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

Two-time Oscar nominee Felicity Jones (The Theory of Everything), will play legendary author Agatha Christie alongside Vincent Cassel (La Haine) in the noir mystery-thriller, Eleven Missing Days. The movie is based on the true story of the British author’s mysterious disappearance in December 1926, while Christie was at the height of her fame. In a case of life imitating art, this whodunnit explores the investigation behind her disappearance, strangely resembling an Agatha Christie novel itself where everyone in her life became a suspect. Cassel will play a retired Belgian police detective who gets drawn into the case, in an echo of Christie’s most famous sleuth, Hercule Poirot. Nicole Elizabeth Berger (He’s Watching You) and Oliver Trevena (The Gorge) will also co-star. Bertie Ellwood (Silo) is directing from a screenplay by Ernesto Foronda (Better Luck Tomorrow), based on the book, Agatha Christie and the Eleven Missing Days, by Christie scholar Jared Cade.  


StudioCanal's new genre division, Sixth Dimension, is heading into production this summer on Sean Byrne's high-stakes thriller, The Mannequin, starring Oscar winner Melissa Leo (The Fighter). Byrne is directing and writing. Byrne said in a statement, “After wading through bloodied waters together on Dangerous Animals, I’m thrilled to be alongside my friends at StudioCanal’s Sixth Dimension. I can’t wait to unleash The Mannequin on the big screen. There have been other serial killer procedurals, but this is its own thrillingly deranged beast—twisted, intense, propulsive, and anchored by a fearless performance from Melissa Leo, building to a shocking twist you won’t see coming. It’ll put you on the edge of your seat and keep you there.”


Scott Adkins and Lewis Tan are set to lead Deadlocked, about a deadly siege in which a group of jurors come under attack. Pre-production on the pic has begun, with Tan overseeing the action design in collaboration with a fight choreographer, and Roel Reiné (Classified) directing. The plot is based around a routine jury site visit that turns deadly when a mercenary kill team led by Hewitt (Adkins) storms the location in search of a secret ledger detailing citywide corruption. Trapped inside, a disgraced ex-cop-turned-bailiff (Tan) must protect the surviving jurors and battle the attackers outside while exposing a traitor within.


Will Smith has committed to star in the David Gordon Green-directed action-thriller Supermax, about two FBI agents investigating a murder that’s taken place in the world’s most secure prison. Amazon MGM Studios closed a deal for worldwide rights to the Miramax project, which will mark Smith’s first non-franchise studio movie in recent years. This will allegedly be a streaming film and not a theatrical release. Additional casting is underway, including Smith’s FBI agent partner, said to be a female role. The project is written by David Weil and David J. Rosen, known for their work on the TV series Hunters and Invasion.


Bill Camp (The Night Of, Presumed Innocent) is set to join Melissa McCarthy and Connor Storrie in Turpentine, the forthcoming indie thriller from Craig Zobel (The Penguin and Mare of Easttown), but his character details are under wraps. Based on a script by Justin Varava that made the 2024 Black List, Turpentine follows a deadbeat son who hires friends to rob his own parents to pay off a bookie, with disastrous results. Rian Johnson (Knives Out) and Ram Bergman’s T-Street are producing alongside Shivani Rawat’s ShivHans Pictures.


Two-time Oscar nominee Colman Domingo (Disclosure Day), Golden Globe nominee Nicholas Hoult (Superman), Hamnet and A Quiet Place star Noah Jupe, and Golden Globe winner Emma Corrin (The Crown) are set to star in the psychological thriller, The Servant, from writer-director Francis Lee. The Servant is set in 1950s New York and follows Tony (Hoult), an entitled British man who moves into a beautiful apartment on Central Park and becomes embroiled in a wicked power play with his manservant, Barrett (Domingo). The project is a reimagining of the subversive 1963 Joseph Losey classic (from a screenplay by Harold Pinter), with its undertones of class, sexuality, and politics and Dirk Bogarde playing the sociopathic manservant to acclaim.  


Ric Roman Waugh (Angel Has Fallen) has inked a deal to direct Six Minutes to Freedom, Kurt Muse and John Gilstrap’s work of non-fiction about the 1989 Delta Force rescue of an American hostage in Panama. With a screenplay by Jared Rosenberg, the film is based on the true story of Operation Acid Gambit, one of the most daring military raids in history. At its center is Kurt Muse, a businessman-turned-CIA asset who ran a clandestine radio operation in Panama to undermine Manuel Noriega’s regime in the late 1980s. After being arrested by Noriega’s secret police and imprisoned in brutal conditions, Muse was rescued by the United States' most elite warriors, Delta Force, during their invasion of Panama in December 1989.


