How Well Do You Know Your Neighbors?

As the title says, this review is about the first three episodes of the show. The episodes are short and there really is not too much happening in them, so I had no reason to review each one separately.

I started watching this show because I read several rave reviews. So far, it has not lived up to the hype. It is not a terrible show, I find it interesting enough, but it is definitely not great.

First of all, so far I found it to be misleadingly advertised. This is not really a crime/mystery show, because so far the crime/mystery takes a back seat to the character drama. That is not necessarily a bad thing, but I like the murder mystery to be the main part in a murder mystery show, and that is not the case here. Character interactions and back stories take up most of the time and they are just not very interesting.

This is also not a comedy, although it is labeled as such. At least it is not a good comedy. I recognize the attempts at the jokes, but they are universally failures. This third episode came closest to almost making me blow air out of my nose a bit stronger, but it was not quite successful. The first two episodes were much weaker in that regard.

And speaking earlier of the characters, we come to the absolutely, undoubtedly the worst part of the show - Selena Gomez. I have not seen her in anything else (and I will definitely not be in a hurry to do so after seeing her in this) so I don't know if she is just playing an extremely annoying character, or if this is just her personality breaking through, but she is absolutely irritating. A total of one facial expression, the "I'm too cool for this universe" attitude, grating voice, and her barely opening her mouth while she speaks and just mumbling her lines make watching her scenes a truly painful experience.

The side-swept murder mystery that we occasionally get to see glimpses of makes this just interesting enough to watch... so far. Hopefully it will get better. So far, the ratings of episodes are noticeably lower than the overall rating of the show, so I am hoping that it will improve, though this doesn't have to mean anything. For some reason, a lot of people rate a show highly, but rate individual episodes significantly lower (makes you wonder why do they like the show so much if they don't like its episodes).

Speaking of ratings, there is a concerning number of obviously fake reviews for this show. Just take notice of all the 10/10 reviews that are just one line of meaningless platitudes and obviously false praises (such as "Selena Gomez is the best actress!")

Flashback: 2005. Oliver pitches Splash! The Musical to Teddy Dimas (Nathan Lane), an investor who lives at the Arconia. Oliver tells the story of how he met his wife, Roberta. After some convincing, Teddy agrees to fund Oliver's show. Charles and Oliver work on the next episode of the podcast, arguing as usual. Ursula arrives with more Gut Milk, more information about Tim Kono, and final notice from Bunny for Oliver, telling him he has 24 hours to pay up or his power and water will be turned off. Charles has taken selfies with all the neighbors who have made complaints against Tim Kono. They need to find the man in the tie-dyed hoodie, and "Tim's fiancee," since he believes the ring in the package was for a proposal. Oliver has a "dream sequence" searching for Tim's murderer in the form of A Chorus Line-style audition. Howard becomes their lead suspect when it is revealed that Tim had threatened to kill Evelyn, Howard's cat. Oliver insists that Mabel and Charles interview Howard, giving them wire microphones to record for the podcast. All the neighbours including our three we are following are hiding their own secrets. It was nice to get to spend some time with Oliver and learning more about why he has family issues. While it was fun and hilarious to spend some more time with Howard. So far, each episode of Only Murders In The Building has been getting better and better and the comedy has been improving too. In this third episode, we see some of Oliver's failures but also the relationship with his now ex-wife. After learning about the connection between Mabel (Selena Gomez) and Tim (Julian Cihi), this episode now focuses on the other residences in The Arconia. A part of me thinks the hooded figure isn't a neighbour but someone who is either connected to the murder of one of our trio. It would be interesting if the hooded figure was someone to do with Charles as he is the one who saw them. My favourite scene of this episode is the scene where Charles and Mabel try to interrogate Howard (Michael Cyril Creighton). In this episode of Only Murders In The Building, Howard is seen as the main suspect because his cat died the same night as Tim. Howard even reveals that Tim was always upset about something and his temper had gotten worse in recent weeks.

Immediately I think all of this has to do with Oscar getting out of jail and he is upset with how things were left with Mabel. Tim also had lost his job. I found it funny that Howard thought that Tim poisoned Evelyn.

Only Murders in the Building is a cyclone of fresh air! I'm onto episode 3 and just want to watch one episode after another.... Steve Martin and Martin Short are always a great team but throw in Selina Gomez and it's pure magic....

I lost it at that line. The episodes are definitely getting better. Looking forward to next week's!

There are some awesome moustaches on two of the blokes at that dinner party.