But Oklahoma is Still Not OK

The rise of the true crime podcast is interesting. Not the podcasts themselves (or the TV shows, or whatever other media you can think of). I don’t watch those because those kinds of things bore me (I also don’t watch documentaries because I’m here for fiction, not reality). But there is a whole culture built around true crime podcasts, people live for each new episode, each new season drop, each new crime story. It’s like the old radio shows of the past, where detectives would go off on serialized crime adventures, except with the twist that everything that’s happening in the story is real. I get the appeal of them (even if I don’t care to sample them myself).

Of course, the whole idea behind a true crime story isn’t exactly new. For as long as TV and radio have existed, there have been shows documenting crimes that actually happened. There’s money to be made by giving people tales of greed and crime and murder. Fictional procedurals are successful for the same reason, but the true crime versions let the listeners (or viewers) live vicariously through a real investigation. They can feel like they’re really there in a way that fiction does not provide. It gets the listeners into the whole moment.

It was only a matter of time, then, before we got fictional stories of true crime creators. I covered one such series, the two seasons of American Vandal, a while ago (and if you haven’t seen that series you really should because it was brilliant). And now, finally, I’m catching up on Only Murders in the Building, another series tackling true crime stories from a fictional angle, but this time following the creators of the podcast as they find the investigation first hand for themselves. It’s an engaging way to tackle the subject matter, and it gets you invested more deeply, I feel, than if this was just another true crime cast.

The series focuses on three tenants of the Arconia, an Upper West Side apartment building in New York City. The three – one-time actor Charles-Haden Savage (Steve Martin), who formerly played TV detective Brazzos; Oliver Putnam (Martin Short), a Broadway producer who went bankrupt over the launch of the disastrous Splash: The Musical; and Mabel Mora (Selena Gomez), a younger woman fixing up her Aunt's apartment in the building – end up meeting each other on an elevator at the apartment building and then, later, meeting again when the fire alarm goes off, clearing the building. They’re all fans of the true crime podcast All Is Not OK in Oklahoma and they find themselves hashing out details and going over the latest episode of the podcast over dinner.

When they get back to their building, though, they discover that it wasn’t a fire but a murder that occurred in the building. Being the lovers of true crime podcasts that they are, the three come to the conclusion (at Oliver’s urging) that they could do their own podcast documenting the murder that just happened. Thus, they begin sneaking around the building, spying on their neighbors, and getting involved in the details of the actual investigation (which the police initially decide was a suicide). And as the clues come about, it becomes increasingly clear that there is far more to this case (and how the characters are related to it) than any of them could have imagined.

As the cast should indicate, Only Murders in the Building is a comedy series. You have two absolute comedy legends, Steve Martin and Martin Short, who have been friends and acting partners for decades (I actually reviewed one of their comedy specials a little while back). They’re joined by a murderer’s row (some pun intended) of other top-flight actors including Amy Ryan, Da'Vine Joy Randolph, Nathan Lane, and Tina Fey. The comedy chops for this cast require absolutely no further explanation. It’s just a damn funny cast.

In fact, the one actor that stood out to me is Selina Gomez. Her inclusion seemed odd to me since she’s not someone I would have thought of as a comedic actor. That, naturally, shows that I haven’t watched the movies and shows she’s been in (The Wizards of Waverly Place, Hotel Transylvania), and that’s due to my age and general distaste for “kids programming”. My knowledge of Gomez extends to the fact that she’s a pop star and had one scene in The Big Short, and she was fine there. And, frankly, she’s fine here.

At least in this first season, Gomez is a bit of a weak link for me. She has decent comedic timing, don’t get me wrong, playing a character that is pure snark. My issue is that her performance, outside of some well placed one-liners, doesn’t feel as strong or nuanced as the other leads. She has a strange, almost muzzled delivery for all her lines, almost like she’s a new kid that just got braces and the rubber bands connecting the top and bottom bits of dental work are keeping her from opening her mouth. I don’t understand the affectation she puts on, and it keeps her character from feeling like she really gets the emotions of the moment.

I don’t mind this so much, though, because Martin and Short sell the hell out of their characters and their story. Martin Short is the more over the top and expressive of the two actors, as he always is, and he plays a flamboyantly fantastic character here, letting Oliver be a drama queen in all the best ways. Martin, meanwhile, gives a solid, straight-man performance, delivering laughs through deadpan line delivery (and the occasional bit of pratfall hijinx). They’re a comedy duo that has worked for years and years and you can see why in every scene they have together.

Meanwhile, the actual mystery is a mixed bag. On the one hand it is filled with a number of solid red herrings to keep the characters, and the audience, guessing. A good mystery should have twists and turns and you shouldn’t immediately be able to guess the killer from the beginning. At the same time, there are a couple of very early clues that, if you’re paying attention, give up the whole game. I won’t spoil what those were, mind you, but they’re pretty obvious if you look into them, and it keeps the mystery from gelling together fully. It’s the kind of clues that, should you want to go back and watch again, would keep the case from being interesting or involving on a second run.

But maybe that doesn’t matter as much. By grace of this being a comedy, this first season doesn’t just have to rely on its mystery alone. It can be funny and intriguing and even when the intrigue doesn’t always hold up the comedy still shines through. It’s hard to hate anything that features Steve Martin and Martin Short working at the top of their game. There’s enough humor to paper over other gaps in this first season, and it’s easy to see how everything, from the mystery to the laughs to the characters, can only get better from here.

This first season of Only Murders in the Building may not be a perfect season of television, but it does far more right than it gets wrong. It’s a solid ten episodes of story and laughs that sets down a great foundation for what’s to come in the series. That alone makes it work sticking around for these episodes and beyond.