Karl Puschmann: Solve the crime or die laughing in Murderville

Will Arnett as Senior Detective Terry Seattle in Netflix's Murderville.

There's nothing elementary about solving a murder. I should know. I've tried.

It did not go well. I'd been presented all the facts. I'd seen the crime scene. Suspects had been interviewed. Motives had been examined. But when it was time to solve the case and name the murderer I had to admit that despite a number of leads I simply had no clue.

I'd been watching the Netflix series Murderville. Well, I say "watching" but really I'd been a passive participant. The show is an unlikely mix of whodunnit murder-mystery and semi-scripted improv comedy which, yes, sounds awful on paper but is a lot of fun in practice.

How it works is that each episode encourages you to act like an armchair Thomas Magnum or Miss Marple by presenting a gruesome murder along with all the facts, clues and leads necessary to stroke your chin and puzzle out who did it.

You'll need to put all the pieces together to solve the crime in Murderville.

Fortunately for those who may be watching along with you there's no call to participate in any of the show's improvisational comedy. Unlike solving a brutal murder it's best to leave the jokes to the professionals.

Of which there's a bunch. That's because each episode tasks a different celeb guest to solve its murder, we're talking people like actress Sharon Stone, comedian-turned-movie star Kumail Nanjiani and comic actor Ken Jeong.

In the fictional world of Murderville they all star as themselves with the hook being that they are trainee detectives working alongside grizzled senior detective Terry Seattle. The twist is that they have no idea of what's going on, what's about to happen or - crucially - who done it.

Will Arnett as Terry Seattle and comic actor Ken Jeong in Murderville.

Seattle is played by comic actor Will Arnett as your classic grump of a TV detective, complete with bad suits, a bushy moustache, gruff manner, inappropriately flashy vehicle and a lingering grief over the loss of a former partner who died 15 years ago but whose desk opposite his he hasn't allowed to be touched out of respect.

"Everything is the same," he says proudly to his first new partner, the former late-night chat show host Conan O'Brien. "Her case notes, uneaten breakfast burrito, pet rabbit Gulliver ..."

Pointing at a small cage with nothing but rabbit bones inside he says, "God, I miss that little guy."

"You know you can feed those things even after the owner's gone?" O'Brien replies, looking puzzled.

"That would not be respectful to touch it," Seattle grunts back. "Disrespectful."

Will Arnett as Terry Seattle and trainee detective Conan O'Brien in Murderville.

That's the sort of absurdist humour you can expect from the show. Sometimes it's by design, such as that scripted set-up of a mouldy burrito and a dead rabbit for Arnett to befuddle his guest with, and sometimes it's by the magical alchemy that is improvisational comedy.

The show's filled with little comedy moments as the guest tries to solve the mystery while Arnett does his best to throw them off with absurd interjections and ridiculous reactions. During an interrogation of a magician suspect his simple sleight of hand tricks literally blow Arnett's detective out of his seat in amazement.

"Sorcery!" he yells from the floor in wide-eyed amazement, as O'Brien laughs uncontrollably at his crazed reaction.

"Come on," he says between laughs, "no one gets that excited about a card trick."

Josh Banday as Dr. Will Gonzalez, Will Arnett as Terry Seattle and Sharon Stone as herself in Murderville.

Part of the fun of the show is that they've embraced the loose improv vibe and haven't tried to gloss over or hide any of the participants corpsing - the term given for when an actor can't stop laughing during a scene. Even though Arnett's Detective Seattle is the driving force of the series and he knows the scripts he's constantly caught cracking up at either an unexpected aside from his guest or his own disruptive, goofy mischief.

About the only thing the show does take seriously is its murder. Everything you need to solve the case is right in front of you, as long as you pay enough attention to what people say, how they act and what they do instead of getting caught up in Arnett's buffoonery.

Kumail Nanjiani joins Will Arnett to crack the case in Murderville.

Before the murderer is revealed the guest has to say who they have deduced to be the killer, give a reason and cite evidence supporting their suspicions.

This part of the show is really fun as their theories either match up with or miss your own conclusions. And like all the best murder-mystery shows Murderville has the obligatory flashbacks through all the breadcrumbs it's been dropping along the way. If you're anything as competent a detective as me you'll find plenty of facepalm moments that you missed ...

"Well, you did it," Arnett says, congratulating one of his more astute guests. "You solved the case, even though your logic was crazy and nonsensical."

Perhaps, but then again so was the murderer's eventual motive.

"I only murdered her," they say as they're led away in cuffs, "because I wanted her dead."