Season 1 (8/10)
In The Afterparty, a murder is committed after a high school reunion and a cop tries to solve the case by listening to each suspects story, episode by episode.
The cop, Tiffany Haddish, is hilarious as usual, as is the rest of the cast. The episodes are each done in a particularly genre - action, musical, cartoon - based on the personality of the suspect. Through it all, main suspect and mystery-room designer Aniq tries to find the real killer and woo the girl he should have dated in high school.
This is all really funny, and the series does a nice job of character development, as the initial cartoonish characters are proven to have more depth than is at first apparent (at least in some cases).
The weakest aspect of this is the genre thing, which feels very half-assed. While a couple of episodes fully commit - the musical and the cartoon - for the most part all episodes are filmed in the same style with minor adjustments for the genre (a guy kinda slides along his car hood in the action episode, the high school episode has people a little extra angsty.
Tiffany also gets a flashback of her own and it's the worst episode in the series. It's not funny or necessary and feels like they just ran out of ideas for all the episodes. But all the rest is really good.
It would have been great if they had really done it up, with distinct film styles for each episode, but it's still very funny, the characters are generally likable (except the ones who aren't supposed to be), and the mystery keeps you guess and has a persuasive finale.
I loved this and binge-watched it. It's no "Only Murders in the Building" but it's still a great comedy mystery for fans of that genre.
Season 2 (7/10)
The second season followed, and in places even improved on its formula. Unfortunately, it was much more hit and miss.
Once again each episode is mainly told as a take-off of a particular genre. While the first season half-assed this concept, this time they really commit to creating something that has the look and feel of whatever they're going for. At its best, this results in a hilarious, dead-on Wes Anderson take-off and a turgid melodrama.
But for the most part the comedy is weaker. The worst episode, as was true of the first season, is the one built around Danner, but this time it's really horrendous. A lot of the other episodes are just so-so, like one featuring Ulysses, which was a big disappointment because John Cho did such a great job with the character.
The cast is solid, especially Cho and Elizabeth Perkins, and the mystery is intriguing, even if I didn't love the denoument.
Not a must-see like season 1, but still very fun.
