Top 250 Tv Shows Like Painkiller
Freedom is never free
A list of the best tv shows similar to Painkiller. If you liked Painkiller then you may also like: Fire Country, Law & Order, Criminal Minds, Supernatural, The Sopranos and many more great tv shows featured on this list.
When an experimental lethal-injection has the unexpected result of making an inmate immortal, the most vicious convicts steal it to take over the prison and the world.
Law & Order
In cases ripped from the headlines, police investigate serious and often deadly crimes, weighing the evidence and questioning the suspects until someone is taken into custody. The district attorney's office then builds a case to convict the perpetrator by proving the person guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. Working together, these expert teams navigate all sides of the complex criminal justice system to make New York a safer place.
Criminal Minds
An elite team of FBI profilers analyze the country's most twisted criminal minds, anticipating their next moves before they strike again. The Behavioral Analysis Unit's most experienced agent is David Rossi, a founding member of the BAU who returns to help the team solve new cases.
Supernatural
When they were boys, Sam and Dean Winchester lost their mother to a mysterious and demonic supernatural force. Subsequently, their father raised them to be soldiers. He taught them about the paranormal evil that lives in the dark corners and on the back roads of America ... and he taught them how to kill it. Now, the Winchester brothers crisscross the country in their '67 Chevy Impala, battling every kind of supernatural threat they encounter along the way.
The Sopranos
The story of New Jersey-based Italian-American mobster Tony Soprano and the difficulties he faces as he tries to balance the conflicting requirements of his home life and the criminal organization he heads. Those difficulties are often highlighted through his ongoing professional relationship with psychiatrist Jennifer Melfi. The show features Tony's family members and Mafia associates in prominent roles and story arcs, most notably his wife Carmela and his cousin and protégé Christopher Moltisanti.
Law & Order: Special Victims Unit
In the criminal justice system, sexually-based offenses are considered especially heinous. In New York City, the dedicated detectives who investigate these vicious felonies are members of an elite squad known as the Special Victims Unit. These are their stories.
True Detective
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.
American Justice
Hosted by Bill Kurtis, American Justice looks at groundbreaking criminal cases, presenting viewers with an inside look at the case through the eyes of those directly involved, ranging from law enforcement officers to the victims.
Baywatch Nights
Baywatch Nights is an American police and science fiction drama series that aired in syndication from 1995 to 1997. Created by Douglas Schwartz, David Hasselhoff, and Gregory J. Bonann, the series is a spin-off from the popular television series, Baywatch.
Big Sky
Private detective Cassie Dewell partners with ex-cop Jenny Hoyt on a search for two sisters who have been kidnapped by a truck driver on a remote highway in Montana. When they discover that these are not the only girls who have disappeared in the area, they must race against the clock to stop the perpetrator before another woman is taken.
Criminal Minds: Beyond Borders
Criminal Minds: Beyond Borders is a drama about the specialized International Division of the FBI tasked with solving crimes and coming to the rescue of Americans who find themselves in danger while abroad.
Criminal Minds: Suspect Behavior
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.
The Equalizer
Robert McCall is a former agent of a secret government agency who is now running his own private crime fighting operation where he fashions himself as "The Equalizer." It is a service for victims of the system who have exhausted all possible means of seeking justice and have nowhere to go. McCall promises to even out the odds for them.
FlashForward
When the entire world blacks out for two minutes and seventeen seconds, everyone sees a flash of their own future 6 months from the present. For some, the future is hopeful, while for others, it is unexpected. For a few, it doesn't seem to exist. Knowing their fate will alter each person's life, destinies will be changed.
Forever
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.
Fringe
FBI Special Agent Olivia Dunham, brilliant but formerly institutionalized scientist Walter Bishop and his scheming, reluctant son Peter uncover a deadly mystery involving a series of unbelievable events and realize they may be a part of a larger, more disturbing pattern that blurs the line between science fiction and technology.
Gangs of London
When the head of a criminal organisation, Finn Wallace is assassinated, the sudden power vacuum his death creates threatens the fragile peace between the intricate web of gangs operating on the streets of the city. Now it’s up to the grieving, volatile and impulsive Sean Wallace to restore control and find those responsible for killing his father.
