While true crime books have been hugely popular for a long time, it's really only in the last few years that the genre has become one of the most addictive things to watch on TV. In general, fans of procedural crime and murder case investigation had to make to do with fictional shows such as CSI, or feature-length movie documentaries liked those pioneered by Errol Morris. But the huge success of the Netflix production Making a Murderer in 2016 bridged both worlds. By taking the episodic format of procedural shows and applying it to a fascinating real-life murder case and trial, it created one of the year's must-see series.
Its popularity inevitably led to a flood of true crime shows and movies on Netflix. It would be a mistake to suggest that the streaming giant invented the true crime series--it obviously didn't, and some of the best offerings pre-date both Making a Murderer and the service itself. But there's little doubt that Netflix is the go-to destination for true crime TV fans, with a wealth of gripping, disturbing, fascinating, and unusual series and films hitting over the past couple of years.
As the streaming wars have heated up, other platforms have started to focus on the genre too. There are some gripping true crime documentaries on HBO, Amazon, and Hulu, and the past year, with many of us stuck at home, has only increased the demand. What it says about us as a society is a discussion for another day, but the fact remains that we can't get enough of these documentaries. And with so much out there, it's hard to know where to start, so we've chosen 18 of the most recent and very best currently available to stream.
18. Wild Wild Country
Netflix
True crime doesn't have to mean serial killers and gruesome murder. The highly acclaimed Wild Wild Country tells the story of a cult that moved into a small Oregon community in the late '80s and slowly began to take over the town. It's utterly compelling viewing that goes into some very dark and strange places but never loses a level of sympathy for those involved on all sides. It was one of the most talked about Netflix shows of 2017, so if you missed it, it's an absolute must-watch.
17. Who Killed Malcolm X?
Netflix
Sometimes a documentary can have an effect beyond simply entertaining and informing the viewer. Shortly after the extremely detailed Who Killed Malcolm X hit Netflix last year, Manhattan's district attorney announced that the case of the murdered civil right activist would be reviewed and possibly reopened, 55 years later. Malcolm X has been written and discussed at length over the decades, but this is the first time that murky circumstances surrounding his death have been fully examined, making it a must-watch for true crime fans and those interested American history.
16. Jodi Arias: An American Murder Mystery
Hulu
This three-part Hulu series looks in detail at the brutal murder of 30-year-old salesman Travis Alexander in 2008, and the following arrest and trial of his ex-girlfriend Jodi Arias. The case received widespread attention when it finally went to trial and this series goes into every salacious detail, including interviews with family members, police, and prosecutors, and examines what it was about Arias and her crimes that transfixed millions.
15. World's Most Wanted
Netflix
The title of this five-part series says it all--it's a look at the most notorious and still-at-large criminals in the world today. Each episode focuses on a different fugitive, namely cartel boss Ismael "El Mayo" Zambada, Russian mafia boss Semion Mogilevich, Rwandan genocide financeer Félicien Kabuga, Italian mobster Matteo Messina Denaro, and British jihadist Samantha Lewthwaite, aka the White Widow. As well as detailing their various crimes, the series goes into fascinating detail about the lengths these real-life villains have gone to avoid capture for many years, which range from forged passports to deep and interconnected webs of fellow criminals and corrupt lawmakers.
14. The Jinx: The Life and Deaths of Robert Durst
HBO
Robert Durst is a billionaire member of a New York real estate empire, who was the main suspect in the disappearance of his wife in 1982. The Jinx tells his story.
It was actually Durst himself who initially approached filmmakers Andrew Jarecki, Marc Smerling, and Zac Stuart-Pontier about being interviewed, and it's a fascinating example of how a true crime documentary can itself become part of the story being told. The filmmakers were subsequently accused of manipulating the truth, particularly in the much-discussed final moments of the last episode, to serve their narrative. But either way, it's a gripping story.
13. The Trials of Gabriel Fernandez
Netflix
Gabriel Fernandez was an 8-year-old Californian boy who was systematically abused and tortured by his mother and her boyfriend over the course of many months, leading to his death in 2013. As well as telling Gabriel's tragic story in powerful, non-sensationalist style, Brian Knappenberger's series shows how he was utterly failed by LA child services, who had placed him in the custody of his mother only six months earlier, despite concerns about his safety, and did nothing to remove him. It's a deeply upsetting but undeniably compelling experience.
12. How to Fix a Drug Scandal
Netflix
This four-part series explores the murky world of criminal evidence tampering, focusing on two crime drug lab chemists, Sonja Farak and Annie Dookhan. Independently of each other, Farak and Dookhan were responsible for tens of thousands of criminal cases being dismissed, and the series examines their motivations for the crimes and the repercussions it had on both themselves, the cases, and the politicians tied up in the scandal.
11. McMillions
HBO
The Emmy-nominated McMillions explores the McDonald's Monopoly promotion scam, in which the fast food chain's long-running promotional game was exploited by an employee of Simon Marketing, the company subcontracted to run it. Over the course of 14 years, millions of dollars of prizes were distributed amongst a close-knit group of people, before an anonymous tip-off led to an extensive FBI operation to bust the network. It's a hugely entertaining story of greed and its inevitable consequences, with some larger-than-life characters at the center of the scandal.
