If you watch the light and witty trailers for Only Murders in the Building, the series about three murder-solving New Yorkers of divergent age and life experience living in the fancy Arconia apartment building, it would be all too easy to assume that the show is all quirky sweetness and sleuthing fluff, the kind of easy digestible entertainment that many of us like to escape to when reality gets a little too much.
And if that is all this masterfully executed was, then that would be absolutely fine because charming escapism, written and acted well, which Only Murders in the Building, is precisely why we fire up our streaming devices and just what the stress relief doctor ordered.
The good news is that not only is the show a bright sweet smile of a storyline, but it is so much more, a show that, among things demonstrates in way big and small the power of found families and how being connected to others can have a life changing effect on us all.
Beyond that though, and lord knows that’s a powerful enough lesson in itself, Only Murders in the Building dives deep into the idea that beneath the obvious, in-sight evidence of a person’s life often lies far more humanity than any of us are privy to, tightly locked beneath protective layers or a strict observance of social convention that brooks no allowance for flaws, weakness or faltering life force.
Time and again in this middle batch of episodes which see the mystery deepening but without a clear idea of who the killer is just yet – with four episodes to go after this, the last thing you want is to peak too early which it’s doubtful this beautifully calibrated series would do anyway – we are taken into the world of characters who, on the surface seem irredeemably ill-tempered, cruel or nasty but who are, when no one is looking, or at least when the people with whom they are share an apartment building aren’t looking, actually have more than a few redeeming qualities.
Take the murdered person of the season, Bunny Folger (Jayne Houdyshell) – unlike some shows such as Britain’s Midsommer Murders, there is no escalating body count with the emphasis more on the solving and the podcasting thereof – a woman who ruled the Arconia’s coop board with ruthless efficiency and minimal niceties for almost three decades before finding herself dead, very dead courtesy of a knitting needle (or was it? Red herrings abound!) at the end of season 2.
In episode 3, “The Last Day of Bunny Folger”, we see that beneath the hardscrabble surface is a woman on warm terms with street food vendors and waiters – they like her, they really like her which is a revelation to be hones – and who extends unexpected generosity to people that you simply wouldn’t think she’d care about.
The fact that she does, and that tries to connect with our three murder podcast-obsessed protagonists – Charles-Haden Savage (Steve Martin), Oliver Putnam (Martin Short) and Mabel Mora (Selena Gomez) who are as joyously and delightfully self-referential as ever – and cries when she feels rebuffed (to be fair they only see surface Bunny, unaware that real Bunny is actually a half-way decent human being; quelle surprise! – is one of the best examples of Only Murders in the Building‘s emphasis on nuanced characterisation.
This refreshing propensity to add layered humanity to supporting characters even extends to two of the baddies of season 1, Teddy and Theo Dimas (Nathan Lane and James Caverly), who, fresh from threatening Oliver in the lift (well, Teddy anyway) with vengeful acts, and clearly people of disreputable intent and action, are ripped apart by the same familial anguish that everyone feels.
It’s one very clever way that this playful show, which is as apt to be witty and sardonic as it is to cut to the heart of the matter, and do so with real, affecting poignancy, adds some grunt to its undeniable charm, eschewing the idea of cardboard cutouts simply going their Agatha Christie paces and making us feel emotionally invested in the why of what these people are doing and not simply the fact that they’ve done it.
It means that for all the slightly whimsical scenes which play to the ability of Oliver particularly to be hilarious witty, and to the fantastically heightened sense that great over-the-top drama exists in a domestic enclave like the Arconia, we are also party to the some very weighty moments.
We witness, for instance, Mabel falling harder for possible girlfriend Alice (Cara Delevingne) only to find in episode 6, “Performance Review” that she seems to be using the murder of Bunny Folger, and the citing of Charles, Oliver and Mabel as persons of interest, for her own personal gain, a discovery that ruins any sense that the much-abandoned Mabel had that she was worth anything to anyone (beyond Charles and Oliver, of course).
We also see rival podcaster Cinda’s (Tina Fey) assistant Poppy (Adina Verson) coming to grips with the fact that she is being used and genuinely abused by her boss who she admires but you slowly get the feeling is beginning to realise does not have her best interests, or any of her interests, really at heart.
It’s this kind of moving, robustly human characterisation that elevates Only Murders in the Building, and episode 3 to 6 in particular, from undeniably quirky sleuthing, anchored by three protagonists who are each other’s found family, something that glues them together in ways heartwarming and hilarious, to a really muscular style of storytelling that takes as its cue the fact that people are dark, yes, and capable of murder, but they are also a thousand kinds of nuanced too.
Embracing this truth means that while we have fun watching glitter bombs in bins explode – the better to find a possible killer – and are taken on a tour of the hidden tunnels that run behind each apartment, courtesy of Charles’ daughter Lucy (Zoe Colletti), and have clues aplenty and further attempts at framing our treasured three central characters dropped on us, including a bloodied knife from a great height, we are always to the people in the story, people who matter and who drive the story in ways that are more affecting that you expect will be the case.
At the end of episode 6, we’re left wondering whether Mabel actually did what the video says she did to a glitter-covered, hoodie-wearing figure on the subway, but one thing we do know, and which is evident all the way these four beguilingly and richly fun and clever episodes, is that it will be handled with an eye firmly on the humanity of her as a person and not simply as a prop in a murder mystery, something which enriches every last scene of this most wonderful of shows.
Only Murders in the Building season 2 is currently available for screening on Disney Plus.