Is Breaking Bad really still the best crime series ever made?

By consensus, yes - and that consensus has held for over a decade against serious challengers. Better Call Saul (same universe, same showrunner) is arguably its equal in craft; watch Breaking Bad first regardless. If you want something that pushes the claim, True Detective Season 1 and Mindhunter are the most credible counterarguments.

What's the best Indian crime drama for someone who wants something more grounded than Mirzapur?

Paatal Lok and Kohrra are the two to beat. Paatal Lok is wider in scope and angrier; Kohrra is more contained and emotionally colder. Scam 1992 is the right pick if white-collar crime is more your speed - it's the best-reviewed Indian original on SonyLIV by a significant margin.

STREAMING · CRIME

Best Crime Dramas in the World Right Now

Crime drama is the genre that every culture keeps reinventing from first principles - the same bones, radically different flesh. This list crosses five languages and four continents to find the shows that understand something true about power, violence, and consequence, not just procedural mechanics.

Updated 8 June 2026

01Breaking Bad (2008)9.5
The still-undefeated template for prestige crime television - a transformation story so precisely engineered that every rewatch reveals another layer of foreshadowing.
SeriesStreaming on NetflixRead the verdict →
02Paatal Lok (2020)8.2
India's answer to The Wire - a single murder case used to dissect caste, class, and media complicity with more precision than any courtroom drama manages.
SeriesStreaming on Prime VideoRead the verdict →
03True Detective: Season 1 (2014)9.1
McConaughey and Harrelson in a Southern Gothic murder mystery that works as philosophy lecture and landscape film as much as crime procedural.
SeriesStreaming on JioHotstar
04Mindhunter (2017)8.6
David Fincher's FBI serial-killer procedural is less about the crimes than the men who convinced themselves they could think like monsters - and what that does to them.
SeriesStreaming on Netflix
05The Glory (2022)8.1
A Korean revenge drama where every move is premeditated years in advance - the crime unfolds backwards, and that's the entire pleasure.
SeriesStreaming on NetflixRead the verdict →
06Scam 1992 (2020)8.9
Hansal Mehta charts Harshad Mehta's Bombay-to-Dalal-Street rise with a biopic bravado that makes financial fraud feel like a heist film.
SeriesStreaming on SonyLIVRead the verdict →
07Ozark (2017)8.3
A money-launderer trapped in escalating cartel pressure in the Missouri Ozarks - slower than Breaking Bad, darker, and Julia Garner's Ruth Langmore is a series-defining supporting turn.
SeriesStreaming on Netflix
08Kohrra (2023)8.0
A Punjab whodunit that hides its investigation inside a grief study - the mystery is almost secondary to what the show understands about small-town silence.
SeriesStreaming on NetflixRead the verdict →

Quick Answers

Is Breaking Bad really still the best crime series ever made?: By consensus, yes - and that consensus has held for over a decade against serious challengers. Better Call Saul (same universe, same showrunner) is arguably its equal in craft; watch Breaking Bad first regardless. If you want something that pushes the claim, True Detective Season 1 and Mindhunter are the most credible counterarguments.
What's the best Indian crime drama for someone who wants something more grounded than Mirzapur?: Paatal Lok and Kohrra are the two to beat. Paatal Lok is wider in scope and angrier; Kohrra is more contained and emotionally colder. Scam 1992 is the right pick if white-collar crime is more your speed - it's the best-reviewed Indian original on SonyLIV by a significant margin.

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