Top 10 Most Popular Netflix True Crime Documentaries

Top 10 Most Popular Netflix True Crime Documentaries

If you’re looking for the next great true crime show to binge-watch on Netflix, you've come to the right place. There’s been a significant rise in true crime documentaries ever since the streaming world opened up, which has allowed a number of stranger-than-fiction stories to be told. A truly great crime docuseries ropes you in with a fascinating hook, then delves deeper and deeper into the case with each subsequent episode. And while murder is certainly a theme on our list here, there are a few true crime shows focused on non-violent crimes listed below as well.

With Emmy-award winning, powerhouse shows, and limited series like The Crown and The Queen's Gambit, Netflix has mastered the art of streaming, giving the term "binge" a whole new meaning. But a huge part of those accolades is thanks to its unwavering run of excellent true crime documentaries for the past 6 years.

From shows that fans of Don't F**k With Cats will get on well with, to chilling 'did she/did she not do it?' storylines, Netflix is unapologetically the King of true-crime docs. So, if there are some on this list that you've not stayed up until 4 am watching, be sure to check out these series and one-off specials, all based on shocking real events, and all available to watch right now.

What are the best true crime documentaries to watch on Netflix?

1. Evil Genius

2. The Devil Next Door

3. The Two Killings of Sam Cooke

4. Room 2806: The Accusation

5. Killer Inside: The Mind of Aaron Hernandez

6. Night Stalker: The Hunt for a Serial Killer

7. This Is a Robbery: The World’s Biggest Art Heist

8. American Murder: The Family Next Door

9. Don’t F**k With Cats: Hunting an Internet Killer

10. Long Shot

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1. Evil Genius: The True Story Of America's Most Diabolical Bank Heist

Photo: netflix

While docs like Making A Murderer paved the way for those that are thriving today like Tiger King, it's the 2018 Netflix docuseries Evil Genius that is the peak of its true crime genre. Breaking the story down into four episodes, Evil Genius} follows Marjorie Diehl-Armstrong and her involvement in a deadly bank heist in Erie, Pennsylvania, known as the "pizza bomber" case.

Filmmaker Trey Borzillieri covers every facet of this story and it is meticulously broken up into four episodes, exploring each major incident from the case in full depth. As one of the best-told stories of any Netflix documentary along with its sure-to-entertain subject matter, Evil Genius had its work cut out for itself. The doc shows how the citizens of a small Pennsylvania town made headline news. It's an honest look into the lives of ordinary people on the surface, and monsters on the inside.

2. The Devil Next Door

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This documentary series is absolutely fascinating because you're never quite sure what to believe. The Devil Next Door is about a Cleveland man named John Demjanjuk who was accused of being an especially sadistic Nazi concentration camp guard known as "Ivan the Terrible." He was arrested and extradited to Israel to stand trial as a war criminal, and dozens of Holocaust survivors recognized him. But I've read enough crime books to know that eyewitness testimony is the least reliable because our memory is an odd thing that changes over time. I don't want to spoil how it ends, since it's more of a mystery than other true-crime series on this list where the perpetrator is more clear, but suffice to say, the Holocaust is perhaps the greatest crime ever committed, so the stakes are certainly high.

At the center of the documentary is Demjanjuk's attorney, Yoram Sheftel, who referred to himself as "the most hated man in Israel" during the trial. Sheftel himself is Jewish and wears a big Star of David necklace in his interviews, and yet here he was, defending someone who, whether he was that particular Nazi or not, certainly seemed to be guilty of... something. And it's that moral dilemma that elevates this series, along with its closing shot of trees. This is an immensely powerful documentary that will keep you guessing until the very end. Like a book that keeps you turning its pages long after bedtime, The Devil Next Door is the very definition of binge-worthy.