Hunter
Hunter is an American police drama television series created by Frank Lupo, and starring Fred Dryer as Sgt. Rick Hunter and Stepfanie Kramer as Sgt. Dee Dee McCall, which ran on NBC from 1984 to 1991. However, Kramer left after the sixth season to pursue other acting and musical opportunities. In the seventh season, Hunter partnered with two different women officers. The titular character, Sgt. Rick Hunter, was a wily, physically imposing, and often rule-breaking homicide detective with the Los Angeles Police Department. The show's main characters, Hunter and McCall, resolve many of their cases by shooting dead the perpetrators. The show's executive producer during the first season was Stephen J. Cannell, whose company produced the series.
Justified
A character drama based on the 2001 Elmore Leonard short story "Fire in the Hole." Leonard's tale centers around U.S. Marshal Raylan Givens of Kentucky, a quiet but strong-willed official of the law. The tale covers his high-stakes job, as well as his strained relationships with his ex-wife and father.
Law & Order: Criminal Intent
The third installment of the “Law & Order” franchise takes viewers deep into the minds of its criminals while following the intense psychological approaches the Major Case Squad uses to solve its crimes.
Lucifer
Bored and unhappy as the Lord of Hell, Lucifer Morningstar abandoned his throne and retired to Los Angeles, where he has teamed up with LAPD detective Chloe Decker to take down criminals. But the longer he's away from the underworld, the greater the threat that the worst of humanity could escape.
Major Crimes
Major Crimes explores how the American justice system approaches the art of the deals as law enforcement officers and prosecutors work together to score a conviction. Los Angeles Police Captain Sharon Raydor heads up a special squad within the LAPD that deals with high-profile or particularly sensitive crimes.
Manifest
After landing from a turbulent but routine flight, the crew and passengers of Montego Air Flight 828 discover five years have passed in what seemed like a few hours. As their new realities become clear, a deeper mystery unfolds and some of the returned passengers soon realize they may be meant for something greater than they ever thought possible.
The Mentalist
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.
Minder
This comedy drama series featured Terry McCann, a former boxer with a conviction for G.B.H., and Arthur Daley, a second-hand car dealer with an eye for a nice little earner. Alongside his many business ventures, Arthur would regularly hire Terry out as a minder or bodyguard, later replaced by nephew, Ray Daley.
MINDHUNTER
An agent in the FBI's Elite Serial Crime Unit develops profiling techniques as he pursues notorious serial killers and rapists.
Orange Is the New Black
A crime she committed in her youthful past sends Piper Chapman to a women's prison, where she trades her comfortable New York life for one of unexpected camaraderie and conflict in an eccentric group of fellow inmates.
The Player
An action-packed Las Vegas thriller about a former military operative turned security expert who is drawn into a high-stakes game where an organization of wealthy individuals gamble on his ability to stop some of the biggest crimes imaginable from playing out. Can he take them down from the inside and get revenge for the death of his wife, or is it true what they say: the House always wins.
Police Woman
Sergeant “Pepper"” Anderson, an undercover cop for the Criminal Conspiracy Unit of the Los Angeles Police Department, poses undercover from mob girl to prostitute.
Prison Break
Due to a political conspiracy, an innocent man is sent to death row and his only hope is his brother, who makes it his mission to deliberately get himself sent to the same prison in order to break the both of them out, from the inside out.
Profiler
Profiler is an American crime drama that aired on NBC from 1996 to 2000. The series follows the exploits of a criminal profiler working with the FBI's fictional Violent Crimes Task Force based in Atlanta, Georgia. Ally Walker starred as profiler Dr. Samantha Waters during the first three seasons, and was later replaced by Jamie Luner as profiler Dr. Rachel Burke during the show's final season. Robert Davi, Roma Maffia, Peter Frechette, Erica Gimpel and Julian McMahon co-starred throughout the show's run. Caitlin Wachs played Dr. Waters daughter for the first two seasons, a role taken over by Evan Rachel Wood in 1998. Profiler shares a similar lead character and premise with the Fox Network series Millennium, created by Chris Carter. Both shows premiered at the beginning of the 1996–97 television season.
