Television series
Conviction
Other titles called Conviction: the 2010 film.
A defense attorney takes the case that could make her career — an arson-murder trial with a wealthy husband as the accused — only to find herself blackmailed into breaking every rule she's built her reputation on. Elisabeth Moss plays cool, coiled competence curdling into desperation. This is a show about what happens when the person paid to defend the truth can't afford to tell it herself.
Should you watch it?
Watch it if you enjoy legal thrillers where a lawyer's moral compromises drive the plot, and a slow blackmail squeeze turns a courtroom case into a personal reckoning.
Skip it if you want something already made to binge tonight, since this is still in development and nothing has aired to judge yet.
What it asks of you: Plan on a dread-heavy pace, with courtroom procedure and private unease pulling in equal measure, and your attention kept on Neve's choices rather than on easy answers.
Not sure? Find tonight's pick in a minute.
If you liked this
Damages2007
Glenn Close is terrifying as a litigator who treats ethics as a negotiable line item, and the show's spiraling structure — told in flash-forwards and flashbacks — makes every case feel like a trap closing slowly.
But The timeline-hopping structure demands patience; if you want linear plotting, this will frustrate you early on.
The Good Wife2009
Seven seasons of a brilliant lawyer discovering exactly how much of herself she's willing to trade for professional survival, with case-of-the-week sharpness and a genuinely corrosive long game underneath.
But It's a long commitment, and the show's political and firm-politics subplots occasionally crowd out the moral core.
How to Get Away with Murder2014
Viola Davis plays a defense attorney whose students get pulled into a cover-up alongside her cases — pure soapy propulsion if you want the blackmail-and-secrets engine turned up to eleven.
But It leans hard into twist-per-episode plotting that can feel exhausting rather than tense by season three or four.
Not sure tonight? Get a pick in a minute, starting from Conviction
The wildcard
Something you would not have found on your own.
Anatomy of a Murder1959
This is the film that established the defense attorney as a morally compromised protagonist rather than a hero, decades before Neve Harper's dilemma became a genre staple.
Jimmy Stewart plays a defense lawyer coaching his client toward a legal defense he half-believes is a lie, in a courtroom drama so procedurally sharp it basically wrote the rulebook everyone since has borrowed from.
But It's black-and-white, talky, and nearly three hours — no visual flash, just dialogue doing all the work.
More like this (8)
Anatomy of a Scandal2022
A tight British miniseries about a barrister defending someone close to her, wrestling with what she owes the truth versus what she owes the people she loves.
But Its twist relies on a structural trick some viewers find satisfying and others find a little too neat.
Presumed Innocent2024
Jake Gyllenhaal as a prosecutor turned suspect in his mistress's murder — courtroom procedure laced with real dread about what a smart, cornered person will do to survive.
But If you've seen the 1990 film or read the novel, the destination won't surprise you, even if the route does.
The Night Of2016
A slow-burn HBO limited series that treats the machinery of a murder case — evidence, doubt, the defense's compromises — with more patience and moral seriousness than almost anything else in the genre.
But It is deliberately unglamorous and slow; there's no procedural snap here, just grinding uncertainty.
Defending Jacob2020
A prosecutor's own son becomes the accused, and the show is genuinely interested in how far a parent — or a lawyer — will bend the law for someone they love.
But It's grim and largely joyless, more character study than thriller, so don't expect much momentum.
Suits2011
A slicker, glossier take on a legal career built on a hidden lie — less morally serious than Conviction, but fun if you want the blackmail premise with more banter and less dread.
But The stakes rarely feel real; it's comfort television more than thriller, and some episodes coast on charm alone.
The Firm1993
Tom Cruise as a young lawyer who realizes the firm that made him is also the trap that will destroy him — a satisfying two hours if you want the compromised-attorney arc resolved in one sitting.
But It's very much a product of its era's legal-thriller boom, glossy and a little pulpy rather than psychologically deep.
The Staircase2022
Watching an actual defense strategy get built in real time makes the fictional version's compromises feel less like plot contrivance and more like recognizable professional pressure.
A real documentary series following a novelist accused of killing his wife — found at the bottom of a staircase, not in a fire, but the defense team's ethical contortions are eerily close to what Conviction dramatizes.
But It's slow, unresolved, and offers no tidy verdict on guilt or innocence — real cases don't oblige narrative closure.
Jagged Edge1985
Same bones as Conviction — attorney, murder-by-arson-adjacent case, compromised objectivity — but played entirely for heat and camp instead of moral gravity, showing how flexible this premise really is.
Glenn Close defends a magnate accused of murdering his wife and falls for him along the way — pure glossy, trashy '80s thriller with a courtroom twist that plays the blackmail-and-secrets premise for maximum pulp.
But It's melodramatic and dated in its gender politics, more erotic thriller than serious drama.
People
Cast
Production
- Bert SalkeExecutive Producer
- David ShoreExecutive Producer
- Elisabeth MossExecutive Producer
- Warren LittlefieldExecutive Producer
Recommended by
Madam Secretary, Traces, American Justice, For the People, Habeas Corpus, Innocent, The Killer in My Family, Reckless, Full Circle, The Jury, The Investigator: A British Crime Story, Swipe Right on the Devil, The Interrogator, Broken English