Television series

House of Cards

Name: House of Cards
Genre: Drama, Thriller
Released: 2013
Cast: Robin Wright, Michael Kelly, Kevin Spacey, Derek Cecil, Jayne Atkinson

A Washington political thriller that turns ambition into seduction: Frank Underwood breaks the fourth wall to let you in on every lie, manipulation and murder on his climb to the presidency. Slick, theatrical, and coldly funny in a way that makes complicity feel like fun. Best in its early seasons, for anyone who likes watching monstrous competence at work.

TVMaze rating

8.2

If you liked this

Succession2018

The same appetite for power and betrayal, but funnier, meaner, and with dialogue so sharp it draws blood. If you liked watching awful people scheme, this does it better.

But No direct-address charm offensive here — the characters are colder and harder to root for, even accidentally.

Boss2011

Kelsey Grammer as a Chicago mayor hiding a degenerative illness while running the city through fear and favours — a close cousin in tone, scale, and moral rot.

But Cancelled after two seasons, so it ends abruptly and never gets to finish what it starts.

Veep2012

The comic mirror image: same DC corridors, same hunger for power, but everyone is incompetent and it's viciously, quotably funny.

But If you came to House of Cards for the menace, the constant jokes might feel like a tonal downgrade.

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

I, Claudius1976

Same structural trick — a scheming narrator letting you in on the murder — four decades before Frank ever turned to camera.

A British classic where poisonings, incest, and imperial scheming in ancient Rome play out with the same intimate, confiding narration Frank Underwood would recognise as a professional courtesy.

But Studio-bound 1970s production values and a slower, theatrical pace will test anyone used to Netflix gloss.

Scandal2012

Washington fixers, presidential affairs, and twist-a-minute plotting delivered with total soap-opera commitment. Pure pulpy pleasure if you want the DC intrigue dialled up past plausibility.

But It's melodrama first and politics second — the storytelling is much broader and less controlled.

The Good Wife2009

Political ambition filtered through law and marriage, with a wife navigating her husband's scandal and building her own empire of influence. Smarter than it looks.

But It's a slower burn, more procedural in structure, and the political stakes creep in gradually rather than upfront.

The West Wing1999

The idealistic opposite number — a White House full of people who actually believe in governing well. Watching it after House of Cards is a genuine palate cleanse.

But Its earnestness can feel almost naive now, and the walking-and-talking rhythm is a different kind of show entirely.

Homeland2011

Swaps electoral scheming for intelligence-world paranoia, but keeps the sense of powerful people making devastating private calculations in public rooms.

But It's a spy thriller at heart, not a Beltway drama — the political texture is thinner than what you're used to.

Damages2007

Glenn Close is terrifying as a lawyer who destroys anyone in her way — same ruthless-mentor energy as Frank Underwood, with a similarly twisty, non-linear structure.

But The timeline jumps around aggressively, which some find thrilling and others find exhausting.

Billions2016

Trade Washington for Wall Street and you get the same chess-match pleasure: two brilliant, amoral people locked in a war of leverage and ego.

But The finance jargon takes a minute to click, and it leans more testosterone-fuelled than House of Cards ever did.

The Tragedy of Macbeth2021

Frank and Claire Underwood are the Macbeths in suits; this is the same marriage-as-conspiracy engine, stripped back to its original, more poetic form.

Denzel Washington and Frances McDormand as a ruthless power couple who talk each other into murder for the throne, shot in stark, nightmarish black and white.

But It's Shakespeare — dense verse, no modern comfort, and a compressed 105 minutes with none of the soapy sprawl.

Weiner2016

Where House of Cards fantasises ambition as control, this shows what actually happens when a real politician's hunger outruns his judgment — the fiction's ugly, unscripted twin.

A documentary that films a real politician's scandal collapsing his career in real time — the same appetite for power and self-destruction, but with nowhere to hide behind a script.

But It's cringe-inducing and sad rather than seductive; there's no clever narrator making the wreckage feel glamorous.