Let's Solve ONLY MURDERS IN THE BUILDING episode 10: 'Open and Shut' | Recap Review Explained s01e10

After 10 podcasts, now we know: Who killed Tim Kono? And we know Who killed Evelyn the cat? But do we know Who poisoned Willie the Dog? Why the police scuttled the toxicology report on Tim Kono? Why Jan tried to get suspicion away from Teddy Dimas?
Let's solve ONLY MURDERS IN THE BUILDING! check clues from Episode 10 "Open and Shut" PLUS, we look at the growing mysteries of Season 2!
In the season finale, the trio races toward a resolution while their own lives are put in danger.
Directed by
Jamie Babbit Writing Credits
Steve Martin ... (created by) &
John Hoffman ... (created by)

John Hoffman ... (written by) &
Rachel Burger ... (written by)

Madeleine George ... (story editor)
Stephen Markley ... (story editor)
Ben Philippe ... (staff writer)

Cast (in credits order)
Steve Martin ... Charles-Haden Savage
Martin Short ... Oliver Putnam
Selena Gomez ... Mabel Mora
Aaron Dominguez ... Oscar
Amy Ryan ... Jan
Vanessa Aspillaga ... Ursula
Ryan Broussard ... Will
Julian Cihi ... Tim Kono
Michael Cyril Creighton ... Howard Morris
Tina Fey ... Cinda Canning
Jackie Hoffman ... Uma Heller
Jayne Houdyshell ... Bunny
Zainab Jah ... Ndidi Idoko
Russell G. Jones ... Dr. Grover Stanley
Daniel Oreskes ... Marv
Maulik Pancholy ... Arnav
Da'Vine Joy Randolph ... Detective Williams
Ali Stroker ... Paulette
Adina Verson ... Poppy White
Jaboukie Young-White ... Sam
Jeena Yi ... Amy Huang
Anthony Ruiz ... Jose Torres
Teddy Coluca ... Lester
Orson Hong ... Grant
Maximilian Lee Piazza ... Young Tim Kono
Seth Andrew Bridges ... Cop #1

[johngoldsmith]

The bassoon cleaner/sex toy was a BRILLIANT clue to the Who!

[PluviophileTraveller]

I think with all the amazing speculations from you and the commenters I was setting the bar really high for a shock at the end; something I wouldn’t have seen coming and would have had to do tons of mental gymnastics to figure out. I was expecting something more elaborate and complex, given all the information that was slowly leaked out over the course of the season. All those unresolved questions. Now I understand that season 2 will help with this, but I still wanted more from this last episode. Still a fantastic show! Loved how they worked in the brilliant humor to the end, even in the most horrifying moments. The character writing was amazing and the chemistry between all the characters was perfect. Acting was spot-on through and through. Thanks for all your brilliant commentary. Can’t wait to follow along to your videos during season 2!

Edit...the one thing that bugs me is there was no guarantee of a season 2 when they were filming. So I’m surprised it would have ended this way.

Edit 2: I’m also selfishly happy about a season 2 because I -- cough*brag*cough--lived around the corner from the building during filming and was able to catch some of it being filmed. Including Selena crossing the street for a scene, the podcast fan club, and a person lying on the ground outside the building! I was wondering for months who this person was going to be?!? Zoe’s body double, of course! I can even see my local liquor store (Mitchells) across the street in some scenes. Ahhhh memories. :) Thankfully I only live a few blocks farther away now so will still be there catching more shenanigans...no spoilers though. :)

[valeskaedith]

I started my suspicion with Jen (The Who) went she was talking to Charles about “hating being second”. That gave me a possible why, the how was quite easy with the whole poison thing. The only thing we couldn’t get from the clues was the why now (he broke up with her, she thought he was cheating).

[outnumberedbbq]

Why was police raiding the building? Who sent the text to get out? Who has connection at NYPD? Maybe season 2 will be told from Tina Fey’s( forget character name) podcast perspective.

[valeskaedith]

About the loose ends: I think the notes on Oliver’s and Jen’s door was not Jan’s doing. Jen probably panicked when she saw the note and stabbed herself so the trio don’t suspect of her.

