Television series
Murdaugh Murders: A Southern Scandal
A three-part Netflix docuseries about the Murdaugh family, a South Carolina legal dynasty undone by financial fraud, murder allegations, and generational corruption. It's a methodical unwinding of how wealth and influence can insulate someone from consequences—until suddenly, catastrophically, it can't. Gripping true crime that feels less like spectacle and more like watching a house of cards collapse in real time.
Should you watch it?
Watch it if you want a true crime documentary that builds its case patiently, treating a powerful family's unraveling as a slow reckoning rather than a string of jolts.
Skip it if the subject is real violence and the pace is deliberate, so a brisk puzzle or a steady drip of revelations will feel slow and heavy going.
What it asks of you: Six episodes of about forty-one minutes apiece make for a short sitting, but the material is dense and grim, so it needs your full attention rather than background noise.
Not sure? Find tonight's pick in a minute.
If you liked this
The Staircase2022
A brilliant miniseries about a man accused of murdering his wife in their Durham home. Like Murdaugh, it excavates how legal privilege and narrative control shape what we believe happened—and how documentaries themselves can mislead us.
But It's dense and long, unfolding across 13 episodes. The Michael Peterson case is genuinely maddening in ways that don't resolve neatly.
Ozark2017
A crime family saga about a lawyer pulled into money laundering, where every financial deception spirals into murder and moral compromise. It captures that suffocating claustrophobia of watching powerful people rationalize increasingly terrible choices.
But It's a fictional drama, not documentary, so it's slicker and more serialized. Some viewers find the final season rushed or its resolution unsatisfying.
McMillion$2020
A docuseries about the McDonald's Monopoly fraud, where a company's own systems are weaponized against it. Like Murdaugh, it's about a con that worked brilliantly until the architecture finally broke under the weight of its own lies.
But It's lighter in tone—almost playful about the scheme itself. If you want gravity and consequence, the crime here feels more absurd than sinister.
Not sure tonight? Get a pick in a minute, starting from Murdaugh Murders: A Southern Scandal
The wildcard
Something you would not have found on your own.
Possession1981
Both examine how proximity to someone can obscure who they actually are; how family structures can hide darkness; how a falling-apart moment reveals the violence that was always there.
An avant-garde horror film about a marriage collapsing in Cold War Berlin. Like Murdaugh, it uses a specific crisis—here, seeming psychological and supernatural—to expose the rage and deception that were always simmering beneath civility. It's visually shocking in ways that conventional narrative can't reach.
But It's deliberately difficult and surreal, shot through with body horror and extreme performances. If you want clarity and linear storytelling, this will frustrate you immediately.
More like this (8)
Unbelievable2019
A miniseries about police failures, institutional bias, and the way systems protect themselves. It shares Murdaugh's interest in how power structures decide whose suffering matters and whose gets ignored.
But It's about sexual assault and features difficult material. The procedural pacing can feel slow if you're expecting constant reveals.
The Jinx: The Life and Deaths of Robert Durst2015
A true-crime miniseries that captures the same unraveling of a wealthy man whose apparent untouchability finally crumbles. The subject's own contradictions are almost as damning as the evidence.
But Robert Durst remains a polarizing figure, and some viewers feel the series lets him perform rather than confront him. It's also quite grim throughout.
Dirty Money2018
An anthology series exploring financial corruption and how the ultra-wealthy exploit systems. Each episode shares Murdaugh's forensic interest in tracing money backwards through a web of lies.
But Episodes vary wildly in quality. Some feel more like polished profiles than investigations, and the docuseries format can feel shallow on subjects this complex.
The Trial of the Chicago 72020
A tense, darkly funny film about power, privilege, and the legal system as performance. It's less about guilt than about who gets to control the narrative—a theme that resonates throughout Murdaugh.
But It's a Aaron Sorkin drama, so it's verbose and theatrical. If you want documentary realism, this sacrifices it for narrative momentum.
Bad Blood2022
A limited series about the Theranos fraud, where a charismatic founder's lies crumble under scrutiny. It shows how some people weaponize charm and selective truth until the machine stops.
But The Theranos story has been thoroughly covered elsewhere. Some viewers find the TV version doesn't add much beyond spectacle and celebrity casting.
The Dropout2022
A miniseries about Elizabeth Holmes and Theranos, examining delusion, ambition, and how conviction can masquerade as certainty. It's a character study wrapped around institutional failure.
But Amanda Seyfried's performance overshadows the institutional critique. If you want analysis more than drama, it veers toward entertainment.
American Animals2018
Both are obsessed with how truth gets bent in the telling; how the person in the room doesn't match the version told in court; how perspective shapes what we're allowed to believe.
A hybrid film where real people and actors alternate in telling the story of a 2004 book heist. It's a formal meditation on memory, narrative reliability, and how we turn our lives into stories. The result is disorienting in a way that mirrors how Murdaugh distorts what actually happened.
But The format is genuinely off-putting for some viewers—the constant switching between actors and real people creates deliberate confusion. If you need cinematic consistency, it's maddening.
There Is No Evil2020
Like Murdaugh, it's about the spaces between who someone is at home and who they are in society; how power and circumstance can make monsters feel ordinary to themselves; how accepting a system makes you complicit in its crimes.
An Iranian film told in four interconnected stories about complicity, duty, and the gap between public identity and private conscience. It's quietly devastating—less a crime procedural and more a moral anatomy of how ordinary people rationalize the unforgivable. The final section will haunt you.
But It's slow, elliptical, and requires patience with ambiguity. There's no satisfying resolution or justice. Some viewers find its refusal to judge its subjects infuriating rather than profound.
