Only Murders In the Building Season 1 Episode 8 Review: Fan Fiction

It’s all coming together.

Only Murders In the Building Season 1 Episode 8 feels like the endgame —  but not so fast! Something doesn’t quite add up. 

Get yourself some dip and pizza rolls, because we’re deep-diving here, Arconiacs!

It’s fair to say this show has achieved self-awareness.

Look at how the Arconiacs mirrors Charles, Oliver, and Mabel. As recently as Only Murders In The Building Season 1 Episode 4, they were fawning over Cinda Canning’s podcast “All Is Not OK In Oklahoma.” 

Fandom is a strange beast. If you’re here reading this review, it’s safe to say you’re a fan of the show. Thanks to the internet and social media, it’s easy to connect with other fans — obsessing over little details, questioning motives, embracing red herrings.

The title of the episode is “Fan Fiction.” One of the most popular types of fan fiction is the “self-insert” genre, where a fan writes themselves into the story so they can interact with their favorite characters.

This is our self-insert episode.

Let’s face it, the Arconiacs are us. Not every show is audacious enough to poke fun at its fans while simultaneously paying tribute to them, but we love it, so we’re here for it. 

By giving the episode’s voiceover narration to Sam (Jaboukie Young-White), it’s almost as though we’re in the story. Our theories carry weight after all and our critiques are validated. The way Paulette (Ali Stroker) rolls her eyes at the Sting cameo — let’s face it, that was pretty real!

It’s a nice wink to the audience, letting us know you can still be a fan of something even if you’re critical of it from time to time.  

Meta comedy isn’t necessarily funny for its own sake, but this show has always leaned into it instead of shying away. It’s a huge part of the appeal. 

Enough about us though, let’s get to what actually happened in the episode!

Nathan Lane does dark and sinister so well! It’s genuinely unsettling watching him play against type. Who knew he had it in him? 

For a long time, I felt ashamed to have a deaf son. It ended my marriage, actually. That and, you know, all the whores.

Teddy

He’s still wickedly funny, but the tone has changed. He’s a monster. At least he loves his son. 

The inclusion of Jan in the investigation is clearly useful, but Oliver and Mabel are strangely at odds with her. Are they still on edge from their traumatic encounter with the Dimases? Are they jealous that she’s going to take Charles away from them?

“Brazzos” was our safe word.

Jan

They just seemed unnecessarily rude. It’s understandable they want to remain focused on getting the podcast out before it’s too late, but tunnel vision is never good in a case like this. Even as the Arconiacs pointed out, they shoudn’t have only one suspect. 

The Dimases are guilty of grave-robbing and Zoe’s death. They are no longer a danger to the trio. But there is still a murderer somewhere in the building — and now Jan has been threatened and attacked. 

Winnie was poisoned. Tim was poisoned. In the final shot, Jan is bleeding from a wound, but the M.O. of the “warning” note and the unlocked apartment door suggests a similarity there. 

Tim’s killer has to be someone who knows the ins and out of the Arconi — someone IN THE BUILDING. If not a resident, perhaps a staff member?

You’ll make the right choice. Because if you don’t, well, I know where you live.

Teddy

During the many discussions that go on in Oliver’s apartment, there were cases of Gut Milk everywhere. The idea of poisoning gave me a “gut” feeling — could Ursula be behind it all?

As I said to Paula Abdul during our production of Hedda Gabler, we’ve got to start thinking outside the box here.

Oliver

We haven’t seen the building manager in a while, but we know she disliked Tim and is not a huge fan of Charles, either. Evelyn the cat was poisoned, too — she was in Tim’s apartment the night he died. Cats are known to like milk.

It might be a stretch, but Jan wouldn’t keep bringing up Howard and his dead cat for nothing — who’s to say this isn’t a crumb left for the audience from the writers?

There’s just no way the murderer could be a new character that we haven’t met yet. That would be an unsatisfying conclusion

This series has proven to be so clever and well-thought-out that the clues have already been dropped for us — we just have to find and decipher them!

Could it be a team effort? Oscar has been around more, though his father hasn’t, so maybe Mr. Torres and possibly Lester the doorman are in cahoots with Ursula?

It’s not impossible, but it also feels like grasping at straws.

That being said, the Theo theory felt like a shot in the dark and that yielded results, so stranger things have happened! 

We’ll find out soon enough!

Steve Martin and Jack Hoffman couldn’t have known the way the fandom of this show would take off as it did — we’re an enthusiastic, weird, thinky bunch.

With this episode, the commentary comes back to the theme that’s been present since the beginning — the shared love of some kind of media, be it a podcast or a television show, can bring together people that might never have connected otherwise. 

As Charles states, it’s a community. In one room, we have Charles, Mabel, Jan, Oliver, Oscar, Sam, Marv, and Paulette working together on something that they all care passionately about. Also present in spirit, we have Detective Williams, Grant (the fourth Arconiac), and, of course, Tim Kono. 

Unfortunately everyone seemed to forget about Detective Williams’s toxicology report until she gets it back. 

Detective Wiliams: Aw, shit. Fuck. Fuck, man.
Oliver: Is that a good shit fuck fuck?

There is also Grant’s astute (belated) observation that the Dimas theory was always shaky since Teddy was the podcast’s major sponsor. Grant would have undoubtedly sided with Jan had he not gone to his piano lesson. 

There are only two more episodes of Season 1! The endgame is upon us. It will be fascinating to see how everything wraps up and ties together. Who will be our final two narrators? 

Luckily, there will be a Season 2. What they might do for a plot remains to be seen, because it feels like the characters and the building are so intrinsic to this particular mystery. It might go in a “whole new direction.” But we’ll have to see how it shakes down with Tim Kono first.

 

It’s money time, baby. Payday is here and check is in the mail.

Charles

Are you a Mabellline, a Haden-Maiden, or a Put-Nut? Or might you be one of those fringe outliers — a Jan-Fan?

Share your thoughts in the comments!

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Mary Littlejohn is a staff writer for TV Fanatic. Follow her on Twitter.