20 best shows like Once Upon a Crime (1992)

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.

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.

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.

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

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.

Murphy is a flawed and irreverent woman who just happens to be blind and is the only “witness” to the murder of her drug-dealing friend, Tyson. When the police dismiss her story, she sets out with her dog, Pretzel, to find the killer while also managing her colorful dating life and the job she hates at Breaking Blind — the guide-dog school owned by her overprotective parents.

Comedy drama following a mismatched pair of police officers who disagree on everything with their partner, from policing to their personal life.

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.

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.

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.

Neal Caffrey, a con man, forger and thief, is captured after a three-year game of cat and mouse with the FBI. With only months left serving a four-year sentence, he escapes to look for Kate, his girlfriend. Peter Burke, the FBI agent who initially captured Caffrey, finds and returns him to prison. This time, Caffrey proposes a deal with the FBI, as part of a work-release program. After some hesitation, Burke agrees, and thus begins this unconventional arrangement where Caffrey helps Burke apprehend white collar criminals.

A pie-maker, with the power to bring dead people back to life, solves murder mysteries with his alive-again childhood sweetheart, a cynical private investigator, and a lovesick waitress.

Several skeletons are discovered on the tracks of a closed train station. However, one of the dead victims walks into the police station. Where did all these dead bodies come from, and who is committing all of these murders? The world split into two on the night of a murder 12 years ago, and Do Won chases after the hidden truth in the parallel universe. This drama shows the contrast between two different worlds, divided by two different choices.

Within the walls of an interrogation room and with time running out, London investigators go after three suspects, each accused of a grievous crime.

Set in the present, the series offers a bold, subversive take on Archie, Betty, Veronica and their friends, exploring the surreality of small-town life, the darkness and weirdness bubbling beneath Riverdale’s wholesome facade.

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.

Subversive, darkly comedic drama Big Little Lies tells the tale of three mothers of first graders whose apparently perfect lives unravel to the point of murder.

Sherlock has a peculiar character flaw. She does not open her heart to strangers. She is Japanese, but was born in Britain. She now works as an investigation consultant for the police department. Wato Tachibana is an excellent surgeon and is guided by the principal of justice. Sherlock and Wato Tachibana get to know each other through a case and begin to rely on each other.

Keen Eddie is an American action, comedy-drama television series that aired in 2003 on the Fox Network. The series follows a brash NYPD detective who goes to London when one of his cases goes sour and remains to work with New Scotland Yard. The basic premise of the show bears a close resemblance to the popular 1980s British series Dempsey & Makepeace, the only notable difference being that the female partner has been replaced by a female housemate. Stylistically, the series derived inspiration from British feature films by Guy Ritchie, such as Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels and Snatch. The soundtrack and incidental music for the first episode was provided by British techno duo Orbital. Daniel Ash of Love and Rockets scored the rest of the series.The series was scheduled to premiere during the 2002–2003 television season, but was postponed and premiered in summer 2003. The series was then moved to Thursdays with its seventh episode to help improve its ratings, but Fox canceled the series due to its low ratings of 5.1 million viewers.The American cable network Bravo picked up the series to begin airing in January 2004, including the six episodes never aired on Fox. All thirteen episodes of the series were released on DVD by Paramount Home Entertainment on September 7, 2004. Unfortunately, the original score was replaced due to music licensing issues.

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.

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.

Adrian Monk was once a rising star with the San Francisco Police Department, legendary for using unconventional means to solve the department's most baffling cases. But after the tragic (and still unsolved) murder of his wife Trudy, he developed an extreme case of obsessive-compulsive disorder. Now working as a private consultant, Monk continues to investigate cases in the most unconventional ways.

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.

Detective Charlie Hudson teams up with what he calls his "highly trained law enforcement animal" German Shepherd dog named Rex who he prefers to team up with because he doesn't talk his ear off.

In the interview room, detectives go head-to-head with suspects and try to get to the truth—even if it means breaking the rules and risking it all.