TELEVISION/STREAMING

Netflix is extending its overall deal with author Harlan Coben, greenlighting Myron Bolitar, a drama inspired by Coben's signature collection of novels. The drama is from Emmy winner David E. Kelley (Big Little Lies) and Kyle Long (Suits) who are writing, executive producing, and co-showrunning. In it, after an injury ends his NBA dreams, Myron Bolitar reinvents himself as a sports agent — using charm, smarts, and a ruthless partner to navigate the high-stakes and dirty world of sports, where saving his clients often means risking himself. Greg Yaitanes, who directed half of the episodes of another Kelley series adaptation of a well known thriller novel, Scott Turow’s Presumed Innocent, will direct multiple episodes and will executive produce the series.


The Lincoln Lawyer starring Manuel Garcia-Rulfo is coming to an end, with the upcoming fifth season being its last. Based on the novels by Michael Connelly, the legal drama stars Garcia-Rulfo as Mickey Haller, a defense attorney in Los Angeles who often works out of a chauffeur-driven Lincoln Navigator. The 10-episode fifth season is inspired by the seventh book in the series, Resurrection Walk. In it, Mickey Haller’s world is upended when the half-sister he never knew existed, Emi (Cobie Smulders), comes to him with a plea to help free a wrongfully convicted woman. In a season defined by blood ties and buried secrets, Mickey takes on a grueling habeas petition to overturn a six-year-old murder conviction, but the deeper he digs, the more nefarious the forces arrayed against him become. Meanwhile, the stakes rise for his trusted team as Lorna (Becki Newton), Izzy (Jazz Raycole), and Cisco (Angus Sampson) step up to tackle high-profile challenges of their own.


Prime Video has renewed its hit series Reacher for a fifth season ahead of its Season 4 premiere expected for later this year. The series adaptation of Lee Child’s bestselling Jack Reacher novels follows Reacher (Alan Ritchson), a drifter carrying no phone and the barest of essentials as he travels the country and explores the nation he once served, usually ending up in situations requiring his keen mind and hard-hitting fists. Season 4 will be based on the 13th book in Child’s book series, Gone Tomorrow. When a chance encounter with a distraught stranger on a subway goes horribly wrong, Reacher is drawn into a complex and deadly game that pits him against ruthless foes from the highest echelons of power. New to the cast for Season 4 are Chris Marquette, Sydelle Noel, Agnez Mo, Anggun, Kevin Weisman, Marc Blucas, Kevin Corrigan, and Kathleen Roberston.

The Good Doctor star Freddie Highmore and series creator David Shore have teamed up for I’m Not Here to Hurt You, a new family crime drama from Sony Pictures Television and Bell Media. Highmore also stars in the Crave original series, which follows an upstanding family man who spirals into a life of crime after killing someone in a bicycle accident, "driven by the noble but futile goal of never hurting anyone ever again” per the logline. The series is inspired by the true story of a man who became known as "Ireland’s most polite bank robber” and The Irish Independent podcast of the same name.


Ella Rubin (The Girl from Plainville) is set to star opposite Maya Hawke and Kerry Condon in The God of the Woods, Netflix's series adaptation of the bestselling novel by Liz Moore. From writers, executive producers, and co-showrunners Liz Hannah and Liz Moore, The God of the Woods is a multi-generational drama series set in the Adirondacks, exploring the Van Laar family’s dark secrets, class tensions, and the mysteries surrounding the disappearance of 13-year-old Barbara Van Laar from her family’s summer camp — in the wake of an earlier family tragedy that may be related. As the past and present collide, the Van Laars’ wealth and influence unravel, revealing the damaging consequences of privilege and the abuse of power. Rubin will play Louise Donnadieu, a working-class counselor at Camp Emerson whose life is upended when one of her young campers, Barbara, goes missing. Condon plays Barbara’s mother, Alice Van Laar; Hawke plays Judy Luptack, investigator on the case.


The Rookie spinoff pilot, The Rookie: North, starring Jay Ellis, has been picked up to series by ABC with an order for 10 episodes that are expected to premiere in midseason. The Rookie: North introduces Alex Holland (Ellis) who believed his midlife wasn’t worthy of a crisis. But after a violent home invasion ignites a dormant purpose, Alex battles a lifetime of failed commitments by joining the Pierce County Police Department as a rookie. Policing from the urban coast to the rural forest where backup isn’t just five minutes away, Alex must prove to his skeptical training officer, his fellow rookies, and himself that he’s finally found something worthy of the fight. Ellis stars alongside Chris Sullivan, Karen Fukuhara, Froy Gutierrez, Janet Montgomery, Mya Lowe, and Malik Watson.


After months of speculation, NBCUniversal has confirmed that a live-action series based on Universal’s Fast & Furious action movie franchise is in development, with potentially three additional series, according to franchise star and producer Vin Diesel. The first series is set up at Peacock (with more in various stages of development at Universal Television), with a pilot to be written by Mike Daniels, who just got an NBC series order for his take on another high-profile title from the NBCUniversal library, The Rockford Files. 


