Television series
El problema final
A storm-sealed island off Mallorca, a dead Englishwoman, and a washed-up actor once famous for playing Sherlock Holmes, now forced to solve a real murder among thirteen trapped strangers. This Spanish Netflix series is a classic 1959-set whodunit with a wink—glamorous, fair-play, and quietly amused that a man who's only ever pretended to be clever must finally prove it. For fans of country-house puzzles.
Should you watch it?
Watch it if you like a closed-circle whodunit where the suspects are stuck together and the pleasure is in arguing over clues, especially with a retired screen detective actor at the centre of the puzzle.
Skip it if you want a fast, twisty thriller, because this one lingers on a crowded hotel and a long roster of suspects before it moves at any real clip.
What it asks of you: Five episodes that take their time, with patience for talky scenes and a good memory for who said what to whom.
Not sure? Find tonight's pick in a minute.
If you liked this
Knives Out2019
The gold standard for modern whodunits: a starry ensemble, a genuinely fair-play mystery, and a detective who's as much performance as person—not unlike Basil playing at Sherlock.
But Its knowing wit and rapid plotting are the opposite of a slow, storm-locked island mood.
And Then There Were None2015
The BBC's bleak, brilliant take on the original storm-trapped-island premise—ten strangers, one killer, no escape, none of the cosiness usually attached to Christie.
But It's genuinely grim, stripped of comfort and quips; not a cosy Sunday-night mystery.
Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery2022
Another island, another impossible crowd of suspects, another detective having far too much fun—proof the closed-circle setup can be endlessly reinvented.
But Its satirical targets are very 2020s; it trades period atmosphere for pop culture noise.
Not sure tonight? Get a pick in a minute, starting from El problema final
The wildcard
Something you would not have found on your own.
Murder by Death1976
Basil is an actor famous for playing a fictional detective who then has to be one for real—this film's entire joke is fictional detectives colliding with an actual crime, the same premise played for farce instead of suspense.
A gleeful spoof gathering thinly-disguised parodies of Poirot, Marple, Charlie Chan and Sam Spade at a country house for a fake murder—pure joy if you love the genre enough to laugh at it.
But Broad, dated slapstick comedy; if you want an actual mystery to solve, this isn't it.
More like this (8)
Murder on the Orient Express2017
Branagh's lavish, moustache-forward Poirot delivers exactly what Basil's fame promises: a celebrated fictional detective made flesh, solving an impossible crime among strangers trapped together.
But The visual gloss sometimes overwhelms the mystery itself; more spectacle than puzzle.
Gosford Park2001
Altman's country-house murder mystery is really about class and performance—who gets seen, who serves whom—echoing the theatrical unease at the heart of Basil's story.
But The murder is almost incidental; this is an ensemble drama first, mystery second.
Death on the Nile2022
More Branagh-Poirot, same pleasures: a beautiful, doomed setting, a celebrated detective, and a guest list of liars with nowhere to go.
But It leans harder into melodrama and romance than pure puzzle-box mystery.
Agatha Christie Poirot1989
David Suchet's decades-long, definitive Poirot is the mother lode if what you want is elegant period murder solved by a fussy, brilliant outsider.
But Long-running and formulaic by design; the pleasures are comforting rather than surprising.
The Alienist2018
A darker, grittier period mystery, with a haunted outsider investigator piecing together a crime a whole city would rather ignore.
But Its violence and psychological darkness are a long way from drawing-room charm.
Broadchurch2013
A patient, character-first murder investigation where the who matters less than what the crime does to a small, closed community.
But It's slow and emotionally heavy, with none of the puzzle-box playfulness this premise promises.
Danganronpa: The Animation2013
Same bones as this premise—strangers sealed somewhere they cannot leave, a murder demanding deduction from the group itself—reimagined as Japanese animation with the volume turned all the way up.
Fifteen students trapped in a sealed academy, forced into a killing game where every death triggers a genuine, twisty investigation—closed-circle mystery cranked to a lurid extreme.
But Its anime aesthetic, gore and video-game logic are a world away from tasteful period mystery; not for the squeamish.
The Exterminating Angel1962
The literal premise of people who cannot leave a confined space mirrors the storm-locked island, but Buñuel strips out the murder plot to ask the same underlying question: what happens to civilised people once the door is sealed.
Buñuel's surreal masterpiece traps a dinner party of wealthy guests in a room they mysteriously cannot leave, and lets social convention curdle into something feral and strange.
But Arthouse surrealism with no crime to solve—unsettling and ambiguous rather than satisfying.
People
Cast
Production
- Urko ErrazquinExecutive Producer
- Fernando BovairaProducer