Only Murders in the Building had the unenviable task of continuing its excellent first season’s momentum with its sophomore outing. The second season mostly manages to do so, but sometimes it buckles under the weight of those expectations, throwing too many sub-plots at characters like Charles for any of them to stick. Still, the show remains enjoyable, even as it creates another murder mystery to keep the in-show podcast train chugging along.
This season picks up where the last left off, with Mabel (Selena Gomez) being discovered in her apartment with a murdered Bunny Folger (Jayne Houdyshell). After the podcast trio is left go after some tough interrogation, they discover a stolen painting and the apparent murder weapon in each others’ apartments. As they investigate the new murder, they meet new acquaintances, such as Alice (Clara Delevgine), an artist who has taken a special interest in Mabel. They also meet technically ‘old’ acquaintances, such as Lucy (Zoe Margaret Colletti), Charles’ former stepdaughter, who also knows about the secrets of the Arconia building.
The main draw of the show, the chemistry between the three leads, is still going strong.
Steve Martin and Martin Short have a hell of time poking fun at each other, and then Mabel is there to roll her eyes and ask these two children in old men’s bodies to stop goofing around and focus on the task at hand. The show is also still undeniably quirky, though the charm has worn off a little by this season. There is just enough balance between character moments and the investigation to work, although, true to second season form, the trio have more at stake this time around in solving this mystery.
In addition to the main cast, the well-realized secondary characters also add a great deal of nuance and enjoyment to the show.
The show focuses on the fact that everyone you know has their own backstory, and their own love (or hate) affair with New York and the Arconia that show how the city and the apartment complex has changed, and how they changed these characters. Howard (Michael Cyril Creighton), Leonora Folger (Shirley MacLaine), and Jayne Houdyshell in particular are notable in the second season.
Unfortunately, some of the storylines don’t work as well as the others. For instance, Charles’ brief re-kindling of his relationship with Jan breaks down before we get a chance to invested in it. The constant meta references to this being a second season wear thin after the first handful of times.
The show ends with a theatrical finale that gathers almost all the side characters in the season and lets them show off their ‘acting’ skills, often to hilarious effect. The murderer this time is more surprising than last season’s culprit, but we haven’t spent as much time with this person, so the reveal feels less shocking.
If Only Murders in the Building followed this case immediately with another murder, you might be strained with the rare possibility of three separate murders involving the podcast trio happening back to back. So the show takes a beat and fast-forwards one year, introducing an A-grade star before unceremoniously disposing of said celebrity to set up next season’s case, complete with intriguing references to a grudge between Charles and the murder victim. Let’s hope the third season continues the momentum and manages to stave off the onset of stagnancy that’s already started to show in the second season.