[chriseverblue]

the reason Jan directed them from the Dimases is cause she likes the excitement of it all, showing off how clever she was. When Charles started piecing it together she said it was "hot", she wanted to know exactly what he discovered and when and how, like it's all a big game. she kinda wanted to get caught not cause she's insane but she wants everyone to know how genius she it at this. which is a little insane too I suppose.

[charlie-obrien]

The writers and the director did a great job laying out all of the clues that were required to solve the mystery before the ending and they also did a terrific job with misdirection by making everything seem to point to the Dimases so neatly.
But they didn't spoon feed the clues. For instance the bassoon cleaner was shown very early on, but they didn't say what it was. That's not their responsibility. The poison and the gun were also connected in the first episode. The handwriting on the notes was clearly shown for comparison and Jan's mental health issues were one of the first things we learned about her.
They didn't make it easy, but it was fair and it was also entertaining as heck. If you plan on solving the mystery they've got brewing in the second season, you had better be on your toes and grab plenty of screen shots.

[Sara-qwlc]

This is becoming my new comfort watch! The writing is great and That cliffhanger 😱 I’m so excited for season 2! I want to see Mabel and Oscar more!

[mevox]

I’m not surprised Jan was the killer. However, there’s more than one actor on the stage. There’s too many loose ends which makes me believe there’s a greater force influencing the situation. Jan is the killer, but I do think someone has been “guiding” her actions (like the note on her door to make her panic). There’s many motives afoot.

[brandonhicks]

If you hop on Reddit, people had it solved by episode 8. So some people got it. To be fair though, some of the posters did say that the clues were slim and they thought it might be far fetched. I think the show gave us clues for everything they just weren’t enough to REALLY solve it

[fancycat]

It makes sense that jan would want to get caught because when charles had caught her it seemed like she was in a way getting off to it. So she finds pleasure in getting caught.

[Jillian_Paige]

Despite my mixed feelings about the uneven finale, I must say - in regard to the writing, I do like how seemingly random information hinted at our main villains…The man being interrogated in the old Brazzos clip pointed to Teddy (a man with an alibi and a street name, who was very connected to his family but had daddy issues), the podcast title “Daddy’s Little Helper” pointed to Theo, and Lucien’s explanation of mistletoe - “the very plant that encourages us to kiss at holiday time can actually kill the tree it hangs on”, “little do you know, all that romance is happening under a tree assassin” - points to Jan! :)

[jessefrancois]

Jan killer Tom because she thought he left her for another girl, poisoned Charles because he found out, but why did she want to poison the whole building ?

[FluffyroxGames]

I already talked about it on Reddit, but I'll reiterate really quickly for anyone reading the comments because I like the debate.

I'm of the mind that nothing was a red herring. I feel like every loose end was designed to play into the next mystery, so the writers could hit the ground running next season with something a bit more complex (especially now without the need to set up all the characters, locations, relationships, etc.). Obviously if this isn't the case, my opinions will change, but given that the writers had enough foresight to acknowledge this in the finale gives me confidence that they were all on purpose.

It's a little bit annoying, but I'm 99% sure all that stuff about finding the who, how, why and why now is setting up for next season's mystery. Admittedly, this is the only part of the show I have gripes with. If it hadn't have spent so much time telling us that we needed to find a motive when it was much too difficult to establish one in the first place, I think we all would've been much happier.

So yeah, I agree that no motive was a bit iffy, but only there wasn't really a motive to begin with. Jan was just serial killer who Tim made the mistake of getting involved with. I personally enjoyed having the culprit be a deranged psychopath because it's not really something you see a lot of in murder mysteries like this. Plus, trying to give clues to a motive would've either given it away too easily, or been too nuanced to figure out.

That being said, I still think it would've been possible to at least get very close to the answer with a bit of deductive reasoning. Rather than assuming that Jan broke up with Tim, we needed to use the clues on offer to figure out if it was possible for Jan and Tim to have been in a relationship, and then use what we know about those characters to figure out if there were any possible reason Jan could then break up with Tim; a point which many people actually figured out.