10. Making A Murderer
Streaming: Netflix
It was Making a Murderer that turned Netflix into the go-to service for true crime shows. The series reached way beyond hardcore devotees of the genre to a wider, mainstream audience and showed how the long-form binge-watching nature of Netflix could really lend itself to this type of addictive storytelling. The tale of Steven Avery, who was charged with the murder of a woman named Teresa Halbach after having already been wrongly convicted for an earlier killing, was as compelling and unpredictable as any fictional thriller. A second season was released in October 2018, which added new details to this already fascinating story.
9. The Lady and the Dale
HBO Max
Elizabeth Carmichael was the founder of the Twentieth Century Motor Car Corporation, an automobile company that hoped to change the industry in the 1970s with the launch of the Dale. This incredibly fuel-efficient three-wheeled car was the perfect, affordable solution to the fuel shortages that affected that decade and the pre-release hype for the Dale was sky-high. But Carmichael was not who she seemed, and Nick Cammilleri and Zackary Drucker's four-part series plunges the viewer into an unpredictable story of fraud, theft, FBI manhunts, and more.
8. Night Stalker: The Hunt for a Serial Killer
Netflix
Richard Ramirez was one of the most notorious and depraved serial killers of the 1980s, who committed a string of home invasions, violent murders, and sexual assaults throughout California prior to his capture in 1985. Night Stalker is a straightforward procedural documentary that explores the manhunt for Ramirez and features extensive interviews with survivors and the police who handled the investigation. But while the presentation of the documentary is familiar, the disturbing stories of Ramirez's crimes, the powerful testimonies of his surviving victims, and the toll the investigation took on the cops makes it compelling viewing for those with strong dispositions.
7. Don't F**k With Cats: Hunting an Internet Killer
Streaming: Netflix
This three-part series hit Netflix just before Christmas, but it definitely wasn't feel-good Holiday viewing. The show looked at the attempts of amateur online investigators to identify the man who, in 2010, recorded a series of horrendous animal abuse videos. It's told from the point-of-view of Deanna Thompson and John Green, two animal rights activists who met online and set about trying to track down the culprit, leading to some amazing and disturbing discoveries. It's a gripping and twist-packed series, and a must-watch for true crime fans.
6. Love Fraud
Showtime
While many true crime filmmakers set about trying to document events from a distance, sometimes many years after the events happened, the directors of Love Fraud took a different approach. Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady discovered the case of a woman who had accused her husband, Richard Scott Smith, of being a con artist who had lied about himself to ingratiate himself into her life--and, as it turns out, the lives of many other women. A warrant was out on Smith, but he had disappeared. So Ewing and Grady hired a series of private investigators and bounty hunters to track Smith down and bring him to justice, turning the hunt into a thrilling four-part series.
5. Athlete A
Netflix
The toxic world of abuse that exists within the world of gymnastics is exposed in the often harrowing film Athlete A. Directors Bonni Cohen and Jon Shenk followed the reporters from The Indianapolis Star as they investigated the abuse of young female gymnasts by doctor Larry Nassar, and the subsequent scandal that engulfed the sport's national body, which was accused of covering-up his crimes to protect the organization. While some true crime documentaries can feel padded in order to fill multiple episodes of bingeable TV, Athlete A succeeds by being a tight, focused, and gripping 104 minute film.
4. Tiger King
Netflix
Tiger King is, of course, far more than just a true crime show. In fact, the crimes themselves are ultimately a relatively small part of the bizarre story of Joe Exotic and the world of big cat breeding. But the cast of characters and the strange and dark path the show takes in telling the stories of Joe, Carole Baskin, Jeff Lowe, and others made it the biggest true crime phenomenon since Making a Murderer.
3. Atlanta's Missing and Murdered
HBO
The Netflix series Mindhunter put the spotlight back on the shocking case of the Atlanta child murders, in which at least 30 African-American children and young adults disappeared between 1979 and 1981. Only two killings were ever brought to justice, and in 2020, the case was officially reopened by Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms. HBO's series examines both the history of the scandal and the modern attempt to solve it, as well as providing a fascinating look at the racial and social tensions that affected Atlanta in the late '70s. The interviews with the friends and the families of the missing children give the show an emotional punch missing from many other true crime docs.
2. Jeffrey Epstein: Filthy Rich
Netflix
One of Netflix's highest profile recent true crime series, Jeffrey Epstein: Filthy Rich explores the rise and fall of the financier and connected sex offender. The series was announced prior to Epstein's death in August 2019, which occurred during its production, giving the whole thing an incredibly relevant immediacy. While Epstein's crimes have been widely documented since his conviction, the series allows the victims to have their voices heard for the first time, along with the former staff members and the police who pursued his arrest.
1. I'll Be Gone in the Dark
HBO
I'll Be Gone in the Dark is adapted from the bestselling true crime book of the same title, by the late Michelle McNamara. The writer spent many years investigating the crimes of the so-called Golden State Killer, who committed at least 13 murders and 50 rapes between 1973 and 1986 and remained at large. McNamara died in 2016, and the book was published posthumously two years later. HBO's TV version is a superb accompaniment to the book, that is both a gripping serial killer investigation and a moving tribute to a woman who refused to give up in her quest to find the truth. McNamara's husband Patton Oswalt is an executive producer on the series.
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