ONLY MURDERS IN THE BUILDING – Season 4 Review

Review

Crime aficionados rejoice! Our favourite trio of amateur sleuths has returned to Disney+ with a brand new series. After a shaky third season which many saw as a bump in the road. Can Only Murders in the Building recapture the lightning which made it an overnight success? Will a complex new storyline, featuring potentially multiple culprits and victims, alienate fans who long for the ability to solve along with Mabel, Oliver and Charles?

I’ve had the chance to watch seven of season four’s ten episodes and this review will be as spoiler-free as it can possibly be.

Season 4 is an Exhilarating return to form for the series. Showrunner John Hoffman has deftly taken the more successful elements from season 3 and mixed them with a more season 1/2 sensibility. Namely bringing the core trio of Selena Gomez, Martin Short and Steve Martin back together for the majority of each episode. That was my – and plenty others – biggest complaint about season 3. OMITB works best with this core cast is capitalising on their incredible chemistry. Here’s it’s undetectably acknowledged by the writers and the course has been corrected.

That’s not to say Mabel, Oliver and Charles now spend their every waking moment together. Though they do manage a trip to L.A together to visit Paramount Studios and may go on another jaunt outside the Arconia in episode seven. These are very specific plot points which put them in close quarters. For the rest of the season as I have seen it, they’re functioning exactly as we saw in earlier seasons. Of course there’s the trademark bickering, it wouldn’t be OMITB if Oliver and Charles weren’t mimicking an old married couple, but it doesn’t boil over in to full blown conflict as it did last season.

One of the benefits of season 3 which continues is the character development. Whilst there is mileage to be had in the continuing appearance of Meryl Streep. The relationship between Oliver and Loretta isn’t at the forefront of season 4. The show is embracing the idea of Mabel searching for her identity. A search which is further complicated by the impending film being made about their podcast. With Paramount casting Eva Longoria as the silver screen Mabel, the real character is faced with understanding her own public perception and, rightly, begins to question her place in the world.

Selena Gomez’s performance is out of this world this season. Her approach to Mabel has always been somewhat deadpan, allowing Short and Martin to be more melodramatic. The overnight success of the show is in no small part down to her unexpected place as the grown up in the trio. But this season Gomez is able to instil Mabel with a new sense of purpose and that exposes a more emotional side of her personality. It’s the perfect storm of great writing and performance and sets the character up for an interesting future.

Spoiler alert if you’ve forgotten the end of season three but with Sazz (Jane Lynch) one of this season’s murder victims Charles is more central to the story at the beginning of the season. Those moments give Steve Martin chance to really revel in Charles’ neurotic side. It’s a big performance. But this is an actor who revels in big performances. The same can be said of Oliver who’s grappling with his relationship going long distance. His insecurities were always going to get the best of him and that means yet another huge performance.

As well as Longoria joining the cast as big screen Mabel, season 4 adds Eugene Levy and Zach Galifianakis as themselves portraying Charles and Oliver in the OMITB film. With production circling them that means the show also adds a typical Hollywood producer in Bev Melon (Molly Shannon) and enigmatic directors The Brothers (Catherine Cohen & Siena Werber). The ongoing story of Sazz’s murder also takes us to the west tower of the Arconia which introduces a slew of new characters including the Christmas obsessed Rudy (Kumail Nanjiani), Vince (Richard Kind) and Daphne Rubin-Vega as family matriarch Inez. The cast is huge, perhaps the biggest of any season to date. But the scripts are able to balance the elements well without overwhelming the audience.

Balance is the name of the game right across season 4. Being careful to avoid spoilers, this is the most complex season so far. It’s clues and Easter eggs reach all the way back to season 1, potentially giving an air of final season to these new episodes. Pushing that vicious rumour aside, season 4 requires its very own murder board in order to keep up with the various plot points. That complexity is never off putting. Quite the opposite. It’s refreshing to see the writers haven’t lose the nerve to experiment after the criticisms of season 3.

Verdict

Only Murders in the Building returns incredibly strong for season 4. An inventive approach to the latest mystery finds the series riding a wave of creative renewal. With the cast all in and some hilarious new guest cast this could be the best season yet.

⭐⭐⭐⭐