On this week’s episode of Only Murders in the Building, the besties are back together as they zero in on a potential suspect ahead of next week’s season finale.
Equipped with Detective Williams’ interview footage, the Arconia gang retraces Ben’s final hours between opening night and his poisoning. It’s a doozy of a timeline as we first learn that Ben and his sewing friends crafted the hankies as apologies for his bad backstage behavior.
But from KT’s gruff welcome to Dickie’s reveal that he plans to leave Ben, nothing goes right for Death Rattle’s leading man on opening night, and it leads him to house down the poisoned cookie. But who poisoned Ben Glenroy? We might have a new leading suspect after this week’s cliffhanger.
For this week’s episode, let’s go to the CableTV.com Only Murders in the Building Suspicion Power Rankings. As always, we’re ranking characters from most to least suspicious using two metrics:
- Who killed Ben Glenroy on Only Murders in the Building?
- Did they have something to do with the murder?
Who killed Ben Glenroy on Only Murders in the Building?
#4: Tobert
Let’s start this recap with one more left-field suspect for old times’ sake. Tobert (Jesse Williams) has been on the edge of the investigation all season and chipped in occasionally, but he hasn’t been much more than a romantic interest for Mabel. But like everyone else this season, he had beef with Ben after working with him, and their relationship wasn’t improved after Ben snatched his camera on opening night.
Tobert didn’t poison Ben, and it’d be a stretch to have him be the elevator pusher, but we don’t know if his reasons for working with Mabel were entirely altruistic. Maybe he was working his own angle or trying to get his own true crime doc off the ground? Now that Death Rattle‘s cast is likely off the board, we’ll slot Tobert into the Keep An Eye On Them spot.
#3: Dickie
Poor dang Dickie. This week’s episode all but acquits Dickie, although he comes out looking more than a little worse for the wear.
Dickie admits that he tampered with Ben’s initial bloodwork, but it was to keep the press from finding out about his illegal habits. After Ben’s return from the hospital, Dickie also admitted that he took Ben’s CoBro costume out partying and shows the Arconia gang a photo that places him outside of the building at the time of the elevator push. Dickie’s likely involved in the season’s endgame, but we’re placing him outside of the main suspects.
#2: Loretta
Loretta spent most of the episode in jail, but we learned a new bit of information this week: She’d actively been encouraging Dickie to leave Ben.
Last week’s episode established that Loretta’s disdain for Ben came from her desire to help out Dickie. Her motive comes with a pretty big caveat, as killing Ben would stop Death Rattle and cause her to lose her big role. But if you’re looking for evidence in the She Pushed Ben column, Loretta mentioned to Oliver in the courtroom that she’d “gone this far already” to help out Dickie.
#1: Donna
We called it! You guys, we called it!
As Donna (Linda Emond) told Loretta last week, a mother would do anything to protect their son. In Donna’s case, this (potentially) includes poisoning her play’s leading man to protect her son from a box office flop.
Howard’s word search skills reveal that the shredded paper was a negative review from Maxine, the theater critic who panned Death Rattle and described Ben’s performance as being as wooden as a lighthouse. In the Arconia gang’s retracing, Donna shredded the negative review in the office before spotting the rat poison in the office, dusting a Schmackary’s cookie with the poison, and dropping it off in Ben’s dressing room.
But with a single episode left, we’re due for one more under-the-wire plot twist. We can safely pin the poisoning on Donna. But who pushed Ben down the elevator shaft?
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Others receiving suspicious votes
- Cliff (he couldn’t be an accomplice. . . right?)
- Kimber (out of sight, nearly off the board)
Off the board
- Jonathan (we cooked that shoe but did not eat it)
- Joy (safely single/out of sight)
- Cinda Canning (she just appeared to tempt Mabel away from the Arconia, and Tina Fey was filming A Haunting In Venice. Also, it’s wild to have Tina Fey do a regular role in a costume drama, right?)
Playbill notes
- This week’s opening credits easter eggs: The Arconia gang keeping watch atop the building and watching the interviews through an Arconia window.
- Chalk another win up for the Reddit detectives, as we learned that a cookie was on the other side of Ben’s dressing room argument. Dr. C also stands for cookie!
- We also learned why Mabel was in a wedding dress in the season trailer—Mabel reused Joy’s wedding dress so they could get downtown in time for Loretta’s arraignment. We’re also a sucker for a good/dumb callout joke, as when the Arconia gang was explaining their situation to the officer at the courthouse. (They’re the fathers of the bride, you see! Like the Father of the Bride!)
- Mabel’s anxiety dream over giving birth to a microphone and baby versions of Oliver and Charles? Pure nightmare fuel.