20 best shows like Deathtrap (1982)

James, a disgraced firefighter turned grifter, seizes a chance, illicit opportunity to reverse his life’s worsening course as he attempts to prey upon Pastor Byron Brown, who turns out to be far more dangerous than he appears.

A sexy, suspense-driven legal thriller about a group of ambitious law students and their brilliant, mysterious criminal defense professor. They become entangled in a murder plot and will shake the entire university and change the course of their lives.

A medical student who becomes a zombie joins a Coroner's Office in order to gain access to the brains she must reluctantly eat so that she can maintain her humanity. But every brain she eats, she also inherits their memories and must now solve their deaths with help from the Medical examiner and a police detective.

In Beacon Heights, a seemingly perfect town, a group of three college friends struggle with the stress of being overachievers. In the aftermath of the town’s first murder, each Perfectionist hides behind a secret, a lie and an alibi.

Laura Holt, a licensed private detective, opens a detective agency but finds that potential clients refuse to hire a woman, however qualified. To solve the problem, Laura invents a fictitious male superior whom she names Remington Steele. Through a series of events that unfold in the first episode, "License to Steele," a former thief and con man, whose real name is never revealed, assumes the identity of Remington Steele. Behind the scenes, Laura remains firmly in charge.

Notorious serial killer Joe Carroll, after being found guilty of murdering 14 female students on the Virginia college campus where he taught literature, escapes from death row. The FBI calls former agent Ryan Hardy to consult on the case, as he was the one responsible for Carroll’s capture in 2003. Ryan, working closely with an FBI team, including Mike Weston and FBI Specialist Debra Parker, piece together the ever-growing web of murders orchestrated by the devious Carroll.

Reporter Camille Preaker confronts the psychological demons from her past when she returns to her hometown to investigate the murders of two young girls.

An intense and fictionalized account of actual events and people surrounding Lizzie’s life after her controversial acquittal of the horrific double murder of her father and stepmother in 1892.

Ex-cop and recovering alcoholic Hank Dolworth partners with his best friend, former criminal Britt Pollack, in an unlicensed private investigation business. The series is set in Ocean Beach, San Diego, California, although it is portrayed as a distinct town, with Dolworth having once been a member of the fictional Ocean Beach Police Department.

The black sheep of the Argyll family, Jack Argyll, was accused of murdering their matriarch a year ago, but now a man shows up on their doorstep claiming Jack’s innocence. The family must come to terms with this news and the fact that the real killer might still be among them.

A family’s lives are irreparably disrupted when the 14-year-old son is accused of murdering a fellow classmate.

Raymond "Red" Reddington, one of the FBI's most wanted fugitives, surrenders in person at FBI Headquarters in Washington, D.C. He claims that he and the FBI have the same interests: bringing down dangerous criminals and terrorists. In the last two decades, he's made a list of criminals and terrorists that matter the most but the FBI cannot find because it does not know they exist. Reddington calls this "The Blacklist". Reddington will co-operate, but insists that he will speak only to Elizabeth Keen, a rookie FBI profiler.

Explore the psychological underpinnings of love and murder in a small mountain resort town while following popular children’s book author and illustrator Olivia Lake, whose literary success makes her a local celebrity in the tight-knit community.

When a pizza delivery driver is shot dead in south London, a tenacious detective goes after the people traffickers behind his murder and unravels a conspiracy that goes to the top.

Corrupt ex-cop turned hitman Nick Sax's life is changed forever by a relentlessly positive, imaginary blue winged horse named Happy.

After a serial killer imitates the plots of his novels, successful mystery novelist Richard "Rick" Castle receives permission from the Mayor of New York City to tag along with an NYPD homicide investigation team for research purposes.

A skeptic is forced to work with a firm believer of the paranormal on unexplained occurrences in Los Angeles.

The New Alfred Hitchcock Presents is an American anthology series that aired on NBC from 1985 to 1986, and on the USA Network from 1987 to 1989. The series is an updated re-imagining of the classic 1955 series Alfred Hitchcock Presents.

The Killing is an American crime drama television series based upon the Danish television series Forbrydelsen. Set in Seattle, Washington, the series follows the various murder investigations by homicide detectives Sarah Linden and Stephen Holder.

