you often end up with queer people only becoming their fullest selves when they are in their 20s or even later, which moves the expected “adult” goals too much later in life. And also – not universally – but a lot of my conversations with other queer folks have been a lot of like, “Oh, I didn’t expect I would make it to 30. I didn’t expect to be alive this long.”
Merri
That’s crazy.
Missy
So the fact that I’m alive at 30 is itself – well, I’m 33 –
Merri
A celebration.
Missy
Yeah, that itself is like a new lease on life – to have this goal. This wasn’t even a stated goal. I just assumed I wouldn’t be here by 30. So the fact that I am alive at 30 is itself like, a whole new life began.
Merri
I think that’s part of the difference too, because I’ve never really felt – I do now kind of feel like an adult. But like I’ve said, I can go through that list. And I’ve hit a lot of those milestones, which is part of the reason I feel old, because I’m trying to have a kid and it’s not working. But I don’t have that, like I’m never gonna make it to 30. So I feel like that’s where that difference comes in. I’m 33 years old, still go to Disneyland all the time. I still – I still feel like a kid – like I’m 20. But I still also feel old. And I think that’s part of where that difference is coming in.
Missy
Yeah, and I think it’s- – I think your relationship to adulthood is fundamentally different from mine.
Merri
Mhhm. My biological clock is ticking.
Missy
Whereas I don’t – what clock? What fucking clock?
Merri
I would be curious if you wanted to have kids, if it would feel any different.
Missy
It might, but that like is unfathomable to me.
Merri
It is changing though, because a lot of women are having children much later than they used to. It’s also – more studies are coming out that it’s not as dangerous to have children as you get older than they previously thought. Probably because they want you to have kids!
Missy
Yeah. This isn’t a universal experience, right? The idea that a lot of queer folks who are approaching 30 or are in their 30s, or even later, that they don’t necessarily feel as adult as their cis or straight friends.
Merri
I would be really curious. I think – I want people to let us know. I think that I’d be really curious to know if other people feel it.
Missy
Yeah.
Merri
I have heard it mentioned on Queer Eye before. And when they helped a trans person, talking about the way that they dress, they dress like they were much younger than they are because – one of them talks about how it’s really common, because they are finally living out an adolescence, essentially, or like their teen years, even though they’re 24.
Missy
Literally both. Both figuratively and biologically.
Merri
Yeah.
Missy
Because starting hormone therapy is going to change your body.
Merri
Yeah. Or even like prolonging puberty.
Missy
Absolutely. So like, this isn’t a universal experience. And I really wonder how it’s changing with, with like, the younger generation,
Merri
I would be super curious.
Missy
Yeah, like people, people who are growing up under marriage equality who are able to be out when their kids like, how is that impacting the sense of time? Like, are they feeling adult along with their cis or straight counterparts? Or are they still experiencing queer time?
Merri
And more and more people? Like the younger generation – are queer.
Missy
Mhmm.
Merri
I mean, I wouldn’t say more than normal, like than previous years, more are out.
Missy
Yeah. Yeah.
Merri
Or even just understand.
Missy
It gets very complicated because like, everybody has a right to use whatever label fits them best. But as our understanding of gender and sexuality broadens, it becomes harder, I think, to definitively pin. I think the big thing is – was – straightness, I think it becomes hard to definitively say what straight means.
Merri
There’s a really good Tik Tok from this girl who’s like, “Me coming out to my mom was actually my mom coming out,” because she told her mom, “Hey, mom, I like women. I think they’re beautiful.” And she was like, “Of course you – all women are beautiful. Like, I love women. I love how women look.” And she was just like, “Mom, I think that you’re not straight.”
Missy
I think just as our ideas broaden, it becomes difficult to align with labels that worked – that felt hard and fast in the past, and they don’t necessarily feel that way anymore. Especially as we get closer to understanding that sex and gender are not a binary, it becomes more complicated a thing to say like, “Yes, I am straight, but also I have attraction to people who are different genders for me, but not in like – not the opposite gender.”
Merri
I actually – I was thinking about this. I was watching a Tik Tok where somebody asked somebody like, are you – I can’t remember exactly if they asked it they were straight, but they asked if they would date a trans man. And it made me think like, “Would I date a trans man?” Yes, I would, because I think trans men are men, but that’d be still be a queer relationship. But I am straight. They talk about this in Sex Education. And I think that’s really – I think all this is so interesting.
