Now I'm going to come off as utterly hypocritical here, but I loved the pilot for Mockingbird Lane, Bryan Fuller's REMAKE of The Munsters television show.
I didn't really watch the original show, and for some reason keep confusing it with The Addams Family, of which I am much more fond. Both shows were before my time, but I loved characters such a Lurch, Cousin It, and Thing (basically a sentient hand). I expected these creatures to pop up in Mockingbird Lane, and when they didn't, I realized that I was missing a rather fundamental expertise with the original source material.
The main reason I'm all over this show is because of creator and showrunner Bryan Fuller. I love him like I love Joss Whedon, except more so. Everything that Bryan Fuller touches has transported me into a world of magic and wonder. First, there was Dead Like Me, where a directionless young woman, George (Ellen Muth) is accidentally wiped out by a flying toilet seat and becomes a Grim Reaper, a job that she doesn't particularly enjoy. This show is a fantasy show about death.
Then he created Wonderfalls, which for one season followed the adventures of Jaye (Caroline Dhavernas), who works in a tchotchke shop in Niagara Falls in which the inanimate objects talk to her and give her orders--which she follows. This show is a fantasy show about madness.
Finally, Fuller created the two seasons of the truly marvelous Pushing Daisies, where Ned (Lee Pace) has a magical touch that can bring people and live things back from the dead. He has a 60 second window to retouch the person before that "life" will have to be paid for with another death, to balance things. He works with PI Emerson Cod (Chi McBride), using his magical abilities to solve crimes, when he isn't making amazing pies. This show is a fantasy show about death. Again.
As you can see, Fuller's world always has a slightly dark edge, which makes his shows simultaneously sunny and dark, joyful and profound. He has a wicked sense of humor and writes terrific women characters too!
The pilot for Mockingbird Lane has a rather odd rhythm, beginning with some cartoon violence amongst a group of boy scouts in the forest, and then quickly shifting to Marilyn (Charity Wakefield) house-hunting for the family. The Munsters quickly settle into their new digs, and start scoping out the neighbors. Grandpa and Lily arrive in coffins/crates in the "dead" of night. Fuller has scored a two-fold casting coup for this show.
The equally gorgeous and hysterical Portia de Rossi plays the poignant, yet mysterious, Lily Munster. This role is by far de Rossi's softest, as she played the kooky Lindsay on Arrested Development, and the hard edged and delightfully brutal Veronica on Better Off Ted. We don't get as much time with Lily in the pilot as I would like, but she's great, and her costumes are to die for.
Still, the standout role on this show, and the reason that it should be picked up immediately is Eddie Izzard as Grandpa Munster. In the image above, he is baking cookies and filling them with his own blood, so that he can turn the neighbors into blood slaves. He's wonderfully irreverent, and Izzard plays the character with grace, wit, and just the slightest touch of menace.
The other star of the show is the setting, the house at 1313 Mockingbird Lane that contains all manner of secret compartments, dark corridors, dungeons, laboratories, and a crazy cookie baking apparatus. This grand manor hints at a violent past, and will surely have many secrets to unlock.
NBC shoe-horned the pilot into a slot before Grimm, a show that I really enjoy but that has very limited roles for women. Women are most frequently in danger, or victims, and the feisty Rosalie has been out of town for several episodes now, leaving everything to the all-male Scooby gang. Bleah.
So please, PLEASE, if you reside on Planet Bunheads, get the word out about Mockingbird Lane so that it doesn't die a sad, little death, and NBC orders a full season for us to enjoy.