Criminal Minds: Suspect Behavior was a short-lived American police procedural drama that aired on CBS. The show debuted in 2011 as a spin-off from the successful Criminal Minds, which had premiered in 2005. This edition's profiling team also worked for the Federal Bureau of Investigation's Behavioral Analysis Unit in Quantico, Virginia. In an April 2010 episode of Criminal Minds, during the show's fifth season, the original team met the new team and worked with them to find a San Francisco serial killer. This episode served as the new series' backdoor pilot. Just like the parent series, CBS owned the underlying North American rights, while ABC owned the international rights. The series premiered on February 16, 2011, and filled the Wednesday 10 pm time slot, airing immediately after the original Criminal Minds. CBS cancelled the series on May 17, 2011. The series ends with a cliffhanger. On September 6, 2011 CBS DVD released the complete series as a 4 disc-set. It is packaged as "The DVD Edition". There are numerous special features and two episode commentaries with the cast and crew. The set includes the backdoor pilot from season five of the original show.

FBI agent Audrey Parker arrives in the small town of Haven, Maine to solve a murder and soon discovers the town's many secrets—which also hold the key to unlocking the mysteries of her lost past.

Set in a single room of an average American motel, each episode tells a different story of the assorted characters who pass through it.

An anthology series that delves into the players, the crime and the media circus, detailing the day-to-day battles of the trial and unveiling the shocking truth of what really went down when the cameras stopped rolling.

Sleuthy foster siblings Max, Tess, Sal, Anika, and Daniel Hunter find new quests, more mysteries, and even new Hunter sibs!

Follows Lia Haddock, a journalist for American Public Radio (APR), as she unravels the mystery behind the disappearance of over 300 people at a neuroscience research facility in Tennessee.

Cameron Black is the world's greatest illusionist. At least, that's what people used to call him - before his greatest secret was exposed and his career destroyed. Even worse, Cameron has good reason to believe this was no accident.

A writer gets caught up in a murder investigation involving his mentor, an esteemed American author. Based on the book of the same name, by Joël Dicker.

Person of Interest follows former CIA paramilitary operative, John Reese, who is presumed dead and teams up with reclusive billionaire Finch to prevent violent crimes in New York City by initiating their own type of justice. With the special training that Reese has had in Covert Operations and Finch's genius software inventing mind, the two are a perfect match for the job that they have to complete. With the help of surveillance equipment, they work "outside the law" and get the right criminal behind bars. 

Ten strangers, drawn away from their normal lives to an isolated rock off the Devon coast. But as the mismatched group waits for the arrival of the hosts -- the improbably named Mr. and Mrs. U.N. Owen -- the weather sours and they find themselves cut off from civilization. Very soon, the guests, each struggling with their conscience, will start to die -- one by one, according to the rules of the nursery rhyme 'Ten Little Soldier Boys' -- a rhyme that hangs in every room of the house and ends with the most terrifying words of all: '... and then there were none.

A young mother kills in a fit of unexplainable rage a seemingly stranger. An inquisitive detective obsesses over the case, attempting to get to the bottom of the true motive behind the act.

Danny is a gregarious, hedonistic romantic who gets drawn into the dangerous world of British espionage in this contemporary, emotional thriller. He falls for the anti-social but enigmatic Alex, both from opposite worlds, and they soon realise they’re perfect for each other. But when Alex suddenly disappears, Danny is utterly ill-equipped to take on his complex and codified world. Young, innocent and adrift he needs to decide whether he’s prepared to fight for the truth?

An accidental killing leads a man down a dark hole of intrigue and murder. Just as he finds love and freedom, one phone call brings back the nightmare.

Investigator Alexa Crowe, cannot help fighting the good fight – whether it is solving murders or combatting the small frustrations of everyday life. Fearless and unapologetic, Alexa's unique skills and insights into the darker quirks of human nature, allows her to provoke, comfort and push the right buttons as she unravels the truth behind the most baffling of crimes.

An American anthology police detective series utilizing multiple timelines in which investigations seem to unearth personal and professional secrets of those involved, both within or outside the law.

Nikita will stop at nothing to expose and destroy Division, the secret U.S. agency who trained her as a spy and assassin.

Syd Burnett has left her complicated past behind to become an LAPD detective. Paired with a new partner, Nancy McKenna, a working mom with an equally complex past, Syd is pushed to examine whether her unapologetic lifestyle might be masking a greater personal secret. These two women don't agree on much, but they find common ground when it comes to taking on the most dangerous criminals in Los Angeles.