Missy
Yeah, I think that overwhelmingly it’s a good thing. It just makes the labels that previously felt limiting now feel very like, “Oh, is it as like, hard and fast as I thought it was?” It may not be. Anyway, that’s off track, but it was interesting. So yeah, this isn’t a universal experience, but it feels common enough to apply to all of the queer friends I have discussed it with. We all have this distorted sense of adulthood and adolescence that differs from our straight and/or cis friends. This is a quote from Neophobic Ned Needs Neotony”: Neuroses and Child’s Play by Ann-gee Lee and I’m not sure if –
Merri
What is neotony?
Missy
Neotony is a fear of the new. No wait, I’m sorry. Neophobic is the fear of the new, neotony I think is new changes.
Merri
Okay.
Missy
“When Chuck’s father wants Ned to stay away from her Chuck tells Ned to think of her father’s attitude as a way to relive their teenage years to quote, “break curfews and mislead our parents and generally sneak around,” unquote. She’s amused that her father is giving her first boyfriend a hard time. She refers to herself as a “flirty head cheerleader,” and Ned as the “studly varsity quarterback.” This appeals to Ned because as he was growing up, he probably was not able to have such adolescent experiences. Also, Chuck was his first love, and when she was alive, they were not able to have a relationship because they were separated as children. In the final episode of the series, when Chuck has to stay home while the gang goes to the Aquacade to protect Lilly and Vivian, Ned correlates it to Chuck serving “detention” while they go off on “spring break” without her, though she says she does not mind. Ned seems to know that Chuck likes these childish allusions because it gives them both a second change together.”
So Ned and Chuck didn’t have these experiences for other life reasons. Ned was a closed-off kid afraid of his gift. And also, he was an outcast at his school. And Chuck was tending to her shut-in aunts, right. So they weren’t able to have these experiences. But they also have this distorted sense of time because of that, right? Their adolescences were non-normative, and as adults they still have this lingering non-normative sense of time. They’re both approaching 30, they’re 29 in the show, but have not had their big milestones. Ned has had girlfriends, but Chuck has not, neither are married, nor are they anywhere close to it. And they are certainly not having children, right?
Merri
Yeah.
Missy
So they relive their adolescence together, now embracing the people that they could have been all along if they had had the opportunity to do so.
Merri
I wonder if there’s anything to when Chuck is talking to her father, and she asked him how it felt. And he said, “It was like floating,” she said it was nothing to her. It was just – it was just alive, and then Ned. I wonder if there’s anything there…
Missy
Could be.
Merri
Because I thought that was really interesting that they’re two different experiences. And I thought originally, “Oh, he was dead longer.” But after this conversation, maybe not.
Missy
Yeah, she’s – yeah, it’s hard to say, I didn’t really think about that. So I don’t have an answer.
Merri
Why not?
Missy
I’m sorry. Again, this relationship, right – it’s not textually queer. But viewed through a queer lens, it echoes the experience of many queer people in that, like for me – like I said, came out in high school.
Merri
No one believed you.
Missy
No one believed me, I guess or wasn’t listening. I’m unclear on what happened when I came out.
Merri
I just think – I think there were a couple of things happening, I think being bi was just not something people understood.
Missy
Right.
Merri
One of like, the biggest –
Missy
We understood being gay because I came out in a car with a gay man.
Merri
Yeah. I mean, we had the big conversation. I don’t – you probably didn’t watch Real World, but –
Missy
Nah.
Merri
One of the gay men on there said being bi, and this is common, is just what you do before you come out as gay.
Missy
Right.
Merri
And then I also think the issue was no one just took you seriously.
Missy
Quite possibly.
Merri
And they just –
Missy
People also thought I couldn’t build a fire and I’m actually quite good at it.
Merri
It’s because you’re bi.
Missy
Yeah, it’s because I’m bi, I’m really good at starting fires.
Anyway! So my experience was that attempt to come out in high school, and then being like, “Well, I don’t really count, because I’ve only ever been with a man and I only plan to ever be with a man.” Which is not because I was denying my sexuality, but because I’ve only ever been with one person – I married him. And then kind of going back and forth in my 20s. Like, am I allowed to call myself bisexual? Am I bisexual?
Merri
Yeah.
Missy
And then finally deciding, fuck it all! I’m out.
Merri
And I’m pretty positive that experience is common.
Missy
Yeah. Especially among bi people who, you know, are attracted to people of different genders and who can essentially deny their sexuality for a long time. The thing with me was people kept telling me I was straight. Like, they kept saying, “Oh, well, you’re straight. Oh, well, you’re straight.” And I’m like, “I’m fucking not. I’m not though.” Like, I’m pretty sure at this point. I’m not.
Merri
I’m pretty sure if you and Josh were to ever break up, I don’t know if you’d ever date a man again.
Missy
Probably not.
