TV Recap: “Only Murders in the Building” Season 2, Episode 8 – “Hello, Darkness”

This episode of Only Murders in the Building is brought to you by Gut Milk. “It’s medicinal, nutritional, and lightly alcoholic.” Now enjoy this recap of Season 2, Episode 8, titled “Hello, Darkness.”

The podcast’s biggest fans all happen to be eating at The Pickle Diner at the same time as Charles-Haden Savage (Steve Martin) and Oliver Putnam (Martin Short) before the blackout starts. The episode’s narration comes from Marv (Daniel Oreskes), who talks about headlines as Paulette (Ali Stroker) and Sam (Jaboukie Young-White) express their disappointment with this season and the lack of progress the hosts are making on the case. Marv watches as Mabel Mora (Selena Gomez) enters the diner and greets Charles and Oliver with a group hug. As Marv’s narration continues, he rambles about “The 6th Avenue Strangler,” a murderer who was never caught from the aughts who didn’t limit his victims to just 6th Avenue. When the power goes out, everyone questions how widespread it is until the waiter, Ivan (Ariel Shafir), announces that it’s affecting the entire tri-state area. Oliver is able to see that he has an email with his DNA test results, but the cellular networks are jammed so he can’t get it to open. The trio gets up to go protect Lucy, and Ivan offers Oliver all of the dips from the fridge, which will go bad without power. It’s an offer he can’t refuse.

The lobby of The Arconia is full of concerned residents, with some not wanting to accept the fact that without power, the elevators won’t work. Ursula (Vanessa Aspillaga) tries to calm everyone down by offering them a free bottle of Gut Milk, saying she will need cash for additional bottles. Bellman Lester (Teddy Coluca) answers the phone when Nina Lin (Christine Ko) calls down, demanding that he bring up her packages right away. He’s old and it will take him a while to climb the stairs. Nina apparently threatens to replace his job with a drone that could do it faster.

Charles, Oliver, and Mabel have reached the 4th floor of The Arconia via the stairs, and Oliver has had enough. He blames his knees, saying he just had them done, and he and Charles start to banter about their surgeries when Mabel tries to get them back on the task of getting to Lucy. She tells Oliver to leave the dips behind as they are weighing him down. Oliver sets them on a step, promising to come back for them.

In the lobby, Howard Morris (Michael Cyril Creighton) was chatting with Dr. Grover Stanley (Russell G. Jones) about a man who is subletting an apartment on his floor. Howard has a crush on him, and Grover suggests that he pretend to be out of batteries for his flashlight to set up a meet-cute. Later, we see Howard trying to feed his new cat, Sevelen, who won’t eat unless her food is warmed up. He decides to try Grover’s suggestion and grabs his flashlight, but when he opens his door, the man from the lobby (Jason Veasey) is standing outside it preparing to knock. He legitimately came to ask for batteries, so Howard offers him a candle instead, inviting him into his apartment.

While all of this was going on, Lucy (Zoe Margaret Colletti) has been waiting in Charles’ apartment. With the cellular lines jammed, she’s been unable to get a text to send to him. She becomes frightened when someone begins to jiggle the doorknob. She calls out to ask if it’s Charles, but whoever it is doesn’t answer. Suddenly the door bursts open and the intruder drops a crowbar on the ground. They’re covered from head to toe and holding a flashlight. Lucy races to the bathroom and opens the door to the crawlspace. The intruder follows her.

Charles, Oliver, and Mabel have reached the 11th floor and have just two more to go to get to Charles’ apartment. Oliver needs to be dragged the last two flights, but what they see in the hallway doesn’t calm their nerves. The door to Charles’ apartment is open, a crowbar lies on the ground. Mabel races to the bathroom, and they realize that she was pursued into the crawlspace. “We have to go in after her,” Charles exclaims.

Howard sits on his couch with his new neighbor, who asks if Howard is the voice he always hears singing down the hall. Howard tells him that he’s in “Yodelshop,” which is like a barbershop quartet but with yodeling. It turns out the man he has a crush on is a professional Broadway performer, currently playing a hyena in The Lion King on Broadway. When he mentions that he sometimes thinks about quitting, Howard asks what else he would do and is shocked when the man says he wants to be a children’s librarian. Howard tells him that he’s a librarian, causing the man to exclaim “Shut up.” Howard’s response: “That’s our slogan.”

Lester finally makes it to Nina’s apartment, out of breath holding a big package. He asks if he can come in to rest for a bit and Nina reluctantly lets him in. A short while later, we see that he has set up a bassinet for Nina’s baby, which is what she needed so badly (the baby has been crying this whole time). He tells Nina that he’s proud of his job and enjoys helping people, noticing all of the paperwork for the construction plans to upgrade The Arconia. They get to talking about Bunny and Nina asks Lester if he has any idea who killed her. He says he fears that he let whoever it was into the building that night. “I just hope it’s not some psycho whose got a thing against board presidents,” Nina says.

