Only Murders in the Building Episode 5 appropriately titled “Twist,” is full of surprises as the crew heads out of the city to Long Island, hoping for answers to all of their lingering questions.
At the end of last week’s episode, Steve Martin’s Charles and Martin Short’s Oliver learn about Mabel Mora’s (Selena Gomez, Hotel Transylvania) connection to Tim Kono, as well as the pair’s collective group of friends, known as the Hardy Boys.
That sets the stage for this episode where Mabel drives off with “Tie-Dye Guy,” whom we discover to be Oscar (Aaron Dominguez, Shaft), who was recently released from prison and is the only other member of the Hardy Boys who is still alive. Charles and Oliver see her leave with him and decide to follow her, both for different reasons.
Charles is worried about her safety and Oliver is hot on the murderer’s trail, theorizing that Mabel was involved with the murder due to her connection to Tim. This dichotomy between them serves for an interesting back-and-forth between the characters and reveals a lot about both Charles and Oliver. Charles wants to believe Mabel, considering she got him to trust others again, whereas Oliver is absorbed with the podcast, constantly whipping out the mic to capture anything that may be of value to the listeners.
Still, Charles reluctantly begins to believe Oliver as Mabel and Oscar get further from the city and closer to the address Mabel found in Tim’s apartment. After all, Mabel did say that Tie-Dye Guy was irrelevant to the investigation, and her involvement with solving the case could be a cover. Though this sounds plausible the more that Charles thinks about it, he’s still unsure, even when they call Mabel and she lies to them about her whereabouts. However, she isn’t the only one keeping something. Oscar tells Mabel he went up the stairs the day Tim died because he was looking for her, but really he was set on finding Tim.
We find out about this when Mabel and Oscar reach their location. Mabel thought they were headed to New Jersey, but Oscar makes her see the note that was in Tim’s place in a whole new light. It’s actually about where the four Hardy Boys got their matching tattoos: the tattoo shop where Mabel’s cousin works.
Meanwhile, Charles and Oliver are having an adventure of their own, following Mabel and Oscar in an old car on the verge of breaking down (one that Oliver has named “Aphrodite”). They wind up at a gas station behind Mabel and Oscar – who are all giggles, BTW – with two men, played by Jacob Ming-Trent (The Possession of Hannah Grace) and Roy Wood Jr. (The Daily Show). It turns out they have their own wildly successful podcast about plants and know Cinda Canning very well, which is yet another one of this episode’s little twists. They help Charles and Oliver trail Mabel for the rest of the journey.
They all eventually reach the tattoo shop, and we find out that Oscar really just wants to move on from this case. He and Mabel have unspoken words between them and clearly see themselves being together, something that is obvious from the moment we see them interact. But he just wants to live a normal life now that he’s out of prison for a crime he didn’t commit and it doesn’t start with him investigating Tim Kono’s murder. Mabel, on the other hand, knows she has to do this and find out who killed her late friend.
This is where they part ways, and where Mabel reunites with Charles and Oliver, who confronts her about her lies. Of course, Oliver’s recording for the podcast as Mabel tells them the truth and defends her innocence. Midway, Oscar comes back into the shop, this time with ice cream, saying he just wants to be with Mabel, regardless of anything else in his life. Sweet.
Here, he reveals that though he went to see Tim the night of the murder, he never actually did because he heard a gunshot from behind Tim’s door and immediately left. This seems to add up, but yet another twist comes right after, from Mabel’s cousin Tavo (Esteban Benito, One Life to Live). He tells them that Tim was trying to take down a black market jewelry thief before he died. This is another “wait…wtf?” moment for the audience, but it actually makes a lot of sense, considering all the jewelry Mabel found stashed in Tim’s apartment.
This is the final twist of Only Murders in the Building Episode 5 that rounds out this whirlwind of an episode. It seems like just when we begin to figure out what’s going on, this show switches directions and adds another layer to Tim’s life and everyone in it. We’ll have to wait and see what next week holds – and if Oscar will join the group and their mystery-solving antics – but one thing’s for sure, this is going to be one hell of a podcast.
Only Murders in the Building Episode 5, ‘Twist’ is now streaming on Hulu.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-V1rQdXXXyI&t=1s
