8 Binge-worthy British Detective Series

Crime doesn’t come much cozier than this lovingly staged 2013 adaptation of G.K Chesterton’s stories featuring a sleuthing priest.

Time-shifted from the 1920s to the 1950s and starring comic-actor Mark Williams in the title role, the series updates the original stories and sets them in a Britain that hasn’t quite yet entered the modern world (though you sense that four young men from Liverpool are already working to change all that).

With a cast of nosy villagers, incompetent cops, and sharp-witted nuns, Father Brown is such great fun that only the most cynical could watch it without a smile.

Many actors have played the role of the dapper Belgian sleuth Hercule Poirot, but nobody has so totally owned the part as the brilliant David Suchet does in these superb ITV productions of the Queen of Crime’s classic novels.

From 1989 to 2013, over the course of 70 episodes, Suchet kept viewers engaged and entertained to such an extent that the broadcast of the final episode practically sparked a day of national mourning.

This powerful police procedural created by Lynda La Plante stars Helen Mirren as DCI Tennison, a tough London detective fighting sexism as well as crime in a Britain far removed from the middle class drawing rooms of Agatha Christie. At times, it feels like you can actually smell the cigarette smoke, beer, and body odor.

Series one was first broadcast in 1991. Based on the case of the horrific 1970s serial killer, The Yorkshire Ripper, it’s a superbly gripping dive into the psychology of a sociopath and those who enable him, though it’s certainly not for the faint-hearted.

These adaptations of Colin Dexter’s excellent whodunits featuring the irascible Oxford-based DCI Morse broke new ground in British television when they began in 1987. Each episode is self-contained and movie-length, something nobody had done before.

Plotted with craftsman’s precision, they star the always watchable John Thaw as the grumpy classical music-loving policeman and Kevin Whateley as his put-upon underling, Lewis.

Each episode moves along through the lovely Oxfordshire locations at a sedate pace (Morse drives a vintage jaguar and likes to call in at cosy pubs), which makes them perfect comfort viewing on a rainy afternoon.

This superbly staged and brilliantly acted drama created by Neil Forsyth tells the story of the 1983 Brinks Matt Robbery. It was a legendary heist that saw a group of hardened South London criminals make off with £26 million in gold bullion.

The tale of the robbery and its aftermath—because selling the gold and laundering the profits was far harder than stealing it—stretches over two series as the dogged DCI Boyce (wonderfully played by Hugh Bonneville) and his ill-assorted team of detectives track the gang of Cockney reprobates across Europe.

An utterly unique mash-up of detective series and sci-fi (it was inspired by a 1960 episode of the Twilight Zone) that sees Manchester police detective Sam Tyler (the always excellent John Simm) hit by a car in 2006 and waking up in 1973.

Here Tyler finds himself an officer in a very different Manchester police force. His division is run by the distinctly non-woke DCI Gene Hunt (Philip Glenister having the time of his life), a man who offends on practically every level.

Each episode sees Tyler helping solve crimes and clashing with Hunt, while all the while trying to find a way back to his own time. A superb soundtrack of 70s British glam rock hits adds to the fun.

Created by best-selling crime-writer Anthony Horowitz (The Magpie Murders), Foyle’s War was designed to fill the slot left vacant when Inspector Morse came to an end. It’s set during World War Two and features Michael Kitchen as DCS Christopher Foyle, an officer in the East Sussex Police.

Methodical and empathetic, Foyle investigates crimes committed by the sort of villains who see war less as a disaster than an opportunity. Later series see Foyle working for MI5 in the early years of the Cold War.

Well-acted, carefully plotted, and with superb attention to detail in the settings and costumes, it’s an under-rated classic.

A trilogy of series created by Chris Chibnall and broadcast in the UK between 2013 and 2018, Broadchurch is set in a fictional coastal town in Dorset.

Starring David Tennant and Olivia Coleman (two of Britain’s most respected actors) as DI Alec Hardy and Sergeant Ellie Miller, Broadchurch features overlapping storylines that link to the murder of an 11-year-old boy.

As well as being a gripping detective story, Broadchurch is also an exploration of grief and an insightful look at the impact of a terrible crime in a small and tight-knit community.