Ray Donovan
Set in the sprawling mecca of the rich and famous, Ray Donovan does the dirty work for LA's top power players, and makes their problems disappear. His father's unexpected release from prison sets off a chain of events that shakes the Donovan family to its core.
Riptide
Riptide is an American TV detective series that ran on NBC from December 3, 1983 to August 22, 1986, starring Perry King, Joe Penny, and Thom Bray. Riptide was created by Frank Lupo and Stephen J. Cannell, and produced by Stephen J. Cannell Productions in the wake of Magnum PI's success. The main theme was composed by Mike Post and Pete Carpenter. A mid-season replacement, it debuted as a two-hour TV movie in early 1984.
The Sinner
In a small New York town, a haunted detective hunts for answers about perplexing crimes while wrestling with his own demons.
Witches of East End
The adventures of Joanna Beauchamp and her two adult daughters Freya and Ingrid -- both of whom unknowingly are their family's next generation of witches -- who lead seemingly quiet, uneventful modern day lives in Long Island's secluded seaside town of East Haven. When Freya becomes engaged to a young, wealthy newcomer, a series of events forces Joanna to admit to her daughters they are, in fact, powerful and immortal witches.
The X-Files
The exploits of FBI Special Agents Fox Mulder and Dana Scully who investigate X-Files: marginalized, unsolved cases involving paranormal phenomena. Mulder believes in the existence of aliens and the paranormal while Scully, a skeptic, is assigned to make scientific analyses of Mulder's discoveries that debunk Mulder's work and thus return him to mainstream cases.
Ultraviolet
With the growing threat of viral epidemic and the possibility of worldwide environmental catastrophe, humanity has an unprecedented ability to destroy itself, and vampires need to take control of their threatened food source. CIB, an elite government force, has been formed to combat the vampire threat. But when eternal life is offered, no one is beyond temptation...
Nash Bridges
Fun-loving San Francisco Police Department investigator Nash Bridges is part of the elite Special Investigations Unit. He tackles crime using his keen sense of humor and charm. Joe Dominguez comes out of retirement to become Bridges' wisecracking yet more rule-abiding partner.
Sledge Hammer!
Sledge Hammer! is an American satirical police sitcom produced by New World Television that ran for two seasons on ABC from 1986 to 1988. The series was created by Alan Spencer and stars David Rasche as Inspector Sledge Hammer, a preposterous caricature of the standard "cop on the edge" character. Al Jean and Mike Reiss, best known for their work on The Simpsons, wrote for the show and worked as story editors.
Happy Tree Friends
This action and adventure comedy is drawn in simple appearance and combines cute forest animals with extreme graphic violence. Each episode revolves around the characters enduring accidental events of bloodshed, pain, dismemberment and/or death.
Miami Vice
The story of the Miami Police Department's vice squad and its efforts to end drug trafficking and prostitution, centered on the unlikely partnership of Sonny Crockett and Ricardo Tubbs - who first meet when Tubbs is undercover in a drug cartel.
The Streets of San Francisco
Two police officers, the older Lt. Stone and the young upstart Inspector Keller, investigate murders and other serious crimes in San Francisco. Stone would become a second father to Keller as he learned the rigors and procedures of detective work.
The Untouchables
Special Agent Eliot Ness and his elite team of incorruptible agents battle organized crime in 1930s Chicago.
Superjail!
An eccentric warden and his staff run a bizarre maximum security prison full of dangerous prisoners.
Wild Palms
Harry Wyckoff is about to become a player in a dark and terrifying battle where everything is at stake and no one is who they seem.
Human Trafficking
The story of an American Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent going undercover to stop an organization from trafficking people, and the struggles of three trafficked women.
Perception
Dr. Daniel Pierce, a neuroscientist and professor, is recruited to help the federal government crack difficult cases. His intimate knowledge of human behavior and masterful understanding of the mind give him an extraordinary ability to read people, but his eccentric view of the world and less-than-stellar social skills can often interfere with his work.
Hannibal
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.
Line of Duty
A drama about the investigations of AC-12, a controversial police anticorruption unit.