Tales from the Crypt, sometimes titled HBO's Tales from the Crypt, is an American horror anthology television series that ran from June 10, 1989 to July 19, 1996 on the premium cable channel HBO for seven seasons with a total of 93 episodes. The title is based on the 1950s EC Comics series of the same name and most of the content originated in that comic or the four other EC Comics of the time. The show was produced by HBO with uncredited association by The Geffen Film Company and Warner Bros. Television. The series is not to be confused with the 1972 film by the same name or Tales from the Darkside, another similarly themed horror anthology series. Because it was aired on HBO, a premium cable television channel, it was one of the few anthology series to be allowed to have full freedom from censorship by network standards and practices as a result, HBO allowed the series to contain graphic violence as well as other content that had not appeared in most television series up to that time, such as profanity, gore, nudity and sexual situations, which could give the series a TV-MA rating for today's standards. The show is subsequently edited for such content when broadcast in syndication or on basic cable. While the series began production in the United States, in the final season filming moved to Britain, resulting in episodes which revolved around British characters.

An agent in the FBI's Elite Serial Crime Unit develops profiling techniques as he pursues notorious serial killers and rapists.

Patrick Jane, a former celebrity psychic medium, uses his razor sharp skills of observation and expertise at "reading" people to solve serious crimes with the California Bureau of Investigation.

Combines four to five segments of dramatic re-enactments, interviews and updates of real human and paranormal mysteries. An audience interactive call-to-action request allowed viewers to call in with tips to help solve the cases.

Emma Banville, a human rights lawyer known for defending lost causes, sets out to prove the innocence of Kevin Russell, who was convicted for the murder of a school girl 14 years earlier.

Like most families that settle inside The Gates, the Monahans are unmoored from a complicated life they abandoned in Chicago. There's something very different about this place, almost... haunting. Named the new police chief of The Gates, Nick Monahan is about to be tangled up in a mystery where he will begin to piece together the dark truth about their new home, and the supernatural elements that lurk behind the shadows of The Gates.

Drive is an American action drama television series set against the backdrop of an illegal cross-country automobile road race, focusing on the willing and unwilling competitors and, as the plot develops, the unseen puppet masters who sponsor the race. Minear has described the show's thematic tone by saying "a secret, illegal, underground road race can be anything from Cannonball Run to The Game to North by Northwest to Magnolia-on-wheels. Ours is all those things."

Dr. Temperance Brennan and her colleagues at the Jeffersonian's Medico-Legal Lab assist Special Agent Seeley Booth with murder investigations when the remains are so badly decomposed, burned or destroyed that the standard identification methods are useless.

Each episode transports the audience to worlds of wonder through the lens of today’s most imaginative filmmakers, directors and writers. A reimagining of the original anthology series by Steven Spielberg.

The eccentric Oh Hyun Jae was a peerless criminal profiler until a bomb planted by a serial killer took the life of his young fiancée, causing him to become a recluse. When a serial killer long thought dead returns to terrorize the city, rising star of the police, Hwang Hwa Young, resolves to outwit the killer. To do so, she teams up with both Oh and the remarkable rookie cop Cha Soo Young, whose photographic memory may prove to be a powerful crime-fighting weapon.

Tech genius Lindy, convinced by her roommate to begin online dating, begins to suspect that one of her mysterious suitors may be a deadly cyber stalker. When her friends at the elusive cyber-police uncover a potential serial killer in Manhattan, all signs point to one of Lindy’s dates. Teaming up with this band of hackers Lindy works to solve the murders while unleashing her own style of justice on the streets of New York City.

Both a gift and a curse, Graham has the extraordinary ability to think like his prey—he sees what they see, feels what they feel. But while Graham is pursuing an especially troubling, cannibalistic murderer, Special Agent Jack Crawford teams him with a highly respected psychiatrist – a man with a taste for the criminal minded – Dr. Hannibal Lecter.

Dogged investigator Allegra Dill returns to her border-town Texas home after her sister is murdered. What begins as a search for a killer turns into an all-consuming fight to bring her corrupt hometown to its knees.

Ichabod Crane is resurrected and pulled two and a half centuries through time to unravel a mystery that dates all the way back to the founding fathers.