Merri
Unless it was like –
Missy
Lee Pace?
Merri
Yeah.
Missy
He’s busy.
Merri
Or? I don’t know. There’s some others.
Missy
There’s some others.
Merri
There’s a few.
Missy
But, yeah. So my mid 20s, to me, it was when I effectively came out again. And my life –
Merri
You’re coming out for the rest of your life!
Missy
Literally! My life is actually notably different after that point. Now, I never shut up about being bisexual. So I don’t want everybody – I don’t want anybody to make that mistake again. Because it’s irritating.
Merri
And it’s important to you.
Missy
It is important to me.
Merri
[Mocking homophobic voice?] Why shouldn’t I be able to go around and saying I’m straight all the time?
Missy
Hmm?
Merri
Why shouldn’t I be able to go around and saying I’m straight all the time?
Missy
No one’s stopping you. Literally, nobody’s stopping you.
Merri
Straight pride.
Missy
Hi, I’m straight… Cool!
Merri
My pronouns are she and her and I’m straight.
Missy
This is a quote from Fashion, Femininity, and the 1950s: Costume and Identity Negotiation in Pushing Daisies by Alissa Burger, who writes, “However, Chuck’s future is similarly unsettled. While her embrace of structured 1950s-style clothes emphasize her femininity, she is unable to pursue a traditionally romantic feminine role in her relationship with Ned, since she will be returned to death if they touch. In this way, both Chuck’s idealized past and future are outside of her reach. In this case, nostalgia becomes the only suitable stand in and this approach is embraced by Chuck, in her childhood recollections and her dreams for the future – including a job, an apartment of her own, and her desires for her and Ned’s future together – as well as in her fashion. Another element of nostalgia that resonates particularly strongly with Chuck is that, as Jean Bertrand Pontalis argues, quote, nostalgia carries the desire, less for an unchanging eternity than for always fresh beginnings, unquote. Chuck was literally given a second chance at life when Ned brought her back to life with a touch of his magical finger and, reflecting on this new beginning, she decides that quote, dying’s as good an excuse as any to start living.”
Merri
Very beautiful.
Missy
So, Chuck being alive again, but also unable to really live her life because people might recognize her as the dead tourist. She further isn’t able to live her life according to the typical milestones, right? Those options are simply denied, she cannot have them. This is a really interesting interpretation of nostalgia, which is usually seen as longing for the past. But in Chuck’s case, since she had her life ended prematurely and got a fresh start, she’s longing for the potential of her early life, where she could have lived everything differently. She now has a greater appreciation for what it means to be alive, and she plans to make the most of it. Nostalgia for her isn’t really about wanting to go backward, it is about wanting to go forward with the same potential she had when she was younger. She’s now exploring all of those milestones – the relationship between the cheerleader and the football player – like she’s exploring those things now. Even that episode when they like fake being strangers, is itself that idea of getting a fresh start and starting over again, because she has the ability to do so. Now that she’s alive again, she has an increased desire to really live her life, but also a reduced ability to do it. Again, this isn’t an exact replica of what it means to be queer, but there is still that feeling for many queer people of reaching your 20s, being surprised that you’re still alive, and feeling the need to really, truly live your life without the fear that has been holding you back up until that point. And like, of course, you know, every person, regardless of their, you know, gender, or sexuality, etc, often that your 20s is about becoming the person that you are. But I also think it’s a very different experience for kids who grew up queer and closeted, who reach you know, adulthood and independence for the first time and then go buck fucking wild.
Merri
Yeah.
Missy
Because they have haven’t – they’ve been having to keep that, like, so close to their chest for their entire life. Can you imagine if Ned’s ability went away? What he and Chuck would get up to? Because it’s a lot.
Merri
Lots of sex… like P in V sex.
Missy
Yeah, I think that – again, it’s not queer itself. But it mirrors the queer experience of like, when you have to deny something for so long, because of danger and your fear of what is going to happen to you and your fear of what is going to happen to your loved one. When you finally no longer have that fear, you wanna go buck fuckin’ wild! You know? Do you have anything else to say about the time thing?
Merri
No, it’s very interesting to me.
Missy
It was really interesting to me when when I first learned about it, because I was like, “I never thought about it before.” But I do feel comparatively very young for my age.
Merri
And I feel old.
Missy
And that’s why it’s strange for me to hear that you’re – that you feel old cause I’m like –
Merri
I’m older than you.
Missy
You’re older than me by –
Merri
Three months?
Missy
Barely. Two –
Merri
Just barely –
Missy
-just two months.
Merri
Cause I’m in the end, and you’re in the beginning.
Missy
Yeah. It’s like two months, and like two days.
