User Reviews

This is rather an unusual episode in that Emerson isn't hired to solve a murder; he is hired to find a runaway teenaged girl, Nikki Heaps... although by the end of the episode the number of dead may be the highest in the series so far! Chuck manages to get Nikki's best friend to tell her that she had run off with a mime called Rocky Milano. By the time they catch up with him Ricky is dead though. He tells them that Nikki had joined the circus and here there are plenty of suspicious characters; a ringmaster who is clearly lying about something, an acrobat who seems to appear out of nowhere and a group of drunken clowns. As Nikki had been working with the clowns it seems likely that they were involved in her disappearance however when they all turn up dead; drowned when their clown car was run off the road and into the lake they are cleared and a new suspect emerges; the member of the audience they abused. Away from the mystery Olive is still in the nunnery along with Aunt Lily and Chuck has to look after The Pie Hole on her own... which presents a problem when Aunt Vivian walks through the door.

This was another fun episode; the mystery started off fairly run of the mill but turned out to be as wacky as usual and the little car full of dead clowns was both hilarious and a little dark. The story with Olive and Lily didn't really go anywhere but it did provide some laughs... I loved it when Lily took a bottle of booze out of her bible during the middle of prayers! It wasn't all mystery and laughs there were also some touching scenes where Ned has to come to terms with the fact that Chuck has moved out and where Chuck has to serve pie to Vivian without being seen. Two episodes in and this season continues to be as much fun as the first.

Towards the end of the run of "The Brady Bunch", the producers were obviously looking for some way to infuse some new interest in the show. So, they 'jumped the shark', to to speak, and created the insipid Cousin Oliver character. Well, while "Pushing Daisies" never was as successful as "The Brady Bunch" (which PROVES like isn't fair AND audiences are filled with idiots), the beginning of season two saw the producers introducing lots of crazy new plot devices to get your attention. Now, the show is more like a soap-opera--with learning in the last episodes that Chuck's Aunt Lily is not only her mother BUT she had apparently slept with her sister's fiancé (Chuck's father)! And, Ned's father is apparently returning. AND, Olive runs off to a nunnery!! When the episode begins, you see Olive and a NEW character, Digby the Pig--perhaps the show's version of Cousin Oliver!

This episode is a bit different as it does not involve a murder--at least at first. Emerson is convinced to search for a missing teenager and the path eventually heads to a circus! But then, murders start occurring. At one point, a clown car is found submerged in a lake. I was scared, as HUNDREDS of clowns could have been inside!! And, actually, quite a few were in this very dark and funny scenes. Where is the lost girl and why would someone start killing people...and clowns?

This is a very goofy episode--with an even larger number of silly jokes and twists. Emerson was particularly good in this one. Well written and I hope to see more of Digby!