Lucy is pursued down a ladder in the crawlspace, using her knowledge of the tunnels to hide behind a pipe. Her pursuer goes the other way. Charles, Oliver, and Mabel stumble around looking for Lucy, but they reach a dead end and realize they don’t even know what floor they’re on anymore.

Howard’s unintentional date brings up that he heard Howard singing “Sound of Silence” by Simon & Garfunkel the other night and asks if he will sing it again. Howard agrees as long as they sing it together, with Howard replacing the lyrics with yodels. Their singing can be heard down in the lobby, where Ursula leads everyone into singing along. The song reaches Oliver’s ears, who begins belting to it until Mabel tells him to be quiet or he’ll lead the killer right to them. In Nina’s apartment, we see that the music has made the baby stop crying. As the song comes to an end, we see Howard’s date sneeze. He asks Howard if he has a pet and when Howard mentions Sevelen, he reveals that he’s “Lethally allergic to cats.” He thanks Howard for the company and leaves.

Lucy finds Charles, Oliver, and Mabel in the crawlspace and tells them that the person who followed her is the same one she saw the night Bunny was murdered. Charles is upset as he learns for the first time that Lucy was in the building that night and that she may have seen the murderer. When pressed for more details about the person, Lucy recalls that they wore a ski mask and a jumpsuit and they never said anything, but they did sneeze. A flashlight suddenly shines in their direction from a figure covered from head to toe. They run, with Lucy leading them out of the crawlspace. They get to the stairs and start to head down to the lobby, with the pursuant hot on their trail.

When they reach the 4th floor, Mabel grabs the bag of dips and carries them to the bottom of the stairs. She ducks under the banister and uses the heavy bag to knock the assailant down. They’re wearing a blue suit and a gas mask. The power suddenly comes back on. Mabel peels the mask away. It’s Marv!

Up in Nina’s apartment, Lester sees the designs for the updated Arconia when the lights come back up. “Wow, that’s more than a bit of stonework,” he shares. Lester offers to take Nina’s mail downstairs with him. She’s had a change of heart about his future at the apartment, offering to make him the “Director of Resident Support.”

Howard walks to his neighbor's door, neurotically rubbing a lint roller around his sweater. He knocks, and his date opens up. Howard asks if he would consider dating him if he were to send Sevelen to live with his colleague and had his apartment deep cleaned. The man suggests that they go on a date right now, asking Howard not to get rid of his cat.

Marv explains himself to the hosts of his favorite podcast, saying that he was so worried that the 6th Avenue Strangler was coming for Lucy that he went to try and protect her. When asked about his attire, he says he’s a mold inspector so he put on his suit assuming he would be going into the crawlspace. Lucy announces that Marv isn’t the person who broke into Charles’ apartment and chased after her. Marv says he was hoping he could help out and end up on the podcast again, hoping it would make his daughter proud. Lucy believes Marv scared the killer off her trail and thus saved her. Oliver offers to interview Marv tomorrow for the show, justifying the decision to Charles and Mabel by saying “We’re low on quality content this season.” They head into the busy lobby together.

Shortly after, Lucy is off talking to someone, and when they turn around, Mabel is surprised to see Detective Kreps (Michael Rapaport). “I was just in the neighborhood, just making sure you guys weren’t up to any of your shenanigans,” he tells Mabel. “You’ve gotta be careful out there. Especially in the dark.” Everyone else leaves except for Mabel, who questions why Kreps would be in the neighborhood, suggesting he’s not an Upper West Side kind of guy. Kreps asks Mabel if she’s interested in him, saying he’s interested in her, especially after seeing the video of her stabbing someone on the subway, which he could arrest her for. Howard moves through the lobby with his date, accidentally bumping into Detective Kreps’ left shoulder on his way out. Kreps reacts in pain, holding his left shoulder and telling Mabel it’s sensitive because he got a new tattoo. But when Kreps turns his head, Mabel notices something behind his right ear… red glitter! “Have a good night, Mabel,” Kreps says as he heads for the exit. “You too, Detective Kreps,” Mabel responds, sounding stunned. “It’s nice to have the light back again.”

As the credits start to roll, one of the icons we see is the chicken sticker from the backpack Mabel took at Coney Island in the previous episodes. Why isn’t Howard’s date ever given a name, and is it purely coincidental that both he and the alleged killer sneezed? Did Detective Kreps really get a tattoo, or is his arm sore from having a locker door bashed into him? Is the glitter from Oliver’s glitter bomb, or somewhere else? Perhaps we’ll find out on August 16th when the penultimate episode of Season 2 begins streaming on Hulu, titled “Sparring Partners.” Here’s the official episode description.

Closing in on the killer, Mabel takes her investigative talents into the ring. Oliver and Charles duke it out over a birdcage only to end up confronting their deepest paternal struggles.