Matt Bomer (Outcome, Fellow Travelers) has joined Season 2 of Peacock and Sky’s spy thriller drama, The Day of the Jackal, as a recurring character opposite star Eddie Redmayne. Details about Bomer’s character are being kept under wraps, but he will allegedly be playing a villain. In the second season, which has started production in Budapest, Bomer joins fellow new cast additions Weruche Opia and Pablo Schreiber. Based on the Frederick Forsyth novel and the 1973 film adaptation from Universal, The Day of the Jackal follows an unrivaled and highly elusive lone assassin, the Jackal (Redmayne), who makes his living carrying out hits for the highest fee.


The first trailer for the new USA Network series Anna Pigeon starring Tracy Spiridakos as the titular character has been released. The show’s premiere date has been set for August 7 at 10 p.m. Based on the bestselling novels by Nevada Barr, the series follows Anna, a former city slicker who becomes a park ranger after a devastating loss that changed the trajectory of her life forever. While Anna tries to outrun her demons, her focus turns to solving crimes that have taken place within national park grounds, no matter who or what gets in her way. The series also features regulars Ronnie Rowe Jr. as FBI Agent Frederick Stanton, a charismatic wanderer who chases crimes through national parks; and Paulina Alexis as Zoey Bear Child, a young ranger coming into her own, whom Anna mentors.


The White Lotus has rounded out the cast for its fourth season with three final cast additions in Ben Kingsley, Max Minghella, and Pekka Strang. Kingsley (The Thursday Murder Club), Minghella (The Handmaid’s Tale) and Strang (Mister 8) will appear within the newest group of White Lotus hotel guests and employees that the HBO drama series follows over the span of a week, taking place during the Cannes Film Festival. They join the existing Season 4 recruits, which include Vincent Cassel, Steve Coogan, Laura Dern, Caleb Jonte Edwards, Dylan Ennis, Corentin Fila, Ari Graynor, Marissa Long, Alexander Ludwig, Chris Messina, AJ Michalka, Kumail Nanjiani, and Nadia Tereszkiewicz.


A trailer dropped for the eleventh and final season of the beloved PBS Mystery! series Grantchester, which will debut on Sunday, June 14, 2026. Robson Green returns as Geordie with Rishi Nair as Alphy; Al Weaver as Leonard Finch; Tessa Peake-Jones as Mrs. C; Kacey Ainsworth as Cathy Keating; Oliver Dimsdale as Daniel Marlowe; Nick Brimble as Jack Chapman; Bradley Hall as DC Larry Peters, and Melissa Johns as Miss Scott.


The Terminal List, starring Chris Pratt, will return with Season 2 on October 21. Based on the best-selling novels of the same name from Jack Carr, The Terminal List centers on Navy SEAL Commander James Reece (Pratt) as he battles unknown conspiratorial forces seeking to upend the world order. The season comes from Carr’s second novel, True Believer, where he puts James Reece on a journey of violent redemption, finding a new purpose after finishing his list after he uncovers a conspiracy that reaches from Moscow to Langley and ties into his own family’s history. Returning cast members include Raife Hastings (Tom Hopper), Katie Buranek (Constance Wu), Mohammed Farooq (Dar Salim), and Jules Landry (Luke Hemsworth).


ABC unveiled its 2026-27 season which moves the Kaitlin Olson-led series High Potential to a mid-season return, enabling the network to utilize the post-Dancing With the Stars time slot on Tuesday to provide a solid launching pad for sophomore series RJ Decker—the crime drama starring Scott Speedman and inspired by the novel Double Whammy by Carl Hiaasen. High Potential will be joined by other mid-season shows, The Rookie and its Jay Ellis-led spinoff, The Rookie: North, as well as the drama Will Trent, based on the books by Karen Slaughter.  


PODCASTS/RADIO/AUDIO

V.E. Schwab and Cat Clarke (writing under the pen name Evelyn Clarke) spoke with Scott Simon on NPR's Book of the Day about their new collaboration, The Ending Writes Itself, where a contest to complete a manuscript turns deadly.


Legendary thriller author James Grady joined Alan Petersen on Meet the Thriller Author to discuss his remarkable career, the enduring legacy of Six Days of the Condor, and his gripping new noir thriller, Shadows on Sidewalks.


On Crime Time FM, Victoria Selman interviewed Anna Bailey (The Tall Bones) and Tariq Ashkanani (The Hollow Boys) about the importance of character development over plot in mystery writing.


The Cops and Writers podcast spoke with New York City Death Investigator and author, Barbara Butcher, about her work, her book What the Dead Know: Learning About Life as a New York City Death Investigator, her new TV special The Death Investigator with Barbara Butcher, and the television pilot that is being filmed based on her life at the New York City Medical Examiner’s Office.