Crossing Lines
Through globalization, many countries have been opened and barriers removed to ensure easy trade, travel and cultural diversity. However, this openness has given opportunities to criminals looking to exploit the system and ultimately threaten our global safety. As Europe has become a "safe house" for criminals eluding law enforcers, a special kind of law enforcement team is needed to handle specific ongoing crimes on a global level. "Crossing Lines" is the story of one such team, made up of five international cops, headed by Captain Daniel. The team - comprised of individuals who have little in common - must learn to live and work under the most dangerous and potentially deadly conditions. Housed in an unused storage section underneath the ICC, this mismatched team faces bureaucratic, jurisdictional and cultural obstacles while traversing continents in pursuit of justice.
You, Me and the Apocalypse
When the news is announced that a comet is on an unavoidable collision course with Earth, the most hilarious and unexpected chain of events imaginable is set in motion.
Inside the World's Toughest Prisons
Crime journalist Raphael Rowe goes behind the bars of some of the world’s most notorious and toughest prisons. Immersing himself in maximum security facilities around the world to live as a prisoner, he encounters the inmates locked up for their crimes and meets the men and women on the right side of law tasked with keeping the criminals behind bars.
The Alienist
New York, 1896. Police commissioner Theodore Roosevelt brings together criminal psychologist Dr. Laszlo Kreizler, newspaper illustrator John Moore and secretary Sara Howard to investigate several murders of male prostitutes.
Love After Lockup
Couples finally meet their fiancé upon prison release. Once the bars are gone, will their love survive after lockup on the rocky road to the altar? Will the inmates ditch their mate as they face shocking "firsts", fights & family drama! Is it true love or just a con?
Condor
Young CIA analyst Joe Turner has his idealism tested when he learns that the CIA has been using an algorithm he developed to spy on American citizens, leading the organization to a terrorist plot that threatens the lives of millions. Inspired by Sydney Pollack’s 1975 political thriller Three Days of the Condor.
Firestarter: Rekindled
A young woman who has the ability to start fires with her mind, must now face the trauma of her childhood by battling with a group of very talented children and their cruel leader, John Rainbird. Firestarter: Rekindled is a 2002 television miniseries and the sequel to the film adaptation of the Stephen King novel Firestarter. It stars Marguerite Moreau as now-grownup Charlie McGee, Danny Nucci, Dennis Hopper, and Malcolm McDowell as Charlie's old nemesis from the original story, John Rainbird. It debuted as a Sci Fi Pictures two-night miniseries on the Sci Fi Channel.
Bulletproof
Police duo Bishop and Pike are two best mates bonded by the same moral code, despite their differences. Packed full of humour, action and emotion, Bulletproof is about friendship, conspiracies and ghosts from the past.
Too Old to Die Young
Detective Martin Jones, who leads a double life as a killer for hire in Los Angeles' deadly underground, suffers an existential crisis which leads him deeper into a blood splattered world of violence.
I Am a Killer
Death row inmates convicted of capital murder give a firsthand account of their crimes in this documentary series.
Bitter Lands
The love story of Zuleyha, who grew up without a father and works with Yilmaz as an auxiliary weaver in order to earn money for her brother, a gambler. The lives of these two young people blinded by the love of one ordinary night will turn into a dark nightmare. This nightmare will take them first from Istanbul and far away, and later to the estate of the Yaman family. In the first episode of the series, Yilmaz and Zuleyha set out to work on the Yaman estate. However, because of one of Zuleyha's lies - the lives of all of them will change radically.
Prodigal Son
The son of a notorious serial killer becomes an acclaimed criminal psychologist who uses his unique insight into how killers think to help the NYPD.
Conversations with a Killer: The Ted Bundy Tapes
A unique look inside the mind of an infamous serial killer with this cinematic self-portrait crafted from statements made by Ted Bundy, including present-day interviews, archival footage and audio recordings from death row.
Very Scary People
A chronicle of the twisted lives of some of the most frightening, diabolical characters in recent history. Each two-hour episode traces the heinous, criminal acts of these elusive miscreants and the eventual road to justice.
Defending Jacob
A family's lives are irreparably disrupted when the 14-year-old son is accused of murdering a fellow classmate.
Killer Inside: The Mind of Aaron Hernandez
Via interviews with friends, players and insiders, this docuseries examines how Aaron Hernandez went from an NFL star to a convicted killer.
