What To Watch
These 16 Crime Dramas Are Prime Suspects for Your Next Must-Watch
They’re arrestingly good.
By Allison Picurro
March 4, 2026
These 16 Crime Dramas Are Your Next Must-Watch - Netflix Tudum
We’re all guilty (get it?) of getting sucked into a crime drama. There’s just something so riveting about theorizing as you watch a detective race to uncover the truth, without actually having to get involved in the investigation yourself.
If you’re in the mood to dig into a fascinating crime plot, there are many different takes on the genre to choose from. Whether you’re probing around inside the twisted psyche of a killer or holding your breath while a team of professionals executes the perfect heist, we’ve laid out all the clues for what you should watch next.
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Bodyguard
Richard Madden won a Golden Globe for his performance in this British series as war veteran turned bodyguard David Budd, who, after stopping a suicide bomber on a train, is assigned as security detail to Julia Montague (Keeley Hawes). Montague is a conservative politician who’s recently come under fire for backing a controversial bill, and a good amount of the show’s tension comes from her ideological clashes with Budd, who opposes her politics but is nonetheless tasked with protecting her life. Taut and thrilling, Bodyguard doesn’t romanticize political intrigue, instead shining a light on the nefarious acts governments get away with every day.
Breaking Bad
Vince Gilligan’s propulsive drama brought us one of TV’s most notorious antiheroes in Walter White (Bryan Cranston), a high school chemistry teacher who unlocks his capacity for brutality when he starts making and distributing meth. He partners with one of his former students, the lovable burnout Jesse Pinkman (Aaron Paul). Over five seasons, they descend into the dangers and horrors of the drug trade and get entangled with the cartel. Once you finish the series, you can check out its prequel, Better Call Saul, which tracks the transformation of scrappy attorney Jimmy McGill (Bob Odenkirk) into the flashy criminal lawyer Saul Goodman. If you love stories of moral decline, you can’t get much better than these two.
Collateral
With only four episodes to tell its story, Collateral, created and written by playwright David Hare, wastes no time throwing the audience right into the center of a seemingly inexplicable mystery: In London, a delivery worker is shot and killed while delivering a pizza to the ex-wife (played by Billie Piper) of a member of Parliament, in what appears to be a military-style assassination. Assigned to investigate the case is Detective Inspector Kip Glaspie (Carey Mulligan), who quickly begins to realize that the whole murder plot is part of a knotty web that involves disparate factions of the British establishment, from the military to the church. Collateral takes the time to flesh out the criminals and the cops. It employs a handful of suspenseful twists and a prescient commentary on Europe’s refugee crisis.
Griselda
Sofia Vergara transforms in the titular role of this Emmy-nominated limited series inspired by the life of crime boss Griselda Blanco. Beginning in the late ’70s and spanning into the early ’80s, Griselda maps Blanco’s journey from fleeing Medellín to keep her children safe into becoming the ruthless queenpin who was known as Godmother of Cocaine. What makes Griselda so interesting is how unglamorous it makes its central figure’s rise seem, showing how easily people can be warped by greed and the temptation of power. The drama is anchored by Vergara’s committed performance, but scene-stealing turns from Martín Rodríguez as Blanco’s hit man and Alberto Guerra as her husband help bring the world to life.
MINDHUNTER
Films like Se7en and Zodiac made David Fincher synonymous with the crime genre (see also: The Killer), and Mindhunter — which he executive produced and directed several episodes of — has his signature style over it. Set during the early days of criminal profiling in the late ’70s and early ’80s, the series spotlights the inception of the FBI’s Behavioral Science Unit. Jonathan Groff and Holt McCallany star as a duo of FBI agents who explore the minds and motives of serial killers by interviewing them, and Anna Torv plays the psychology professor who joins their team. The drama draws parallels between the interviewers and their subjects, which makes for chilling, compelling television.
Money Heist
If you’re searching for a crime series that’s a bit less grim than some of the genre’s other offerings, give the deliciously fast-paced international sensation Money Heist a try. The series follows two different bank robberies, which have been put together by an enigmatic figure known only as “Professor,” who recruits a highly skilled group of people to carry out a pair of intricate heists. A snappy blend of action and emotional drama (plus the built-in Halloween costume factor courtesy of those red jumpsuits) turned Money Heist into a fan favorite. Spin-offs include Money Heist: Korea and the upcoming Berlin, which focuses on Pedro Alonso’s titular jewel thief.
Narcos
One of the most famous drug kingpins in modern history, Pablo Escobar (played here by Wagner Moura), gets his story told in the gritty and violent Narcos. While the first season tracks Escobar’s journey as he becomes the world’s most prolific cocaine distributor, it also focuses on the urgent search for him, spearheaded by two DEA agents (played by Pedro Pascal and Boyd Holbrook) — it’s an engrossing cat-and-mouse thriller. Similarly, its spin-off series Narcos: Mexico, led by Diego Luna as the ruthless Miguel Ángel Félix Gallardo, explores the creation of the Mexican drug trade and the Guadalajara Cartel, as well as the DEA’s pursuit of Gallardo.
