Television series

Ripley

Name: Ripley
Genre: Drama, Crime, Thriller
Released: 2024
Cast: Andrew Scott, Johnny Flynn, Dakota Fanning, Vittorio Viviani, Margherita Buy

Andrew Scott's black-and-white, Italy-set retelling of Patricia Highsmith's amoral grifter is less thriller than slow, exquisite unraveling — eight hour-long episodes shot like film noir, drenched in shadow and marble staircases. It rewards patience over adrenaline: dialogue is sparse, silence does the heavy lifting, and Scott plays Tom Ripley as a man perpetually one beat behind his own lies. Gorgeous, cold, deliberately airless.

TVMaze rating

3.5

Should you watch it?

Watch it if you enjoy a patient, sun-bleached character study where a charming liar's slide is watched with cool, unblinking attention rather than thrills.

Skip it if you want plot momentum or a quick binge, since it lingers on silences and small gestures and rarely hurries toward its next set piece.

What it asks of you: Eight episodes of about 56 minutes each, it asks for patience with stillness and slow-building unease rather than a tidy chase.

Not sure? Find tonight's pick in a minute.

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But It's louder, hornier and far more explicit than Ripley's cool restraint — some will find its shock tactics gratuitous rather than clever.

Killing Eve2018

A gorgeous, playful cat-and-mouse thriller between an assassin and the agent obsessed with catching her, full of the same fascination with performance, disguise and who's really in control.

But It gets sillier and more stylised as it goes, and the tonal whiplash between comedy and violence won't suit everyone.

You2018

A charming, articulate murderer narrates his own justifications directly to you, and you'll hate how easy it is to root for him — the same queasy intimacy with a killer's logic.

But It's pulpier and far less subtle, aimed squarely at binge-watching rather than art-house restraint.

Not sure tonight? Get a pick in a minute, starting from Ripley

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

Purple Noon1960

Same Highsmith novel, same character, made over sixty years earlier — watching it after Ripley shows how differently two eras read the same amoral con man.

The original screen Ripley, made decades before Andrew Scott's, is sun-bleached, sensual and shot in gorgeous Mediterranean colour — Alain Delon plays Tom as a beautiful predator rather than a haunted one.

But It's dubbed or subtitled French cinema from 1960, with a pace and moral shrug some modern viewers find alien.

The Night Manager2016

A man talks his way into a world of wealth and menace he doesn't belong to, and the show luxuriates in the same sun-drenched, expensive European settings while the tension coils underneath.

But It's a straighter spy thriller with clearer heroes and villains — less morally ambiguous than Ripley's total amorality.

Fargo2014

Each season is a self-contained, darkly funny crime saga where ordinary greed spirals into murder and cover-up, told with the same patient, novelistic confidence and eye for unsettling detail.

But The humor is broader and more absurdist — it wants to make you laugh as often as it wants to unsettle you.

American Crime Story2016

A real con man drifts through glamorous Italian and American high society leaving bodies behind him, and the show is just as interested in performance, desire and self-invention as Ripley is.

But It's true crime, so the tragedy is real and the show occasionally tips into melodrama that fiction can avoid.

Match Point2005

A charming outsider claws his way into a wealthy family through sheer social performance, then discovers how far he'll go to keep what he's stolen — cool, controlled, morally bleak.

But It's Woody Allen, whose off-screen history may be a dealbreaker, and the pacing is talkier and less visually sumptuous.

The Night Of2016

A slow, aching meditation on guilt, identity and how quickly an ordinary life can be undone by one bad night — the same patience with silence and dread.

But It's grimmer and more procedural, rooted in the American justice system rather than European glamour.

The Undoing2020

A charmed, wealthy life unravels after a murder reveals how little anyone really knew the person they loved — glossy, paranoid, obsessed with appearances hiding rot underneath.

But The mystery plotting is thinner than Ripley's, and the ending disappointed a lot of viewers who wanted more rigor.

Parasite2019

Both are studies in deception as class warfare: outsiders performing a role to gain access to wealth, and the violence that erupts when the performance slips.

A poor family cons and infiltrates their way into a wealthy household through lies, forged documents and stolen identities, until the class fault lines crack open into something much darker.

But It's a different genre entirely — pitch-black comedy tipping into horror — and subtitled Korean dialogue may be a barrier for some.

The Imposter2012

The same fascination with a fluent liar reshaping reality around him, except this one really happened, and the people he deceived are on camera explaining why they believed him.

A real con man convinces a grieving Texas family he's their long-missing son, and the documentary lets you watch the lie work in real time, through the actual people who believed it.

But It's a documentary, not fiction — slower, talkier, without any of Ripley's visual glamour or narrative control.