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
White Lotus star Michelle Monaghan and Severance star Adam Scott are set to join Robert De Niro in the movie adaptation of the Alex North novel, The Whisper Man. James Ashcroft is set to direct, with Ben Jacoby and Chase Palmer adapting the script. The story revolves around a widower crime writer who looks to his estranged father, a retired former police detective, for help after his 8-year-old son is abducted, only to discover a connection with the decades-old case of a convicted serial killer known as “The Whisper Man.”
TELEVISION/STREAMING
Charlie B. Foster is set to recur in Scarpetta, Prime Video‘s upcoming thriller series starring Nicole Kidman and Jamie Lee Curtis. The actor, who is Jodie Foster's son, plays Wingo, an assistant in the morgue. Based on Patricia Cornwell’s hit books, the series follows Kay Scarpetta (Kidman), the Chief Medical Examiner, as she returns to Virginia and resumes her former position with complex relationships, both personal and professional – including her sister Dorothy (Curtis) – with plenty of grudges and secrets to uncover. Foster joins previously announced cast members Bobby Cannavale, Simon Baker, Rosy McEwen, Jake Cannavale, Ariana DeBose, and Hunter Parrish.
Paramount+ has officially renewed Criminal Minds: Evolution, starring Joe Mantegna, A.J. Cook, Paget Brewster, and Kirsten Vangsness, for a fourth season. The early pickup for the Criminal Minds sequel comes ahead of the crime drama’s Season 3 premiere, which has been set for May 8. The 10-episode third season will feature a time jump, picking up six months after prisoners attack the notorious Sicarius Killer, Elias Voit, leading his restless followers on the dark web to begin wreaking havoc all over the country. In order to stop this nefarious group from killing more innocents, the BAU is forced to work alongside an increasingly unpredictable Voit who has his own agenda.
Netflix has officially greenlit Nemesis, the story of two men on either side of the law: expert criminal, Coltrane Wilder and brilliant police detective, Isaiah Stiles. According to the logline: "What starts as a series that aims to subvert the heist genre at every turn, amped with thrilling life-or-death stakes, family dynamics, and explosive action, actually gives birth to an exploration of what drives us, sustains us, and ultimately destroys us." Matthew Law (Abbott Elementary) and Y’Ian Noel (Lady in the Lake) have been tapped for the two leads. Rounding out the cast are two Power alums, Domenick Lombardozzi and Jonnie Park, as well as Cleopatra Coleman (Black Rabbit), Tre Hale (All-American) and Ariana Guerra (CSI: Vegas).
British crime thriller Unforgotten has been renewed for season 7. The program follows a team of London detectives led by DCI Cassie Stuart (Nicola Walker in Series 1–4), DCI Jessie James (Sinéad Keenan in Series 5-6) and DI Sunny Khan (Sanjeev Bhaskar) as they solve cold cases of disappearance and murder. Each series deals with a new case, introducing seemingly unconnected characters who are gradually revealed to have some relationship with the victim. As the murder mystery unfolds, the emotional ramifications of the crime on the lives of those affected are also explored. Keenan and Khan are both expected to return for the seventh season.
Prime Video has officially released the trailer for the third and final season of Bosch: Legacy. The series will debut with four episodes on March 27, followed by two new episodes every Thursday until the series finale on April 17. Based on Michael Connelly’s bestselling novels, Desert Star (2022) and The Black Ice (1993), the final season will see Harry Bosch (Titus Welliver) facing one of his most challenging cases yet, the murder investigation of Kurt Dockweiler, which unearths dangerous secrets.
The deep cuts on CBS's series slate include two high-profile cancellations, the FBI spinoffs, FBI: Most Wanted, which is ending after six seasons, and FBI: International, canceled after four seasons. Both Wolf Entertainment/Universal television series are headlined by big stars, Dylan McDermott (Most Wanted) and Jesse Lee Soffer (International), who had moved to the offshoots from other Dick Wolf shows, Law & Order: Organized Crime and Chicago P.D., respectively. The cancellations leave the highly rated mothership FBI, now in its seventh season on CBS, and a potential new offshoot, FBI: CIA, now in development. It is unclear whether Universal TV and Wolf Entertainment will shop the two FBI spinoffs, which still deliver solid viewership numbers, to other platforms.
PODCASTS/RADIO
The Sidedoor podcast focused on "Poison and Poisonability" with guests Kristen Frederick-Frost, curator of science at the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History, Lisa Perrin, author and illustrator of The League of Lady Poisoners, and Deborah Blum, author of The Poisoner's Handbook. When we think of serial killers, we tend to think of men—Ted Bundy, Jeffrey Dahmer, Jack the Ripper. But in the 1800s, the deadliest killers often wore corsets. In fact, so many women were arrested for serial poisoning that the era became known as the “Golden Age of Arsenic.” How did these women evade capture for so long? And how did their murders help give rise to modern criminal forensics?
On Read or Dead, Katie McLain Horner and honorary "reading assassin" Liberty Hardy talk about mysteries with feminist themes for Women’s History Month.
The BBC's Shedunnit podcast featured a look at "The Mystery Short Story: a consideration of crime fiction’s more compact incarnation."
Paul Burke reviewed twelve of the latest crime fiction titles on Crime Time FM.
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