Only Murders In the Building Season 3 Premiere Review: The

We have another murder in the building, Arconiacs!

After a murder-free year, the first supposed death of Ben Gilroy hit everyone with a bang, and Mabel’s reaction on Only Murders In the Building Season 2 Episode 10 was a testament to another death plaguing the building.

The probability of someone being in the center of murders three times in a row is very low.

Yet on Only Murders In the Building Season 3 Episode 1, Ben died, was resurrected, and died properly. And each time, Mabel suspected foul play.

We were reunited with our offbeat trio, and in the two-episode season premiere, they seemed out of sync. Sure, there was the same old banter between the three, which never gets old, but it didn’t feel like old times.

Charles: I know you’re nervous. I know your last Broadway show was a disaster. Everyone knows that. The world knows it.
Mabel: Fast forward, fast forward.
Charles: But you, sir, are a talented young man. You have a gift for leadership. And when you ask me to join this production.
Oliver: Hold, please. I asked you?

That could have partly been because Oliver and Charles had been working on Oliver’s show for a year, and Mabel was doing her thing.

Even the conversation between Oliver and Charles was foreign to Mabel, which might account for the lukewarm vibes between the three.

Only Murders In the Building has borrowed a lot from theatre — the show had been teasing it since its first season, and being thrown into the middle of it was enthralling.

I’ll admit that just like Mabel, I didn’t quite get theatre, and I had doubts whether I would enjoy this season if it relied too much on the niche experience of being part of a theatre cast and the little insider knowledge one needs to grasp what is happening.

OK, secret, I think theater is kind of lame. People all dressed up in costumes no real person would ever wear, acting like nobody’s sitting out there watching them say things no real person would ever say. But at least this piece of theater is a murder mystery. That, I can get my head around. And every murder mystery needs a victim.

Mabel

However, their approach to the characters was so universal that it was quite relatable and, initially, scary.

The cold open saw a trip to the past as a young girl attend her first Broadway show and fell in love with the art form.

That young girl would turn out to be Loretta.

Terrifyingly, she did everything right, yet the years rushed by without the big break she’d hoped to occur. It was sad to think she could put so much work into something, and it would amount to nothing.

There wasn’t much to learn about Loretta from her audition apart from that there was great talent there. I mean, it’s Meryl Streep. She made spontaneous screaming in Big Little Lies seem like the best thing ever.

What we would learn about Loretta would come later, and as of the first meeting, no one was rooting for her.

If you read our Only Murders In the Building Season 3: Everything to Know article, you must know about the numerous cast additions the season teased. We met all of them in early previews.

The first was Meryl Streep as Loretta, who was just hilarious trying to do various accents as part of her process during the table read.

We also got a taste of Wesley Taylor as Cliff. Taylor created a web series called Indoor Boys which was hilarious and didn’t disappoint.

Paul Rudd played the charming and annoying Ben Gilroy, who would die twice in one day and would never wake up the second time.

Ben was a proper as*hole, and the list of people who hated him became significantly huge when he entered the table read. Fart joke? Come on now; are you 12? Is this the 2000s?

He tried to connect with everyone but ended up annoying them to the last bone.

He had a superiority complex, thinking everyone was there to prop him up, and when he heard Oliver sing Loretta’s praises, he felt threatened.

In a way, he was just like Charles without the luxury of old-age cuteness.

But both were so self-centered because of their celebrity status they could sometimes be insufferable. They were too similar and would never become friends because they reminded each other of their worst traits.

The opening night was disastrous, and no one felt it more than Oliver.

It was his final shot to make a legacy for himself. Slash was an epic failure, and Only Murders in the Building Podcast was not the hit they thought it would be.

The death of the show’s main star in the same theatre as Splashe’s small splash was a bad omen.

We had heard Oliver talk so much about the failure that was Splash, so the gravity of Death Rattle’s success was not lost on us.

The episode’s twist was Ben annoyingly barging into the opening night party. Wasn’t he supposed to be dead?

His explanation for how he was not dead was rushed and glossed over. It wasn’t convincing, but the writers wanted to communicate a point quickly.

They say dead men tell no tales, but what if a dead man could resurrect for a few hours to name people who might have killed him? The scene seemed to be gunning for that, even if it wasn’t successful overall.

But it did introduce all potential suspects before Ben died for good.