Ozark
Bill Dubuque and Mark Williams’ drama centers around Marty Byrde (Jason Bateman), a financial adviser who, when we meet him at the beginning of the series, has already been knee-deep in a money-laundering scheme with a drug cartel for years. After a job goes sideways and his partner is killed, Marty moves his wife (Laura Linney) and kids to Missouri’s Lake of the Ozarks region to, sure, save their lives — but mostly to launch an even bigger operation. Once there, the Byrdes become involved with the local crime scene, which includes other families and, later, the mafia. A tense thriller, Ozark is about the insatiable hunger for money and power — and the dark things people will do to maintain their status.
Peaky Blinders
Cillian Murphy stars as Thomas Shelby, the steely and ambitious boss of a crime family in 19th-century Birmingham’s criminal underworld. Across six seasons, the series traces his rise, even as new foes threaten to disrupt the family’s ascension from street gangsters to legitimate political players. With an anachronistic rock ’n’ roll soundtrack, glamorous costumes, and a host of layered performances from Murphy and the ever-expanding supporting cast — which includes Anya Taylor-Joy, Tom Hardy, and the late Helen McCrory, among many others — this slick period piece (which now has a movie on the way) is worthy of its passionate fan base.
The Sinner
Each season of The Sinner finds Detective Harry Ambrose (Bill Pullman) investigating the unlikely culprits of various crimes. Season 1 finds him trying to uncover the truth of why Cora Tannetti (Jessica Biel), a mild-mannered mother, stabbed a man to death in an apparently random act of violence, while Season 2 sends him back to his upstate New York hometown to look into the case of a young boy who claims to have poisoned his parents. Ambrose’s own deep-seated trauma helps him relate to the people he’s investigating, which subsequently helps him deduce their true motives, making for a mystery that’s less of a whodunit and more of a whydunit.
Top Boy
This British series, which just wrapped its final season, counts none other than Drake among its fans — and its executive producers. The kinetic and violent Top Boy focuses on a pair of friends (played by Ashley Walters and Kane Robinson) who make their money dealing drugs in London. They live in the Summerhouse Estate, which has been devastated by crime and is ignored by the corrupt police force, and navigate their way to the top of the hierarchy — until it becomes painfully clear that only one of them can rule over this cruel world. Between the series and its predecessor, Top Boy Summerhouse, the supporting cast includes a who’s who of British and Irish actors — Barry Keoghan, Letitia Wright, and Benedict Wong. Both shows cleverly drill home the point that sitting on a bloody throne has incredible consequences.
Unbelievable
Based on Pulitzer Prize–winning reporting by T. Christian Miller and Ken Armstrong, Unbelievable follows the police investigation into a series of rapes in Colorado and Washington between 2008 and 2011. The series uniquely explores the survivors’ perspectives and the injustices they continue to experience in the aftermath at the hands of the American judicial system. Led by outstanding performances from Toni Collette and Merritt Wever as the two detectives who set out to uncover the truth and Kaitlyn Dever as the teenage girl whose initial report was picked apart and dismissed by the cops, Unbelievable is a brutally gripping series.
Your Honor
Your Honor, which ran for two seasons from ’20–’23, was Bryan Cranston’s first starring role after Breaking Bad, playing another family man who gets in over his head when he turns to a life of crime. But unlike Walter White, Your Honor’s Michael Desiato takes no pleasure in his descent into dealings with drug cartels and mob bosses. When the series begins, Michael is a New Orleans judge whose teenage son accidentally kills another boy — who just happens to be connected to the mafia — in a hit-and-run. Desperate to protect his son, Michael helps him cover up his involvement, which has dangerous consequences for their entire family. In addition to Cranston, Your Honor’s stacked cast includes Michael Stuhlbarg, Carmen Ejogo, Margo Martindale, Isiah Whitlock Jr., and Maura Tierney.
Missing You
If you know Harlan Coben’s work, you’re familiar with his signature brand of twisty crime dramas, but if you aren’t, settle in for a ride. Missing You is based on his novel of the same name, following the mystery writer’s hit limited series adaptations, Fool Me Once and The Stranger. The drama follows Kat Donovan (Rosalind Eleazar), a detective whose entire world is turned upside down after she discovers her ex-fiancé on a dating app — over a decade after he vanished from her life without a trace. It turns out his reappearance is actually one piece of a much larger conspiracy, prompting Kat to reopen the case of her father’s unsolved murder and leading her down a dangerous path of long-concealed secrets.
The Åre Murders
In this Swedish crime drama, a ski resort town is shaken up by a pair of mysterious crimes. Based on the novels by Viveca Sten, the series focuses on Hanna (Carla Sehn), a recently suspended police officer whose plan to unwind in solitude is disrupted when a young woman goes missing. Hanna just can’t resist getting involved, and understaffing at the local police department results in Daniel (Kardo Razzazi), the town’s head investigator, reluctantly agreeing to work with her as they look into the disappearance together. The Åre Murders is as much about the investigation as it is about the troubled partnership between Hanna and Daniel, and at just five episodes, you can easily devour it in a weekend.
Dept. Q
Matthew Goode stars as a prickly, tormented cop in this enthralling procedural from The Queen’s Gambit creator Scott Frank. Set in Edinburgh, Dept. Q follows Carl Morck, a survivor of a traumatic shooting who is tasked with leading a new cold case department. The job is an insult — Morck’s boss only put him there so she can keep an eye on him, but he approaches his new responsibilities with sincerity, assembling a team of misfits who help him break open a series of unsolved crimes.
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