The young "Commisario" detective Salve Montalbano, based in a village, solves mysterious crimes in Sicilia.

A bright-eyed New York lawyer takes his first big case defending an eccentric poetry professor accused of murdering his wife.

The world's leading deception researcher, Dr. Cal Lightman, studies facial expression, body language and tone of voice to determine when a person is lying and why, which helps law enforcement and government agencies uncover the truth. But his skills also make it easier for him to deceive others.

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.

Doctor Henry Morgan, New York City’s star medical examiner, has a secret. He doesn't just study the dead to solve criminal cases, he does it to solve the mystery that has eluded him for 200 years—the answer to his own inexplicable immortality. This long life has given Henry remarkable observation skills which impresses his new partner, Detective Jo Martinez. Each week, a new case and their budding friendship will reveal layers of Henry’s long and colorful past. Only his best friend and confidant, Abe knows Henry’s secret.

Set in a 1950s Britain rising from the ashes of the Blitz into the grip of a new Cold War, our beekeeping duo stumble into a world of murder, undercover agents and cold war conspiracy. Tuppence is a woman who sees adventure round every corner, throwing herself head first into every mystery with passion and fervour, determined to get to the truth no matter what it takes, much to the dismay of her more cautious husband Tommy.

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.

The super-charged comedy-horror series is a modern take on the classic whodunit with a killer cast. 

Detective Lieutenant Everett Backstrom is a man with no filter. After a five-year exile to the traffic division for offensive behavior, he has returned from disgrace to lead Portland's newly minted S.C.U. Tasked with navigating the city's most sensitive and serious cases, he must solve each crime as he tries, and fails, to change his own self-destructive behavior. Based on renowned Swedish criminologist and novelist Leif G.W. Persson’s hit series of books of the same name.

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.

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.

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.

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.

A retired FBI serial-profiler joins the mysterious Millennium Group, a team of underground ex-law enforcement experts dedicated to fighting against the ever-growing forces of evil and darkness in the world.

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

A diverse band of Nazi Hunters living in 1977 New York City discover that hundreds of high ranking Nazi officials are living among us and conspiring to create a Fourth Reich in the U.S. The eclectic team of Hunters set out on a bloody quest to bring the Nazis to justice and thwart their new genocidal plans.

Two sisters discover disturbing family secrets after a string of mysterious deaths occur on a luxury ship traveling from Spain to Brazil in the 1940s.

Jonathan Creek follows the story of Madeline Magellan, an investigative journalist. Like most journalists, she sticks her nose in where it isn't wanted, but this is what makes her such a great journalist! While writing a piece about the death of a prominent artist, she happens across a man named Jonathan Creek. Jonathan makes a living inventing magical tricks for magician Adam Klaus, and has a brilliantly lateral mind.

Laura Diamond, a brilliant NYPD homicide detective balances her “Columbo” day job with a crazy family life that includes two unruly twin boys and a soon-to-be ex-husband — also a cop — who just can't seem to sign the divorce papers. Between cleaning up after her boys and cleaning up the streets, she’d be the first to admit she has her “hot mess” moments in this hilariously authentic look at what it really means to be a “working mom” today. Somehow, she makes it all work with the help of her sexy and understanding partner, and things becomes even more complicated when her husband, ironically, becomes her boss at the precinct. For Laura, every day is a high-wire balancing act.

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.

CSI: NY is an American police procedural television series that ran on CBS from September 22, 2004 to February 22, 2013 for a total of nine seasons and 197 original episodes. The show follows the investigations of a team of NYPD forensic scientists and police officers identified as "Crime Scene Investigators".

High-profile district attorney Maya Travis fled L.A. after devastating defeat when prosecuting an A-list actor for double murder. Eight years later, the same celebrity is under suspicion for another murder, and Maya is lured back to the DA’s office for another chance at justice.

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.

A politically sensitive murder forces two disparate detectives into a battle with the Berlin underworld and a confrontation with their own corruption.

A web of secrets sends family man Adam Price on a desperate quest to uncover the truth about the people closest to him.