Merri
But I really do, I feel like I’m running out of time. But I also have that – the idea of milestones, like it was important to me to get married, it was important to me to buy a house. It’s important to me to try to – like these are things that are important to me!
Missy
Right.
Merri
And sometimes I look back, I’m like, yeah, it was good that I bought a house. And sometimes I look back, like on my wedding and be like, “I tried to be too traditional on that. And that wasn’t me.” And so sometimes hitting those milestones works, and sometimes it doesn’t, but I definitely think when we had that conversation – 100% goes to me wanting to do things that are what a lot of straight people do, and not even have to think about that.
Missy
Right.
Merri
And I think it’s just really interesting.
Missy
Yeah, when I look back at those milestones for myself, I don’t know how I have a house. I’m still confused about it. My wedding was over in less time than it takes to get through –
Merri
Your wedding was great.
Missy
“You Make My Dreams” by Hall and Oates.
Merri
Graduated college!
Missy
I did graduate college. Much later than usual.
Merri
I did too, though.
Missy
I wasn’t… There was a lot of things going on with why it took me so long to graduate college. I didn’t have a good group of friends really until college. Like, until I went to the four year university.
Merri
And you’re never gonna have kids.
Missy
And I’m never gonna have kids. I don’t want kids. I don’t want to adopt. I don’t want children at all.
Merri
Just furry ones.
Missy
Yeah. Pets, yes.
Merri
And where I really – I’m trying really hard to get pregnant.
Missy
Yeah. Do you have anything else to say about time?
Merri
It’s an illusion.
Missy
It is an illusion. It’s not real and you’re not old.
Merri
I know I’m not old.
Missy
If you’re old then I’m old. And I’m not old!
Merri
I have felt like I’m getting old since I was like 25. My sister feels the same way.
Missy
And I think that’s the thing – I think you’re both straight.
Merri
Yeah.
Missy
I’m sorry. I’m sorry that you have to be confined to time like this.
Merri
I’m sorry that I’m your token straight friend!
Missy
I know, we all have one.
I think this is the last thing on the list, is the idea of tension.
Merri
Like Pride and Prejudice
Missy
Yeah! So the isolation that comes from Ned’s ability could be a source of sadness. And it often is, right? Like, Ned is not a happy person.
Merri
Chuck is!
Missy
But Chuck is. But this is not a sad show, right? Much like Ned’s power, queerness can be a source of isolation or fear or sadness. But it doesn’t have to be. And this is something I think more people need to understand.
Merri
Just go to Pride. It was not sad!
Missy
No! It’s only that way – it only feels that way because of how the world responds to it. If homophobia did not exist, there would be nothing sad about being queer at all. Personally, I love being bisexual, and I find a lot of joy in being bisexual! Not just like, the fact that I can be bisexual. I mean, literally being bisexual. I mean, when I look at a hot person and I’m attracted to them –
Merri
It makes you happy!
Missy
That’s a moment of joy for me! I’m like – my world is so open that I can – I’m so glad I can be attracted to different kinds of people! Like that legitimately fills me with joy. I really resent the implication that there is something inherently tragic about being attracted to multiple genders. Because there isn’t, right? There’s nothing tragic about that. I don’t feel fucking bad about it.
Merri
I think that’s changing a lot, though. I think you’ve grown up with so much media telling you it is, so –
Missy
Yeah. Even among queer people I have seen, and I’m not going to call the specific thing that I’m thinking of out here, but I have seen like, “Oh, it’s not okay to think that this character is queer, because they have this other form of marginalization happening, and it would make them too… it would make them too tragic.” And like, okay, but actually, it’s not sad at all to be queer!
Merri
Yeah.
Missy
Like, it’s – I’m not fucking sad about it! I’m ecstatic that I get to be queer. I think it’s amazing that people are queer. I think it’s amazing that people are not straight. I think it’s amazing that people are not cis… what a fucking joy that we get to have to experience all these different methods of living!
Merri
And just yeah, just like, being able to experience life.
Missy
It’s not tragic to be straight, either. It’s not tragic to be cis.
Merri
Sometimes it feels like it is!
Missy
I think that these are all unique ways of living, and none of them are inherently tragic. And it frustrates me when people act as if any of them are.
Merri
Being a conservative, straight person is tragic.
Missy
Well, that’s a decision that somebody has made for themselves.
Merri
To be awful.
Missy
Yeah, that’s a decision that you made. These are all just like different ways of living and engaging with the world. And I think that that’s lovely and exciting and beautiful. And… going full Lady Gaga here, “Never been seen before.” Unbelievable unique, etc, etc. But, I don’t think that any of it is limiting. I think it’s wonderful. I think that we can appreciate all of the different points of view that the world offers us and be excited about all of them and not feel like any one of them is tragic, because it’s society’s fault that it feels tragic, it is not. The thing itself is not tragic.