The Stranger
A web of secrets sends family man Adam Price on a desperate quest to uncover the truth about the people closest to him.
Code 404
In the near future, an undercover Detective Inspector gunned down and killed during a botched sting is brought back via an experimental Artificial Intelligence project. Full of glitches, he’s got to track down the person who shot him, prove himself as a cop so as not to get shut down, and save his marriage and his friendship, all with his partner Carver to boot.
Top Dog
A mysterious disappearance makes two completely separate worlds collide, creating an extremely odd couple – the lawyer Emily and recently released convict Teddy. They have two opposing desires. She wants up. He wants out. She wants to secure her future. He wants to leave his old life behind. They are both forced to thi
Law & Order: Organized Crime
Detective Elliot Stabler returns to the NYPD to battle organized crime after a devastating personal loss. Stabler journeys to find absolution and rebuild his life, while leading a new elite task force that is taking apart the city’s most powerful criminal syndicates one by one.
Cyberpunk: Edgerunners
In a dystopia riddled with corruption and cybernetic implants, a talented but reckless street kid strives to become a mercenary outlaw — an edgerunner.
Mayor of Kingstown
In a small Michigan town where the business of incarceration is the only thriving industry, the McClusky family are the power brokers between the police, criminals, inmates, prison guards and politicians in a city completely dependent on prisons and the prisoners they contain.
Whitstable Pearl
With her son grown up, single mom Pearl Nolan decides to pursue her lifelong dream and launches a private detective agency, which she runs from her family's restaurant in the coastal town of Whitstable. Drawn by her caring nature, locals soon flock to her with all manner of cases. But when an old friend dies suspiciously, Pearl finds herself in conflict with gruff new cop in town, DCI Mike McGuire.
Inside Man
A prisoner on death row in the US, a vicar in a quiet English town, and a maths teacher trapped in a cellar cross paths in the most unexpected way.
The Endgame
A high-stakes thriller about Elena Federova, a very recently captured international arms dealer and brilliant criminal mastermind who even in captivity orchestrates a number of coordinated bank heists, and Val Turner, the principled, relentless and socially outcast FBI agent who will stop at nothing to foil her ambitious plan.
Stay Close
When Carlton Flynn vanishes 17 years to the night after Stewart Green did, it sets off a chain reaction in the lives of people connected to both men.
Tulsa King
Just after he is released from prison after 25 years, New York mafia capo Dwight “The General” Manfredi is unceremoniously exiled by his boss to set up shop in Tulsa, Okla. Realizing that his mob family may not have his best interests in mind, Dwight slowly builds a “crew” from a group of unlikely characters, to help him establish a new criminal empire in a place that to him might as well be another planet.
Conversations with a Killer: The John Wayne Gacy Tapes
He dined with the powerful. He preyed on the vulnerable. Beneath a smiling exterior was the horrifying darkness of a sadistic serial killer.
Sprung
A convicted criminal is determined to turn his life around after serving more than two decades in prison. When he is released unexpectedly from prison due to the pandemic with no place to live and the world on lockdown, Jack shelters-in-place with an unlikely group of former inmates, who band together and use their criminal expertise for good.
First Blood
“First Blood" examines some of America’s most notorious serial killers through the prism of their first known kills to reveal what drove them to the moment when violent fantasy and curiosity became a devastating reality.
I Am a Stalker
Convicted stalkers and survivors share harrowing accounts of harassment, abuse and other crimes in this documentary series.
Wong & Winchester
An ex-cop turned private eye, Marissa Wong, ends up being forced to work with Sarah Winchester, an inexperienced young woman fresh out of university. Each episode, the unlikely duo to solve their client’s cases, which often end up being far more dangerous than they first appear.
Mafia Killers With Colin McLaren
Colin McLaren shares stories about his undercover work inside organized crime families; chilling firsthand details about how mafia families operate and why their ruthlessness was often their downfall.
Fire Country
Seeking redemption and a shortened prison sentence, young convict Bode Donovan joins a firefighting program that returns him to his small Northern California hometown, where he and other inmates work alongside elite firefighters to extinguish massive blazes across the region.