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This article contains spoilers for Only Murders in the Building season 4 episode 1.
Only Murders in the Building’s fourth season premiere opens, closes, and is titled in reference to one of the best Western movies in cinema history. 1968’s Once Upon a Time in the West was directed by genre pioneer and legend Sergio Leone and starred Henry Fonda, Charles Bronson, Claudia Cardinale, and Jason Robards. The film is considered a landmark due to its incredible depth of moviemaking magic, from dense themes about loyalty to acute sights and sounds that give clues and foresight into the plot. But what does any of this have to do with Steve Martin, Selena Gomez, and Martin Short’s murder dramedy, and why did the Hulu series make One Upon a Time in the West a pivotal analogical vehicle in episode one, “Once Upon a Time in the West?”
Both stories are about a group comprised of two men and one woman trying to avenge the death of somebody close to them. In the case of Only Murders in the Building, this would be Charles (Steve Martin), Oliver (Martin Short), and Mabel (Selena Gomez) finding out that Charles’ friend and body double Sazz (Jane Lynch) is the most recent victim tacked onto the Arconia’s homicidal track record. In Leone’s classic picture, the trio is made up of the cowboys Harmonica (Charles Bronson) and Cheyenne (Jason Robards), and widow Jill McBain (Claudia Cardinale) as they track down Jill’s husband’s killer.
Unless you’re an old-school movie buff, you probably wouldn’t think about how these characters connect in any way, but the people writing the scripts for Only Murders in the Building didn’t decide to randomly pick a film to show scenes from and cross-reference throughout the episode. The similarities in both cast’s genders, backgrounds, and motives surely can provide some clues about where the story will be headed in the Hulu show during its fourth season. And why else would we watch a murder mystery if not to put on our sleuthing caps and attempt to play Sherlock Holmes ourselves as the weekly madness unfolds? Let’s take a look at a few more symmetrical corroborations between the two stories and see where our investigation takes us!
Who is the Killer in Once Upon a Time in the West?
The biggest difference between Only Murders in the Building and Once Upon a Time in the West is that the audience is privy to the culprit of the murder right away in the latter. Frank (Henry Fonda) is the person who kills Jill McBain’s husband. The rest of the story is therefore about the vengeance that McBain and her two cowboy friends try to enact in taking Frank down. In Only Murders in the Building, the protagonists don’t know who killed Sazz. In fact, the audience knows she’s dead long before the characters do. We see the murder take place at the end of the third season, and Charles, Oliver, and Mabel only find out in the closing minutes of the season four premiere.
Now that we know the difference in how the murders occur in both stories, we can look at the smaller, overlooked ties between the two. In the film, Frank tries to pin the murder of McBain’s husband on Cheyenne. In Only Murders, it appears whoever the killer is wants to pin the blame on Charles, or maybe wanted actually to kill Charles himself. Since Sazz is dressed up like Charles as his body double, and she was inside Charles’ apartment when she was murdered, she may have ended up being the accidental victim of a crime intended to take out Charles.
What is the Killer’s Motive?
The murder in Once Upon a Time in the West is actually an accident. Frank whacks Mr. McBain in his attempt to frighten him into selling a plot of land to him. He doesn’t feel guilty about the crime, but it wasn’t a premeditated kill. He was trying to get something he didn’t have though. In Only Murders in the Building, perhaps the killer wanted something that Charles possesses. If the motives of both killers are the same, we can start looking at what Charles has that others would want and who would want those things.
Charles has had a semi-successful acting career. He starred in the TV series Brazzos, built a successful second career as a podcaster, and he’s now helping Oliver on Broadway, expanding his resume and fulfilling his own acting dreams in the process. He may get teased for relying on his past and being washed up, but Charles has lived a life many performers dream of. It’s not unbelievable for someone tow want Charles’ success, or at least a specific part of it.
This leads to an early guess that Scott Bakula could be a main suspect this season. The real-life star of Quantum Leap makes a cameo at the end of the premiere where he discusses what Sazz could be up to. Sazz body doubles for Bakula as well as for Charles, and he claims he doesn’t know what she’s up to right before Charles finds out about her death. Bakula could have been coy about her whereabouts, hiding that he’s the culprit hiding in plain sight. Bakula also surely lost out on some acting jobs to Charles since their appearances are strikingly similar.
How Does Once Upon a Time in the West End?
If the mirroring between these two stories continues through the end of the season, we should take a look at how Once Upon a Time in the West concludes. Frank and Harmonica engage in a classic Western draw in which Harmonica gets his revenge and one-ups the antagonistic outlaw. Charles wouldn’t harm a fly, much less murder someone.
Charles’s version of revenge would result in getting Bakula (or whoever the murderer is) to admit to the crime before seeing them off to prison. The movie hopefully proves that Charles will be the hero of this story, but we probably didn’t need any movie references to figure that one out! As it does every season, Only Murders in the Building loves to throw curveballs and create red herrings out of thin air. It’s likely that Once Upon a Time in the West was incorporated into the first episode to get us thinking, while also directing us in the opposite direction of the truth. The twists and turns never cease to exist in this modern mystery classic!
New episodes of Only Murders in the Building season 4 premiere Tuesdays on Hulu.
The post Only Murders in the Building: Will Once Upon a Time in the West Spoil Season 4? appeared first on Den of Geek.