This is a quote from Pushing Daisies used quirkiness to bridge time and queer history by Kyle Turner, who writes, “But Pushing Daisies’ neo-screwball reflexes are also compelling given the genre’s history of queer coding, from masculine envy in The Philadelphia Story to the sultry ménage à trois of Design for Living. This postmodern impulse rears its head beyond the heavy dialog and through visual gags, notably the wall in the pilot (a nod to the 50s Doris Day/Rock Hudson sex comedies like Pillow Talk), and in a sequence where Chuck has adorned herself with slippers with bells, prompting she and Ned to announce “coming” and “going” through the apartment. Its double entendre smirks throughout the scene, but their tête-à-tête is literalized. Their near bumping into each other homage and update, wrought with as much dramatic tension (she might die!) as erotic tension (but they want to make out!)
So obviously, it’s not super fun for the characters of Pushing Daisies to not be able to touch one another right? Like that’s not fun. But we’re not talking about real people here, right? We’re talking about something created for dramatic tension. And the tension certainly happens. It feels almost Regency-like in how badly you want the characters to touch one another, but the consequences are even more dire than you would see in a regency-era romance. But the show is so light in tone that despite the risk, you’re not kept tense. Instead, you get to enjoy the like, delightful, almost abjection of wanting them to touch so badly, but knowing that for them to touch would be horrible. Drawing on the traditions – the genre traditions of screwball comedy, Pushing Daisies takes things that might be serious and makes them playful and fun instead. The genre choice is important, because without following those traditions, you’d have a pretty depressing show. Like in another universe, this is a really depressing story. I cannot tell people how to feel about their own relationship with queerness. But I think this points to the idea of framing. Ned’s ability could be a curse or a gift, right? Depending on how he looks at it. He looks at it as a curse because it separates him from other people. To him, you know, it’s not a good thing. To Chuck, it’s a gift, because it’s what brought them together. It’s what literally brought her back to life and what brought them together.
Merri
He could be the second coming of Christ.
Missy
Yeah. Similarly, the world often tells us that queerness is something shameful or morally wrong or deviant. And it’s easy to believe that because we’re bombarded with that mentality constantly, especially in the time period in which the show was made. But it’s not true, right? It’s not real. It’s a story that culture tells us, there is no moral component to being queer no matter how much society tells us that there is. So reframing something that feels bad because society tells you it’s bad can actually be really beneficial. And it’s interesting to consider this in the context of screwball comedy as Turner points out, which is not only comedy but also often uses queer coded – but also uses like queer coded elements, something like Some Like it Hot or Bringing Up Baby. It’s important to note that while queerness could be part of the humor, queer people existed in Hollywood and worked on movies like this. lt’s not – including queerness in old Hollywood was not just a matter of making fun of queerness, queer people worked on these movies, they made these movies, they acted in these movies, they wrote these movies, they were present, they were doing this. That’s part of the big reason why homosexuality got lumped in with the Red Scare. So even straight people were sympathetic to queer folks in that time period, right? It wasn’t – we like to look at the past and say it was all bad. But that’s not true, right? Progress is not linear, we often –
Merri
Clearly!!!
Missy
Clearly, we often take steps forward, and then we take steps back and we go back and forth. Homophobia existed, of course, but that didn’t mean existence was miserable all the time, right, like people were still experiencing queer joy. This is from Sweet Talk in the Pie Hole: Language, Intimacy, and Public Space by Tara K. Parmiter, who writes, “When the show debuted, San Francisco Chronicle critic Tim Goodman wondered if quote, the unfulfilled romance may eventually test the viewers patience, unquote, but his concern rises out of an understanding of romance that privileges the touch, the kiss, the physical union. Series creator Bryan Fuller sees it another way: quote, it’s not so much about celibacy as it is about intimacy, he explains. Sometimes physicality gets in the way of true intimacy. So if that’s removed from a relationship, what’s going to happen? unquote. Most romantic plots on television shows depend upon suspending the viewers’ satisfaction, waiting until sweeps week or season finales for pivotal turns in the characters’ romantic relationships. But we always expect that that the consummation will finally occur, that Ross and Rachel reunite by the end of Friends, that Maddie and David of Moonlighting will stop their flirting and lock lips, that Mr. Big will finally sweep Carrie Bradshaw off her feet and back in bed for some Sex in the City. Ned and Chuck managed to smooch “prophylactically” through plastic wrap, hold hands while wearing gloves, and spoon in bed with the aid of of a vinyl partition, but since they will never connect physically they must forge the relationship through words, not the silent messaging of touch.”
