‘Only Murders in the Building’: Steve Martin, Martin Short and Selena Gomez Never Lose Their Great Chemistry in Crackling Fifth Season

Alci Rengifo

Going into its fifth season, Hulu’s “Only Murders in the Building” continues to have charm to spare. Fans have been lucky that circumstances have not conspired thus far to replace any of its three great leads. So, even if some cases inevitably work better than others, we still have Steve Martin, Martin Short and Selena Gomez keeping the fun alive with their chemistry. Yet, this season is better than the last one, expanding on giving the latest case a bit more emotional heft while dabbling in one of the more popular villain trends. 

This season comes back home to the Arconia, the exclusive apartment in New York’s Upper West Side that just happens to attract enough murder plots for our trio to keep a podcast going. In the aftermath of Oliver (Short) getting married to Loretta Durkin (Meryl Streep, the three sleuths make a shocking discovery when they find beloved doorman Lester (Teddy Coluca) floating dead in the Astoria fountain, the water turned crimson with his blood. Security camera footage explains nothing. However, a blurry photo of Oliver shows Lester in the background talking to Nicky Caccimelio (Bobby Cannavale), a Staten Island gangster. Caccimelio’s wife, Sofia (Téa Leoni) happens to want the podcasters’ help in finding Nicky, who is missing. Now Charles (Martin), Oliver and Mabel (Gomez) are on the case.

There is a welcoming formula to how showrunner John Hoffman, who co-created the series with Steve Martin, keeps what generally works while expanding how to refresh the formula. This season finds the main characters engaged in another rather goofy case, but they are also growing and going through life changes. Oliver is getting ready to move out of the Arconia to live with Loretta. Mabel doesn’t even live in the building anymore but keeps coming back because these two friends and the podcast are her life. Charles is feeling stuck and lonely. Everyone else seems to be moving on except him. The new case finely explores all these character developments while building the kind of puzzle fans love to decipher.

This latest mystery also carries more emotional weight. The second episode of this season is one of the show’s most poignant. It lets Lester narrate his story starting with his arrival as a young aspiring actor thinking a doorman job at the Arconia will be a temporary gig. Tony Plana is endearingly sober as the longtime doorman who trains Lester and scoffs at his dreams. Lester then becomes a witness not just to Arconia’s history, but that of the main characters. A younger Charles is seen basking in his celebrity as the star of the cop show “Brazzos,” while Oliver has absurd meltdowns and overdramatic moments during his prime as a theater director. By the time Lester has married and aged while still working at the Arconia entrance, Mabel walks in as a young woman with money but few friends. It wonderfully loops back to the gang realizing why Lester meant so much to them. He became a friend giving advice and witnessing some of their most important developments.

The rest of the season doesn’t quite measure up to the power of that episode but remains a fun time. Another theme, one so common now in TV, is how the criminals of old have been replaced by more ruthless billionaires. When the trio go see Sofia (played with excellent, straight-faced comedy by Téa Leoni), they discover the mafia is really finished. Nicky was more of a relic of a bygone era (“Even Martin Scorsese is making movies about Native Americans!”). When they discover a secret underground game room in the building, the sleuths don’t come across mobsters but a trio of billionaires which Charles’ narration informs us are the new criminals running the world. These modern elites are Sebastian “Bash” Steed (Christoph Waltz), Jay Pflug (Logan Lerman), and Camila White (Renée Zellweger). While the characters are tailored for these big names to guest, they are also chortling satirical riffs on Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg, and Martha Stewart. Zellweger in particular looks like a devilish near twin of Stewart. Beanie Feldstein also appears as Althena, a pop star with the stage name of “The.” She’s an old friend of Mable’s who talks with that veiled passive aggressiveness of someone secretly gleeful their old pal isn’t on their social level. 

As a testament to the comedic timing and crackling energy of everyone involved, this season of “Only Murders in the Building” never bores even when the case itself loses some steam. We can guess there will be some kind of sudden twist, etc. Clues are thrown around, including gruesome ones like a severed finger in cocktail shrimp. Yet, it is the people that prove much more entertaining, including Randall (Jermaine Fowler), who captures the workplace stresses of our time when a robot doorman is brought to the Arconia, threatening his job. L.E.S.T.R., as the robot is morbidly called, becomes the bane of Randall’s existence and in many ways represents the unsure new world emerging with AI. Dianne Wiest is also memorable as Lester’s grieving widow. Always completing the delights of watching this show is, of course, its main trio. This series endures because Martin, Short and Gomez seem to have endless energy in reuniting to give these characters quirky life. Even as their characters undergo personal changes, we keep wishing for another body to be found so they can go back on the prowl and take us along with them.

“Only Murders in the Building” season five begins streaming Sept. 9 with new episodes premiering Tuesdays on Hulu.