YMMV / Search Party

• Broken Base:
  • Fans are somewhat mixed on the show’s ending. Is a Zombie Apocalypse a fitting way to end a ridiculous Black Comedy filled with Serial Escalation, or was it too ridiculous even for this show?
  • Season 4. Many consider it to be the show's best season, thanks to a scenario that perfectly straddles the line between being outlandish and scarily realistic, Cole Escola's masterful performance as Chip, and Alia Shawkat doing probably her best acting of the show's run. For others, however, it's when the show moved away from a quirky black comedy into something far too dark for its own good.
• Ensemble Dark Horse: All three of the attorney characters introduced in season three; Cassidy Diamond, Bob Lunch, and Polly Danzinger, have received widespread acclaim for their larger than life performances. Cassidy Diamond's popularity in particular caused her actress, the relatively unknown Shalita Grant, to gain a lot of recognition from various entertainment websites.
• Harsher in Hindsight:
  • The harassment of Julian by a political figure was not as harsh a topic in the news at the time episode was written. He found himself in trouble for publishing an article doubting Chantal's (false) tale of abuse, which put him more in the candidate's power.
  • At the end of the trial, Bob Lunch says that he doesn’t think he has much time to live. His actor Louie Anderson died just a few years later.
• He Really Can Act: Dory's Sanity Slippage-filled Protagonist Journey to Villain gives Alia Shawkat plenty of opportunities to show off her acting chops.
• Jerkass Woobie:
  • Dory throughout the first season is shown to be a selfish, thoughtless person time and time again; however, she's also shown to have a very low self-esteem, as well as being completely unappreciated by most of the people in her life. It's practically impossible not to feel for her when she realizes that her search for Chantal and murder of Keith were All for Nothing.
    • Dory assumes this role again in season 4. For all the despicable things she's done as the series progressed, no one deserves to be kidnapped, imprisoned, beaten and brainwashed.
  • Drew may be a spineless and passive-aggressive man-child and is very guilty of reprehensible behavior of his own, but it's hard not to feel sorry for him as he's forced to lie about his innocence in Keith's murder against his will, despite clearly being consumed by guilt about the entire incident.
  • Elliott is a tremendous asshole, but his sudden breakdown over the immense guilt he feels not just about his involvement in the murder but also for all the times that he's lied and cheated to get ahead is a shockingly genuine and humanizing moment for him, particularly after season 3 reveals that his entire identity is a lie. Of course, he snaps back to his old self soon after letting it all out, but it still stands as one of the few times when we see a suggestion that there's a bit more to him Beneath the Mask.
  • April is rude, standoffish, and manipulative, but is heavily implied to be a lifelong victim of poverty and abuse, and she's hardly in the wrong for feeling as though the main four need to face consequences for their actions.
• Late-Arrival Spoiler: The series takes a sharp turn at the end of season 1, so it's inevitable that viewers coming in from later seasons will have most of its twists ruined for them.
• Nightmare Fuel:
  • The closing scene of season 4: after an episode that seemed to conclusively end the series, complete with a closing shot of Dory's face mirroring the opening shot of the first episode, we abruptly cut to a close-up shot of a soot-covered, wild-eyed Dory in an ambulance manically wheezing in terror and confusion about how she had just died, seemingly directly to the audience. The sheer suddenness of it all, when combined with Alia Shawkat's disturbing acting, makes it quite the unsettling finish to the season.
  • The scene in season 5 where Dory’s disciples fall into Sanity Slippage and chemically burn their color into their faces is very disturbing.
  • The Zombie Apocalypse that occurs at the end of season 5. While humorous moments are mixed in, many of the scenes where characters have to run or hide from zombies are legitimately scary, mixed in with much more gore than the show previously had.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character: You can't help but wonder what the creators had planned for Julian had his actor's outside obligations not caused him to get Put on a Bus.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: With the amount of buildup it gets, it's a bit disappointing to see the fallout of Detective Hartman's accidental murder of Fat Frankie go nowhere in season 3, particularly in relation to Dory's trial.
• The Woobie:
  • Portia is repeatedly emotionally manipulated by the people she considers to be her closest friends into becoming an accessory to murder and is a "Well Done, Daughter!" Girl with a complex about her lack of intelligence on top of that.
  • Marc is an Extreme Doormat Love Martyr who is willing to repeatedly endure having Elliott lie to and take advantage of him for the sake of maintaining their relationship. That's why it's immensely satisfying to see him finally leave Elliott towards the end of season 3. His ultimate fate in the series finale is even sadder, as he turns into a zombie and is killed.
  • Dory's parents are seemingly totally ordinary people whose daughter has completely shut them out of her life due to finding them to be boring and sad, and only allows them back into it as a way of improving her public image during her murder trial.
• Too Bleak, Stopped Caring: All four of the main characters are varying degrees of loathsome, and much of the supporting cast somehow manages to be even worse. The series also gets increasingly dark in its subject matter as it goes on, which can be hard for some to stomach.