So again, this could be tragic, right? It is – it feels like trying to imagine a relationship in which I could not touch my partner feels terrible. I don’t want that –
Merri
Yeah I don’t want that.
Missy
In another genre, it could be terrible. But in Pushing Daisies, drawing on a variety of filmic traditions that include noir, fairy tales, and screwball comedy, among a bunch of others, it’s instead used to explore other emotions, including the possibilities of sexual tension and also a deeper form of intimacy. For many people, sex can be a means of avoiding difficult conversations, right? Not always intentionally, but it can feel easier to express things and be vulnerable in a sexual context than to be vulnerable with language. Pushing Daisies does not let that happen. They cannot escape the fact that they cannot touch one another. Therefore, they have to be vulnerable through their language.
Merri
They have to use their words.
Missy
They have to use their words, they have to talk to one another, which is kind of funny because Ned in particular is really bad at effective communication.
Merri
I bet he’s good at dirty talk.
Missy
Probably! He tends to speak in double negatives, and he dodges questions, which fits in really well with the show’s fast-talking dialogue. But again, I think this has another dimension when we look at it through a queer lens. As we’ve discussed, Fuller was inspired by the HIV epidemic with disproportion – which disproportion – good grief –
Merri
You got it –
Missy
– which disproportionately affected queer people and was ignored for a long time for that reason. Part of the reason it got as bad as it did was because it was seen as a quote unquote, “queer plague” that would never spread to the heterosexual population. And that is why the Reagan administration was content to just let millions of queer people die. They did not care, because they did not think it would affect them.
Merri
Or they thought, “This is good.”
Missy
Yes, or they thought it was a good thing, which, they did. But since we’re talking about a show that debuted in 2006, there’s also the element of it not yet being socially acceptable to be gay, it was still considered deviant by a lot of people. Even if that deviance was harmless. I think by 2006-ish we had shows like Will and Grace and stuff like that where it’s like, “Oh, queerness is kind of a quirky thing. But let’s not be sexy about it because that’s weird. We don’t want to know what’s happening in the bedroom.” They make references to this to like side-eye references or sideways references to this with things like Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, they make references to that in Pushing Daisies.
Merri
Well there’s also, around this time – you heard it all the time, “I don’t care, like, you can be gay. I just don’t want to see it.”
Missy
Right.
Merri
Like that was a really, really common theme.
Missy
In my deepest stages of denial, that came out of my mouth.
Merri
Yeah.
Missy
I remember saying it and I remember going, “Why did I say that??”
Merri
I talked to my dad cause my dad saw the movie Milk, which is about –
Missy
Harvey Milk.
Merri
Harvey Milk, and he was a gay man. And he really loved it! But he goes, “I didn’t need to see him have sex with another man.” And I was like, “Well, that’s a really important part of his life!”
Missy
Yeah!
Merri
So, sorry!?
Missy
Yeah.
So even if you know, in 2006, 2007, 2008, we thought of queerness as harmless, it was still weird, right? We weren’t 100% on board with it. And when I say we, I mean mainstream culture. It was scary to have someone – to have feelings for someone and try to discern if they were queer. So there were a lot of euphemisms (cosmo-drinking shopaholic!) or coded conversations, or flagging, or ways of communicating without communicating, right?
Merri
This seems so mentally – like mentally exhausting. And I – that would just be a really difficult way to live.
Missy
Yeah. Because if I – so, say I’m attracted to somebody of the same gender, and I see them across the bar, and it’s not a gay bar. And I’m like, “Oh, I feel like she’s making eyes at me. But I’m not sure.” If I go over to her and I tried to flirt with her, I could be attacked.
Merri
Yeah.
Missy
You know? I don’t know what’s going to happen. And so it becomes very difficult and scary to try to express yourself in any way.
Merri
There’s a lot of funny Tik Toks about this.
Missy
Yeah.
Merri
Like, is she interested? Or does she just like my outfit?
Missy
Yeah.
There’s a sense of vulnerability just to conversation among queer people, when you don’t know if the other person is queer and you can’t ask directly. Which gets especially ramped up when there is the fear of sexual contact. It’s just like, the show being at its core about intimacy without touch is so fascinating to me. And again, it just kind of goes into that idea of this being a show informed by the queer experience, which we know it is, because Bryan Fuller’s gay. And I think – I want to say he’s like in his 40s now, so he grew up – like he would have been, you know, coming of age during the AIDS epidemic, right? I’m not exactly sure how old he is. He may have been –
Merri
I’ll look it up.
