The second season of a hit TV series can be tricky, especially when the first was a bolt-to-the-blue sensation that deceived and delighted anyone who watched it, and ended up on every critic’s best-of-the-year list. done .
The brain behind the comedy-mystery only murders in the building (Star on Disney+), co-creators Steve Martin — who plays former TV star Charles-Hayden Savage — and John Hoffman, are all too well aware of the weight of expectations.
As a result, the first couple of episodes contain a lot of self-aware gags that reference both the premise’s inherent absurdity (multiple unrelated murders taking place in the same high-end NYC apartment building) and the threat of lightning. ,
The Archonia Building’s newest tenant, Amy Schumer—who, like last year’s guest star Sting, plays a comically exaggerated version of herself—asks Oliver Putnam (Martin Short) if he, Charles and the team’s third The member, Mabel Mora (Selena Gomez), will be making another season of the Titanic podcast.
“Well, the second seasons are tough, you know,” Oliver says, “but people keep dying, so I guess there’s always a chance.” Later, Charles noticed that the second season of the True-Crime podcast rarely worked out. “They usually move on to a new case that is never hit like the original,” he says.
There is no danger of this happening here. I’ve watched six of the 10 episodes – though for review purposes, I’ll stick to the two currently available – and only murders Every bit in his second outing is as wonderful as it was in its first.
It comes in the aftermath of last season’s cliffhanger when Mabel was found kneeling on the dead body of cranky Arconia board chairman Bunny Fogler (Jeanne Houdishel). Mabel’s clothes were soaked in blood, and a knitting needle had come out of the bunny’s chest.
Three of our heroes are taken to the police station, which provides an early highlight: an interrogation scene in which deadpan Mabel walks around the running rings of an unscrupulous, dumb-a-rock detective called Craps, by Michael Rapaport. A new character has been introduced. ,
To the displeasure of his smartest partner, Detective Williams (returning Da’Vin Joy Randolph), Kleps states that the murder weapon was a knife, not a knitting needle, and that it has yet to be found. The police have no option but to let the three go.
When photos of Mabel covered in blood go viral, her nickname is Bloody Mabel, and the smoky, nasty true-crime podcast queen Cinda Canning (Tina Fey) attacks them. Only killers in the building, They decide the only way to redeem themselves is to mount their own investigation—and of course to record a podcast about it as they go along.
This leads them down a rabbit hole that includes a hidden elevator behind Bunny’s wardrobe, secret tunnels running through the building, Bunny’s dying words, which were “fourteen” and, to Charles’ dismay, “barbarian”. And deserved an erotic painting. One million dollars, for which Charles’ late father was one of the nude models, disappears and reappears with alarming regularity.
New additions to the cast include Cara Delevingne as a shifty gallery owner who becomes a love interest for Mabel, and Shirley MacLaine, in her Shirley MacLaine-ist, as Bunny’s half-blind mother Lenora. Me, who is not as cool as she pretends to be. Either, of course, could be the killer, as could any of the three leads.
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There’s also a subplot that invites Charles to sign up for a reboot of his hit ’90s detective show Brazos. At first he is delighted, then he is crushed when he learns that the character is being reimagined as a young black woman and is being offered the lesser role of her uncle.
This season’s suspense is more elaborate—a good thing, as it gives extra room to delve into the sadness and loneliness hidden inside Charles, Oliver, and Mabel, and explore the stories of other rich-dressed residents of Arconia in greater detail. to put.
from the beginning, only murders in the building Very heartily stood out as an eclectic series.
It’s beating more happily than ever.
