RECAP: “Only Murders in the Building” Season 4, Episode 3
Episode 3 of “Only Murders in the Building” Season 4 brought together the two seemingly disparate mega-plots of the season — the mystery surrounding who killed Sazz, and the worryingly fast-tracked Hollywood production of the film version of the podcast. After returning guest-star (and Oscar winner!) Da’Vine Joy Randolph’s inspector brought the Arconia 3 up to speed on what she knew about the investigation — which wasn’t much — the Hollywood version of our leads barged in, announcing that the film’s director, The Brother Sisters, insisted they spend the day shadowing the protagonists. Without their permission! Again I find this whole film plotline clearly suspicious, but I guess we’ll have to wait for that bomb to go off.
This episode took a step back from moving the plot forward, instead offering each of the leads some moments of character development and clarity. While I enjoyed most of the banter between the Arconia 3 and the Hollywood actors playing them in the film, I thought the episode was let down by the over-the-top wackiness of this episode’s prime suspect. Let’s get into it.
Spoilers ahead! Consider yourself warned!
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MABEL & EVA LONGORIA (“MABELLE”)
The most engaging plot this episode saw Mabel and her Hollywood counterpart, Eva Longoria, interrogating the last remaining “Westie” who was on their initial suspect list, Christmas Guy, AKA Kumail Nanjiani. All of the Westies are off, but Christmas Guy was on a whole different tier — one that I think stretches outside this show’s usual lane of “cozy eccentric” to full-blown parody. While investigating the abandoned apartment from which the murderer shot Sazz, Mabel discovered a string of silver material she thought might be tinsel. As she attempted to come up with a plausible reason to visit Christmas Guy, she and Eva Longoria got into a fight — Eva continually points out all the ways her character is “different” from Mabel, including but not limited to being decisive, not being sad all the time, and taking charge of things — and the two split up. When Mabel finally shows up at Christmas Guy’s apartment, she finds Longoria already there, attempting to pump him for information.
In fairly short order they discover some things that seemingly clear Christmas Guy’s name — he did not hate Charles for getting real Christmas trees banned in the building; the string Mabel found was not tinsel; the gun over his mantle is a prop that shoots Nerf darts. Oh, and he actually hates Christmas, but he’s a fitness influencer who went viral for a holiday video and now that is his whole brand. This whole thing feels goofy to the degree that it borders on cringe, and I felt like every actor in this plotline deserved better.
That said, the investigation into Christmas Guy was not a total waste. While in his apartment, Mabel realizes that he uses a HAM radio, which starts blaring “Nothing’s Gonna Stop Us Now,” the excellent theme song to the 80s sitcom, “Perfect Strangers.” (Sidebar: “OMITB” is the second show I know of to prominently feature this song outside of “Perfect Strangers,” as it was also a plotpoint in the final season of HBO’s “The Leftovers.” And yet the song does not exist in its original form on Spotify. WTF?) Let’s hold on to that information for later.
CHARLES & EUGENE LEVY
Charles remains convinced that the perpetrator is Stink Eye, AKA Pink Eye, played by veteran character actor Richard Kind. Undeterred by the pink-eye excuse, and wondering if that eyepatch actually hides the bruise from a shotgun recoil instead of conjunctivitis, Charles and Elliott concoct elaborate yet totally thoughtless ruses to get them back into Stink Eye’s apartment, including eye patches worn on the OUTSIDE of their eyeglasses, which is…wild. Stink Eye receives Charles significantly less warmly than he received Mabel and Oliver last episode, and after a brief exchange, Charles and Stink Eye realize they both thought the other was avoiding them, but in fact they were just mutually awkward people. There was some good physical comedy in this plot, and it was overall more successful than the Mabel/Christmas Guy one.
Charles and Eugene’s bid to get Stink Eye to remove his eyepatch in front of them fails until, eventually, it doesn’t, and they recognize that he does indeed have one hell of a case of pinkeye — presumably he has been hanging out with Scott Baio. This again seemingly clears him of the crime, except that Eugene Levy alerts Charles to a photo by Stink Eye’s door of the Westies with someone holding the pig who escaped from the abandoned apartment, but with that person’s face scratched out.
OLIVER & ZACH GALIFIANAKIS
The least-essential plot of the episode features Oliver attempting to get his celebrity stand-in, Zach Galifianakis, engaged with playing him in the film, trying desperately to make himself seem interesting, with Zack protesting that he is a boring, blowhard never-was who has no real psychological meat as a character (Zach is trying to pivot away from broad comedies and focus on the Legits Actor phase of his career). There are some good zingers in here, and some absolutely withering insights into Oliver’s character. Ultimately Howard (Michael Cyril Creighton) — now in possession of the escaped pig, to whom he keeps giving celebrity-inspired pig pun names — steps in and, in a brilliantly delivered monologue, explains why Oliver is his hero, while also exposing the many ways in which Oliver is a schmuck. More Howard, please!
Howard also keeps track of the musings from the HAM radio found in the abandoned apartment, which also picked up the “Perfect Strangers” theme song.
PUTTING THE CLUES TOGETHER
Ultimately the Arconia 3 reunite in the abandoned unit, which Mabel — inspired by Eva Longoria’s cajoling over not having an apartment of her own — has decided to squat in, in order to assert squatter’s rights. Fascinating. She is also hoping that this move will prompt the Dudenoff guy who owns it to come back from his supposed stint in Portugal to boot the person illegally living in his property. It’s a bold move, but it will also allow her to keep an eye on Charles, and vice versa.
While in Mabel’s new “apartment,” they all realize that something is very much going on with the HAM radios, and that one of the codes they found in their research is actually a frequency. They get on it, and a woman speaking in a European accent tells them to get off the channel, because the last person who was snooping around on it (presumably Sazz) got killed. The person on the other end of the radio heals the pig squealing in the background and yells out, “Hammy Faye Bakker I love you!”
So we have HAM radios. A celebrity pig. And a group of very odd, connected Westies who play a card game and slice off pieces of ham for a “fix.” Clearly there is a theme here. How does it all lead back to Charles? Could it be his hammy acting? We’ll see.
What did you think of the episode? Who do you think killed Sazz? What do you think is up with his obviously bonkers movie scenario? Leave your takes in the comments!