Missy
Yeah, I want to say he’s in his, like, mid to late 40s. But I don’t know, I don’t know anything. So he grew up in this environment where he was a gay man who, you know, wasn’t sure how to –
Merri
He is 52.
Missy
52. So he’s a little bit older than – When was he born?
Merri
He was born July 27th, 1969.
Missy
Oh, wow. He’s older than I – Okay. So he would have been in his 20s in the 80s.
Merri
Well does not look that old, maybe these are older pictures.
Missy
It’s because he’s gay, queer time.
Merri
I guess that’s true.
Missy
Um, I just made that up. So again, the show is not explicitly about queer people, right? But it feels heavily informed by the queer experience. There’s a lot to like about Pushing Daisies. Just generally speaking, it’s a really original concept that mashes unexpected genres together. The acting, set design, and costumes are great. The story is engaging, even if it’s a little more episodic than we expect of modern TV. I think that’s the hardest thing about recommending Pushing Daisies today, is that it feels like a show from 2007.
Merri
Yeah.
Missy
And that it’s like episode by episode by episode with, with some through lines. But for the most part, you could watch any episode and be fine.
Merri
Yeah, not true for a lot of TV.
Missy
Yeah, it just doesn’t work like that anymore. But the sense of longing and queerness that runs beneath the surface of it is, I think, what made it my favorite show, even before I noticed that those things were happening.
Merri
And why I felt like this is good, but I don’t like it like Missy does.
Missy
Yeah. And I’m not saying that you have to be queer to like the show. Or like, if you do like the show a whole lot, if it’s your favorite show, and you’re straight, that you’re secretly queer. That’s not it. There’s lots of things to appreciate about the show.
Merri
It just seems to line up well, in this situation.
Missy
It is certainly a collection of my favorite interests. But the sense of longing and queerness that runs beneath the surface, I think, is what made it my favorite show, even before I noticed this things were happening. It’s a fantasy show, and it isn’t true in that sense, right? Like, it’s not true that this happened, or that anything happened like this. But it is a show about two people of different genders and their romantic life, among other things. But despite that, it still feels like a very true show about the queer experience because Bryan Fuller is drawing from his own experiences. It’s not that on-screen queer rep isn’t necessary (although again, Lee Pace is a queer man) and he may not be playing a gay man in Pushing Daisies, but I also think he’s not not playing a queer man, you know what I mean? So it’s not that queer rep isn’t necessary, but rather that queer people are capable of telling all kinds of stories that showcase what it’s like to be queer, even if they’re not always read that way by everybody. And just to be clear, this isn’t like the “Makorra is a queer relationship because one is a handmaiden one is a feudal lord,” thing. That’s drawing on heteronormative gender roles and assuming that flip flopping them is subversive in a straight relationship. I very purposefully did not argue this point by pointing to Ned’s more reserved masculinity and Chuck’s go-getter attitude, I very intentionally did not make that argument. Queerness exists outside of heteronormativity, right? Heteronormativity is a construct, queerness does not have to adhere to heteronormativity. When somebody asks, “Well, who’s the man and who is the woman?” Like, fucking nobody! Because heteronormativity isn’t real, right? We’re not constrained by borders, not just queer people, but straight people also. Cis and straight people are not confined by the borders of heteronormativity, they don’t have to be! Nobody has to adhere to normative gender roles in our relationships, or elsewhere. That’s why I didn’t want to point to that idea of like, “Oh, well, this is a queer show, because Ned bakes pies, and Emerson wears bright colors.”
Merri
It seems like that would be more of – just like you said, but like gender roles.
Missy
Yeah –
Merri
That doesn’t – that’s not inherently about queer life.
Missy
Yeah. And I can’t remember how much we talked – I know, in one of our episodes, we talked about queerness existing outside of heteronormativity. And this being a very – like, we are taking this really academic approach to something and I feel like –
Merri
That seems often!
Missy
Well, it was about that specifically. And I was like, “I wouldn’t be surprised if the creator of this thing was familiar with this aspect of…”
Merri
Oh, what was that?
Missy
I wonder if it was Hannibal?
Merri
It might have been Hannibal.
Missy
Because I feel like the same thing – again, it’s Bryan Fuller. I feel like the show is very purposeful about queering as a verb –
Merri
I know exactly what you’re talking about.
Missy
Yeah. I wonder if it was Hannibal? I’m not sure though.
Merri
I feel like we would have known definitely. He would be, right?