3. The Two Killings of Sam Cooke

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The Two Killings of Sam Cooke is another installment of Netflix’s original music documentary series ReMastered, attempting to create a holistic portrait of American soul legend Sam Cooke—one that doesn’t carelessly whitewash his story just because his crooner soul also appealed to white audiences. In an effort to save his “murdered legacy,” the film examines his early roots in black churches, the evolution of his music, his impressive business acumen, and his political activism later in life, which is believed to have led to his eventual murder.

As Cooke became an increasingly influential cultural figure, his associations with other politically active black figures like Malcolm X, Muhammad Ali, and Jim Brown posed a threat to the racial status quo. Cooke’s murder arises as an integral point of discussion in the film, and the details to this day are still muddy. Just as Cooke began writing politically-minded music—the sequence where “A Change is Gonna Come” plays in the background are breathtaking—his life was tragically cut short, and the film is a reminder of his unbelievable talent, and his embrace of blackness, that history largely forgot.

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4. Room 2806: The Accusation

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Room 2806 is the story of a French politician and former director of the International Monetary Fund, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, and the sexual assault allegation that forced him into resignation. At one time in his career, one of the world's top 25 most powerful people, Strauss-Kahn's scandal is broken down by those who were directly involved. Filmmaker Jalil Lespert sits down with the hotel housekeeper that was assaulted by Strauss-Kahn, Nafissatou Diallo, as she gives a harrowing recount of the traumatic incident. Dating back to 2011, the four episodes in this series explore every twist and turn during Strauss-Kahn's scandal, a story that had major ramifications and led to the birth of detrimental government conspiracies. Discussing both the corruption within politics and sexual assault awareness, this series packs a punch with its storytelling. It takes some of society's most taboo subjects like sexual assault, politics, and corruption and blends them together into a fast pace, binge-able docuseries.

5. Killer Inside: The Mind of Aaron Hernandez

Photo: Youtube

I've been a New England Patriots fan since middle school, so when the news broke that one of our star tight ends had murdered multiple people, it hit me like a Tom Brady spiral in the chest. The Mind of Aaron Hernandez does its best to explain just that and believe me, it's a tough one to explain, if not completely unexplainable. The documentary delves into Hernandez's drug use following his father's death, and how he fell in with a bad crowd despite excelling on the football field. Recruited by dozens of colleges, he tried to his escape his demons by snubbing hometown UConn for Florida, but they only intensified down there, and by the time Hernandez returned to New England to play in the pros, he thought he was untouchable.

When his future brother-in-law Odin Lloyd threatened to reveal Hernandez's ultimate secret—that he was bisexual—he shot him in cold blood. And Lloyd wasn't the only one to fall victim to Hernandez, who likely killed two other people, and nearly took the life of a fourth man. It's one thing to read about this harrowing story as it unfolded in newspapers and magazines, but to see it in video form is a different thing entirely, and one that's absolutely haunting, especially given Hernandez's potential after signing a $40 million deal. This is just a sad story all around, athlete or no athlete.

6. Night Stalker: The Hunt for a Serial Killer

Photo: netflix

Featuring sinister footage and interviews with people involved in the case, this series tells the story of one of the cruelest and most feared killers in LA history. Beneath the sunlit glamour of 1985 LA, the killer known as The Night Stalker committed heinous crimes and evaded capture for a long time, before, two detectives became obsessed with stopping him.

Yeah, you’ll want to lock your doors and windows for this one. Beneath the glitz and glamour of 1985 LA lurked a sinister killer. Richard Ramirez hunted, assaulted, tortured, and murdered his victims in unimaginable ways. Unlike other true crime documentaries, Night Stalker doesn’t seek to humanize its subject.

One glance at Ramirez’s mugshot is enough to send shivers down your spine. Night Stalker taps into our worst fears, and it doesn’t hold back. If you’re one to get scared easily, this is definitely something to watch with others.