I don't necessarily think the show didn't want you to solve it or anything; the clues we needed (ie; the bassoon cleaner in the sex toy box (denoting a potential relationship), the insistence of Jan's hatred for being second, Tim taking trash from 6, The very obvious handwriting similarities, Tim acquiring the ring a day before his death (and how this may look from a lover's perspective, as well as the constant mention of how it was suspicious that Tim didn't have any signs of a girlfriend), and the parallels between Charles and Tim) just ended up being a lot more conceptual or less obvious than in the typical murder mystery, and it didn't help that they were mixed in with so many that aren't even relevant to the mystery at hand.

That being said, the show is a comedy first, and I dare you to tell me with a straight face that it wasn't hilarious; and episode 10 especially reminded me of this. Plus, the misdirect of having Jan be the most obvious culprit only for her to ACUTALLY be the culprit (among many other similar subversions and misdirects) was a lot of fun if you ask me.

Great channel btw, definitely checking out more!

[dan_]

Love love love this show. The drug scene with Steve Martin and Martin short reminded me of father of the bride 2 when franc gave g we ogre banks a sleeping pill then they had to go deliver the babies at the hospital.

[johnyg]

Ok i have a theory…Cinda Canning announced “only murderers in the building coming this fall” in episode 4 and was there at the finale…what if Cinda and her team are actually planning the murders they do podcasts for and thus murdered Bunny!!! I know it sounds crazy but i dont get why she would pitch a show for the fall without knowing for sure how things would unfold for the main characters in the last episode?

[pratertots]

This has been such a fun addition to this show! I was obsessed with it and needed other Arconiacs to talk about it with! I think the why of Jan killing Tim was just that she's a serial killer. This definitely wasn't her first murder and she almost did the same thing to Charles. I'm not sure it had anything to do with any of the Zoey/Oscar/Theo stuff. Tim just made the mistake of getting involved with her and breaking up with her.

[DT-gzzl]

The rings
1 the engagement ring: Who it was for!?
2 the emerald ring was Teddy's grandmother and maybe passed down to who ever they marry to. That it's why he got so upset when Zoe had it. Maybe Jan was Teddy's ex wife and the ring belonged to her at one point and she wanted back.

[gloria]

This show was brilliant in every way : the writing, the music, the comedy! Very artistic and fun!
I was in for the clues and remembered the Yard Dogs telling the guys about mistletoe being a tree assassin. Then when Jan got all kissy kissy I began to zone in on her. (If I had been a bassoon player I would have picked up on that item Oliver was twirling around

[notjoshua]

Just got to watch the last episode!
Couple of thoughts/questions. Why did Jan poison Charles before a fallout between the two? Just because he left when he found out she lied?

Also, the questions you mentioned intrigued me, who sent them a text, how did the police get there so fast, knew where to go, and the entire floor seemed already empty? Also why was Bunny wearing the podcast merch? Why did the police not check Tims phone or his autopsy report??

A final thought, what if Bunny really just stumbled into the apartment and had already been attacked? Hint to why ‘its not what you think’, Mabel didnt attack her. This would mean that the person who wanted to frame Mabel was watching her because that person knew about the needle she carried for self defense. (Oscar? Hmm) Also this person could be the person who wrote that note on Jens door to put pressure on her. (This of course only makes sense if all the scenes we see are true, so Jen beeing shocked when seeing the note really happened and is not just a scene to throw us off track) Furthermore, this might be the person who poisoned the dog and may have supplied Jen with the poison, as we don’t have an answer to where she got the poison from. This could also be the person who called in the police because they knew that they would send Bunny into Mabels apartment after attacking her. In this scenario the question remains, how did the ‘killer’ know Mabel was going to be in her apartment? Did the killer send the message to Charles and Oliver, and not Mabel, hinting towards the killer only holding a grudge against Mabel? Hmm… maybe too intricate of a theorie.. Having a lot of fun with the show and podcast though!