Missy
Yeah, I think he went to film school or something… But it feels – this show feels, to me, purposeful. And it’s like destabilizing heteronormativity as a whole, and not simply doing a gender flip, right? Not saying like, “Well, Chuck is ‘the man’ and Ned is ‘the woman'”-
Merri
That clearly isn’t true!
Missy
Right. It feels like it’s doing something much more interesting than just like, flipping our expectations. Instead, it’s like saying, “Actually, your expectations are wrong. You shouldn’t even have those expectations.” And anyway, I love Pushing Daisies and I think Lee Pace is so handsome.
Merri
Anyone who doesn’t is just a liar.
Missy
I – God, he’s so handsome. Yeah, that was an important part that we left out of the episode is how handsome Lee Pace is.
Merri
I know he’s –
Missy
Oof!
Merri
And he’s only gotten more handsome!
Missy
God, do you follow him on Instagram? Because –
Merri
Uh, I don’t think so –
Missy
He’s worth following. I don’t know what the fuck – his stories are so weird. He posted some pictures of himself the other day and then he just like put little rabbit gifs all over them.
Merri
I think he –
Missy
And I don’t know why.
Merri
– might be… I mean, his instagram name is leeepfrog, I think he just might be a weird dude.
Missy
And I love that for him. I love that for me, and I love that for him.
Merri
Oh yeah, he’s in Bodies Bodies Bodies.
Missy
I’m really excited for Bodies Bodies Bodies.
Merri
I am too! And I’m really excited to see how they handle it because they put all that social justice wording and stuff at the end –
Missy
I trust Lee Pace.
Merri
I’m very curious to see how they handle that.
Missy
I trust him.
Merri
Yeah, he’s so attractive…
Missy
And that’s why.
Merri
He’s wearing the good… There’s those real good – you can’t see it – James Bond shorts.
Missy
Uh huh! Do you have any else to say about Pushing Daisies?
Merri
Just that he’s really hot. Also, the girl that plays Chuck literally looks the same.
Missy
She does!
Merri
She looks slightly older.
Missy
So that’s it for this episode. I finally succeeded in my goal of doing a Pushing Daisies episode. Now what am I going to do with my life? If you like this, you can find us on our website at fakegeekgirlscast.com, that has links to all of our previous episodes and is starting to have links to transcripts of our episodes. Thank you to Emily June for helping out with this enormous project. Emily is handling new episodes as they come out. So roughly two weeks after an episode debuts, we hope to have the transcript for that episode up. I am handling the back catalogue, working on episodes – like full episodes, like this one first before doing What We’ve Been Up To’s. You may not know this you guys, but I’m super busy. So the back catalogue –
Merri
– That’s an understatement!
Missy
– the back catalogue is going to take longer, but I do want to – I am working on it. It’s just, don’t expect it to go super fast. If you like this and you’re like “Oh, I wish Missy could work more on this,” then all of you should donate to our Patreon so that I can quit my job and just do this podcast full time.
Merri
It’s true.
Missy
We’re not anywhere close.
Merri
Maybe one day!
Missy
Maybe one day. But yeah, consider supporting us on Patreon, you get cool rewards like mail, or access to our outlines, which include like, the shit that we cut. Because I can’t talk about everything I want to talk about. I have to cut things and –
Merri
Sometimes we say stupid funny things.
Missy
That’s true. Well, that don’t go in the outline. Oh, you have to pay more for that. That’s – that’s the unedited episodes, where you can hear all manner of depravity.
Merri
That’s true. And maybe one day you’ll get our spicy book reviews.
Missy
Yeah, which we should do, because I have the one. Next time, What We Do In The Shadows. Let me tell you, there’s a lot of papers called “What We Do In The Shadows.” And there’s like some that are actually about What We Do In The Shadows, but the majority of them are not. They’re about things like frogs, and other weird stuff – like things I did not expect. But I’m very excited to talk about What We Do In The Shadows. After that, we’re going to be doing Good Omens! Good Omens has won our poll, I plan to do both the book and the TV series. I have not watched the TV series, I have read the book. And I’ve heard very good things about the TV series and very bad things. And I’m excited about it.
Merri
I have watched it and I liked it.
Missy
Mhhm. I’m excited and I think it’s gonna be really interesting to follow – I mean, it’ll be a while after Pushing Daisies, but it’ll be really interesting to talk about after talking about Pushing Daisies. So I will be gone one weekend in July, so I believe the Good Omens episode will be… later than expected.
Merri
When I go to Disney, I won’t be gone during the weekend, so I’ll still get to do that.
Missy
Nice. But yeah, so there will be a weekend – there will be a Monday without an episode. That’s what I’m trying to say. And that’s it.
Merri
All right, catch you on the flipside.
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