7. This Is a Robbery: The World’s Biggest Art Heist

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Oftentimes true-crime series have such heavy, soul-crushing topics. Though fascinating, they can be difficult to watch all in one sitting. A select few true-crime series can have both an enticing storyline and not be incredibly sad or traumatizing; thankfully, Netflix’s new This Is a Robbery: The World’s Biggest Art Heist fits the bill. Similar to Sandi Tan’s documentary Shirkers about missing strips of film, or perhaps even the recent McMillions on HBO, This Is a Robbery is a lost and (sort of) found caper that’s actually quite fun to watch. Instead of the McDonald’s Monopoly game prize or a student film, the missing items here are paintings. Huge museum paintings, to be exact.

This Is a Robbery explores the mystery of the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, a gorgeous spot that’s well-known to most Boston locals but fairly off-the-map for those new to the city. Right away, the first episode does exactly what it’s meant to do: pique your interest. A museum robbery sounds like something straight out of a James Bond film, and This Is a Robbery treats the topic as such. The music growls as talking heads recreate the night of the crime from memory; the dramatization throws us into the museum to witness the paintings being torn from the walls. Was the security guard in on the job? Maybe the ghost of Isabella Stewart Gardner herself? Or perhaps a Boston mob was involved? The mystery of the museum is enough to hook one’s interest, and the mystery starts strong.

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8. American Murder: The Family Next Door

Photo: mmolo

There’s no such thing as a picture-perfect family. In 2018, Chris Watts murdered his pregnant wife Shanann and their two daughters, Celeste and Bella. The heinous crime dominated headlines and tabloids, but this docuseries gives us a more personal look into the Watts family. American Murder strips away the suburban façade and retraces the victims’ final moments through home security footage and personal text messages.

Using police body camera footage and Shanann’s own social media posts and text message exchanges with friends, director Jenny Popplewell pieces together a chilling look at the police investigation.

Haunting. American Murder is a devastating documentary when you read Shanann’s text messages and see family photos of the young daughters. We’re left wondering if we really know those around us — especially the ones we love.

9. Don’t F**k With Cats: Hunting an Internet Killer

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When Mark Zuckerberg invented Facebook to rank college girls, he probably never intended for his social network site to help solve a murder. After a disturbing online video involving cats enrages viewers, Facebook sleuths try to track down the uploader. To their surprise, they discover that this person is not just an animal torturer but a sadistic killer.

Don’t F**k With Cats is a dark documentary about twisted killer Luka Magnotta. In 2010, Magnotta -born Eric Newman- posted a series of disturbing videos to the internet, leading a group of amateur online sleuths and animal rights activists to launch their own investigation - which soon turned into a worldwide manhunt. After years of evading the authorities, Magnotta was convicted of murdering student Lin Jun in 2014 and sentenced to life in prison.

The best true crime documentaries are those that snowball into the most deranged stories. This is it. Each episode gets more bizarre, and you almost feel like the plot was written from Mad Libs.

10. Long Shot

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Among all true crime documentaries, Long Shot holds the impressive and bizarre honor of being the only one in which Curb Your Enthusiasm plays a key role and in which Larry David is a talking head. If that doesn’t hook you into watching the strange case of Juan Catalan’s arrest, not much else will. Director Jacob LaMendola’s film isn’t the most stylish or intricate—in fact, it’s a workmanlike 39 minutes with just enough stage-setting to get to the big twisty payoff.

The biggest moment of emotion comes from a production assistant grappling with the impact he, the low man on the totem pole, had at the time. But it’s not a bad thing. The substance is there. It makes for a great cocktail party anecdote. And honestly, between the lengthier, headier films and drag-your-feet series flooding this subgenre’s market, it’s quite a feat to get in and out with a well-told story in such an elegantly clipped runtime. There are no unsolved questions as to Catalan’s innocence. He didn’t kill anyone. But proving that is where the secondhand fun, the Sherlock-Esque mystery of it all, comes into play. And if Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s nitpicking self somehow time-traveled his way into the 21st century, this is a criminal investigation with the exact kind of oddball detail that he’d love to bury for his fictional investigator to dig right back up again.

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