Media Murder for Monday

 

It's the start of a new week and that means it's time for a brand-new roundup of crime drama news:

THE BIG SCREEN/MOVIES

ITN Distribution has acquired North American rights to the thriller, Joe Baby, starring Dichen Lachman, Willa Fitzgerald, Ron Perlman, and Harvey Keitel. The film "follows a money collector (Lachman) for a private investigator hired to track down 10 million dollars stolen in a dodgy real estate deal, opening a complex can of worms." Kelly Hu, Kenneth Choi, Corin Nemec, David Lipper, Dan Bakkedahl, and Jason London round out the key cast. The film is based on Drew Fine’s novel, with the screenplay adaptation by Todd Samovitz.

Yahya Abdul-Mateen II (Wonder Man) has closed a deal to star opposite Mark Wahlberg in the crime thriller, By Any Means. The actor steps into the lead role originally to have been played by Sterling K. Brown, who departed the project due to scheduling conflicts. By Any Means is based on the incredible true story of the notorious mafia hitman who was hired by Hoover’s FBI off-the-books and partnered with a young Black special agent to hunt down those responsible for the murders of civil rights leaders in 1966 Mississippi.

MRC and T-Street productions are putting together the crime drama, A Place in Hell, featuring Fair Play director Chloe Domont, and starring Michelle Williams (Manchester by the Sea) and Daisy Edgar-Jones (Twisters). Details are sketchy, but the project is described as a thriller following two women at a high-profile criminal law firm.

TELEVISION/STREAMING

Great news for Blue Bloods fans: one of the drama’s signature characters, Donnie Wahlberg’s Danny Reagan, will be back on CBS with a new cop show in a new city. CBS has given a straight-to-series order to Boston Blue (working title), a universe expansion of the long-running Blue Bloods, for the 2025-2026 broadcast season. In the new series, from writers Brandon Sonnier and Brandon Margolis (S.W.A.T.), Wahlberg will reprise his role as NYPD Detective Danny Reagan as he takes a position with Boston PD. Once in Boston, he is paired with Detective Lena Peters, the eldest daughter of a prominent law enforcement family.

Miss Scarlet has been renewed for a sixth season on Masterpiece PBS and UKTV, with Kate Phillips once again reprising her role as the title character. Other members of the returning cast include Tom Durant-Pritchard as DI Alexander Blake, Cathy Belton as Ivy, Paul Bazely as Clarence, Simon Ludders as Mr. Potts, Tim Chipping as Detective Phelps, and Ansu Kabia as Moses Valentine. Joining the cast for the new season are Sam Buchanan as Detective George Willows, who joins Scotland Yard after rising through the police ranks, and Grace Hogg-Robinson as Isabel Summers, an ambitious young woman who joins the Clerical Office alongside Ivy.

Masterpiece on PBS has just unveiled the first look at Benjamin Wainwright (Belgravia: The Next Chapter) as Paris’s most renowned detective, Chief Inspector Jules Maigret, in the upcoming contemporary adaptation of Georges Simenon's iconic Maigret novels. PBS have put a new spin on the legendary sleuth, as the upcoming series re-positions him as an up and coming star in the Police Judiciaire — someone who is methodical, voracious in his approach, and with a knack of getting inside the minds of criminals. Joining Wainwright in the cast are Stefanie Martini, who plays Madame Louise Maigret, along with Blake Harrison, Reda Elazouar, Kerrie Hayes, Shaniqua Okwok, Rob Kazinsky, and Nathalie Armin as Prosecutor Mathilde Kernavel.

The BBC announced the return of the mystery drama series, Vigil. Suranne Jones and Rose Leslie return as DCI Amy Silva and DI Kirsten Longacre, whose new case takes them to a remote Arctic research station, where a member of a covert British special forces mission has been shot dead. Amy and Kirsten will need to catch the killer and diffuse a potential international confrontation, driven by a land-grab for energy and resources in the changing polar climate, with both their careers and relationship on the line. Premiering in 2021, when Silva was enlisted to solve a murder on a navy submarine in Scottish waters, Vigil was nominated for Best Drama Series at the 2022 BAFTA Television Awards, and went on to win the International Emmy for Best Drama Series.

CBS is sticking with its solid crime and adventure drama lineup by ordering more seasons of Elsbeth, Fire Country, Tracker, and its three NCIS series. The network already gave a full-season order to Matlock, and has announced it has ordered the Fire Country spinoff, Sheriff Country, with Morena Baccarin. The original FBI series was already renewed through the 2026-2027 broadcast season, but there's no word yet on the status of FBI: Most Wanted and FBI: International, as well The Equalizer and Watson.

PODCASTS/RADIO

Gigi Pandian returned to the Crime Writers of Color podcast to talk with Robert Justice about the latest installment of the Secret Staircase Mysteries and to give an update on her Accidental Alchemist and Jaya Jones series.

Crime Time FM welcomed Tod Lending to talk about The Umbrella Maker's Son; the Holocaust; interior character; documentary film; and storytelling.

The first Mysteryrat's Maze podcast episode of 2025 features the first chapter of Tragedy in Tahoe by Rachele Baker, as read by actor Ariel Linn.

Katie McLain Horner and Kendra Winchester recommended books set in the locations of their 2025 vacations, on the Read or Dead podcast.