The Afterparty Review: Aniq, Brett, and Yasper (Season 1 Episodes 1-3)

With true crime podcasts so popular these days, murder mysteries are becoming en vogue, too. The Afterparty takes that concept and makes it a comedy with a stacked cast while dressing it up in different genres. 

A detective is on the scene of a possible murder. The victim, a celebrity and the host of the afterparty. The suspects, the party guests—all fellow classmates celebrating their high school reunion.

The stage is set for a chaotic whodunnit with unreliable narrators that have history with each other. Tiffany Haddish plays the detective who has to solve the puzzle and deal with this shifty bunch.

However, she does have an investigative technique that may shed a cinematic light on the killer: mind movies. 

Detective Danner: We’re all stars of our own movie. The same thing could happen, but you see it in a different way. And as a part of my process, I like to talk to each person. I wanna hear your story. I wanna hear your mind movie. You gather all that together then you can get at the truth.

Yes, this is a tad expositional, but it’s still a nice introduction to the format that will play out. Each episode centers around a different suspect and their version of the night’s events, presented in a film style that matches their vibe.

Detective Danner’s exposition is followed by a brief example of what is to come with Indigo’s mind movie—a pretentious arthouse flick in moody black and white. We don’t know much about Indigo at this point but it’s obvious that this is the film style to accompany her story.

The first three episodes of The Afterparty, which Apple TV+ dropped all at once, tell the story of Aniq (Sam Richardson) as the main character in a trope-filled rom-com, Brett (Ike Barinholtz) as the hero in a high-octane action film, and Yasper (Ben Schwartz) as the talented star of a musical comedy.

We are treated to parodies of these genres as their mind movies play out with scenes from the investigation interspersed throughout. The storytelling nature helps it all flow as clues and motivations are revealed.

Starting with Aniq’s romantic comedy version makes him sympathetic from the get-go, getting viewers to root for him instead of Brett. The next episode is Brett’s action-packed mind movie that doesn’t quite take the heat off him for the murder.

Brett’s night consists of bad attempts to get back with his ex and an escalating beef with the victim, complete with a literal pissing contest. Fans of The Office might find the style of Brett’s film familiar—it’s very much in the same vein as Michael Scott’s Threat Level Midnight and Brett is exactly like the Michael Scarn character. 

Perfect example: While in a fight with a big, bad security dude, Brett hits him with a skillet and says, “You got skills, but you ain’t got a skillet.” Then when he knocks him out, “Order up.”

Tell me that’s not something Scarn would say.

Now that I think about it, the next episode with Yasper has something in common with Threat Level Midnight as well: the unnecessary musical number. Although, it’s not really fair to compare “The Scarn” with the production value of “Yeah, sure, whatever.”

Schwartz makes it a pleasure to follow Yasper in the spotlight on his musical adventure, especially after his appearance in Aniq’s mind movie playing the funny and helpful sidekick role. Additionally, Schwartz’s scenes with Haddish during the retelling are fun, too—the two play off each other really well.  

The Afterparty Episode 3, “Yasper,” ends with the finger pointing toward Chelsea (Ilana Glazer). As a fan of Glazer’s, I find Chelsea to be among the more intriguing characters and am looking forward to seeing her “tense psychological thriller” version of events.

Stray Observations:

• “Y’all are some messy white folks, I’ll tell you that much.”
• “At the age of 21, Xavier went platinum with the song “X Marks the G-Spot” off his album, Somebody Xave Me” is such a repulsive sentence.
• The idea of a jungle adventure based off the game Hungry Hungry Hippos with someone like Xavier as the star is the most unappealing pitch ever.
• It can’t just be a coincidence with Ike Barinholtz’s character having a weird conversation about breast milk cheese on Brett’s episode and his brother, Jon Barinholtz as Marcus on Superstore having a whole storyline involving breast milk cheese, right?
• I mean, that’s a pretty rare topic, no?

What did you think of the first three episodes of The Afterparty? Share your thoughts in the comments below!

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New episodes of The Afterparty stream Fridays on Apple TV+.

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