It also returned the show to its original setting at the Arconia, with which our trio is quite familiar.

Before watching Only Murders In the Building Season 3 Episode 2, I theorized about who the murderer might have been.

Even without the complete picture of the events in the year leading up to opening night, there was a lot to work with.

The obvious suspect was Loretta, who clarified that she also hated Ben, and for a good reason.

She had worked tirelessly to face rejection her entire life, and when she got a chance to defeat it, Ben wanted her fired.

It was ironic that Ben did the same thing to Loretta that Charles did to him. Even if she was older than he was when it happened to him, she was still a child in the industry, and it doesn’t matter how old you are; rejection always crushes you.

I’d just done my very first table read ever, you went over to the director, told him I was a phony and got me fired. I was eight years old.

Ben

Everyone was tired of Ben, from Kimber to Cliff (actually, “the boy” was much funnier, and I wish it had continued), and Donna.

But there was someone else they had glossed over and tried to keep in the background. Howard had not been chosen for the role and was unhappy about it.

Howard: We thank you for your attention. Brief anecdote. I remember when I auditioned for Mr. Oliver Putnam for this very play.
Oliver: True.
Howard: Do you remember what you said to me, Oliver?
Oliver: I sure do, I said. How about you be my assistant instead?
Howard: That’s right. Word for word.

Whoever murdered Ben had a handkerchief, and Howard and the stage manager spotted each handkerchief at the opening night party.

Jonathan: Oh, you’re using Ben’s opening night gift?
Stage Manager: Yeah, I didn’t think I’d need it so soon.
Howard: It really is a beautiful gift.
Stage Manager: I didn’t realize assistants got one too.
Howard: And I didn’t realize stage managers wiped their noses with anything other than the bottom of their palms.
Stage Manager: You’ve got crumbs in your beard.

I figured out who Tim Kono’s killer was in Only Murders In the Building Season 1 as soon as she appeared on screen, so I trust my instincts with this.

Who do you think killed Ben, and why?

The writers give backstories to the characters throughout the season, and this one is Mabel-centric. We learned a lot about Oliver in Only Murders In the Building Season 2 and some about Oliver.

It is only befitting we learn something about Mabel and supplement the rest of Oliver’s backstory.

Ben’s death reminded Mabel of when her mom was sick, and Ben’s show was the only thing connecting them through laughter.

She went all Mabel and had a full-blown conversation with a dead guy, but of importance was that she gained a little peace.

The apartment was sold, and she will need to move out, so when I say a little peace, it is that little.

The rest of the episode was rather dull as the trio attended Ben’s funeral, only for Mabel and Charles to be kidnapped by Ben’s stalker.

This interaction helped narrow the suspect pool because there were few people with Ben’s gift, and most, if not all, were part of the cast and crew of Death Rattle.

If Greg had Ben’s handkerchief then whose handkerchief was Ben holding when he died?

Mabel

Elsewhere, Oliver’s nightmare was compounded when a reviewer hinted at having written a terrible review for the show.

I haven’t always been a fan of yours, but even your worst production sing and somehow this one just didn’t sing.

Maxine

Oliver wanted nothing more than a great show, and that dream faded daily. No wonder the man had a heart attack.

But can a heart attack keep a big ball of energy like Oliver down? He came with a twist to make the show better.

Mabel and Charles were excited about the podcast and solving this murder, but Charles was concerned the podcast would further derail his production. For the first time, the trio was at cross purpose.

Oliver: I’m gonna make it goddamnit. That’s right, folks. It’s a musical. Get ready for Death Rattle: Dazzle. What are you doing with that?
Mabel: The cops got it wrong. We think that Ben’s killer is someone in your show, which means we’re back!

I was concerned that the show would lose that killer hook, but this was a strong season premiere that promises a twist-filled story as the trio(?) tries to save Oliver’s show by uncovering the killer.

It’s still too early to tell whether it will match its predecessors, so we must wait and see. And our Only Murders In the Building reviews will dive into it all.

What did you think? Does the show still have it, or is it time to wrap it up?

Let us know in the comments section. 

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Denis Kimathi is a staff writer for TV Fanatic. He has watched more dramas and comedies than he cares to remember. Catch him on social media obsessing over [excellent] past, current, and upcoming shows or going off about the politics of representation on TV. Follow him on Twitter.

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