Hulu’s Number 1 in the World Crime Thriller Is ‘NCIS’ Meets ‘Mindhunter

A new Hulu crime thriller has one of the most memorable opening scenes I’ve watched recently, and I need to talk about it. It’s Halloween, and kids are trick-or-treating in New York City, caught up in the magic and the promise of candy. Catherine Grace (Lola Petticrew) runs back into her apartment and says she’s going to grab some full-sized chocolate bars. At the same time, she’s holding her latest victim, Caleb Easton, hostage.

That’s how Furious begins, and it immediately makes you wonder who Catherine is, why she’s doing this, and whether she’ll be caught. It’s also number 1 on the Disney+ chart on Flix Patrol, with Ryan Murphy’s thriller The Shards at number two. I’ve been a fan of showrunner and creator Elizabeth Meriwether for a while, as she co-created the sitcom Single Parents and created New Girl. Along with those quirky stories about the highs and lows of parenthood, friendship, and love, she created the Hulu miniseries The Dropout starring Amanda Seyfried as Elizabeth Holmes, the founder of Theranos. Meriweather’s new series, Furious, arrived on July 27, 2026, on Hulu. It reminds me of two other series.

Hulu’s ‘Furious’ Blends Elements From Several Popular Crime Thriller Series

Hulu Furious crime thriller streaming success

Somewhat based on the 1987 thriller movie Black Widow, Furious is about Alice Black (Emmy Rossum), a new FBI agent who starts investigating Catherine Grace (Lola Petticrew), a serial killer. As soon as I started watching the first episode, I was reminded of both the long-running CBS procedural NCIS and the Netflix thriller series Mindhunter.

Alice’s scenes with Danny Kelly (Scoot McNairy), a cop she used to work with at the NYPD, feel like they could appear in a show like NCIS, as they share funny banter about their workaholic tendencies. It’s clear that they need to maintain a sense of humor in what is a bleak and harrowing field, as otherwise, it would be hard to get through each day.

Like the main characters on NCIS, Alice and Danny have a unique dynamic from working together for years and experiencing things that others never have to. They have a closeness that might have been impossible to achieve otherwise, but they maintain an emotional distance from each other, too. That ensures that every piece of dialogue they exchange is compelling.

Alice’s scenes with Nora Washington (Quincy Tyler Bernstine), who is in charge of an FBI unit, explore the same question as Mindhunter: is it possible to learn how a serial killer thinks, and could that knowledge alter how criminals are prosecuted? A brief scene of Nora singing in the car emphasizes how devastating this kind of job is and how you have to find small moments of hope when you can.

What makes Furious stand out is that, after we learn Catherine’s motivation (which happens fairly early on), we find out more about Alice’s background. Along with being a crime thriller that moves quickly, the series explores mental health, the legal system, the everyday work of being an FBI agent or detective, trauma, and loneliness. While we see Alice celebrating her sister’s engagement, they aren’t close, and Alice shares that her coworkers and friends have stopped talking to her after a traumatic event from her past. It’s heartbreaking to see how isolated she is, and the story follows her attempts to move on and focus on her job along with her hopes of catching Catherine. Even just a brief scene of Alice returning to her dark, empty apartment is powerful.

‘Furious’ Has An Incredible and Powerful Cast

Emmy Rossum and Quincy Tyler Bernstine in Furious

After nine seasons playing the burdened older daughter Fiona Gallagher on Shameless, Emmy Rossum impresses as Alice in Furious, a role that explores the disturbing nature of trauma. Quincy Tyler Bernstine, who played Detective Perry on Ray Donovan and Tameika Washington on Power and Power Book II: Ghost, is another standout.

The Furious cast includes Rob Delaney, who plays Oliver Charles, a wealthy lawyer whom Catherine meets and manipulates. Scoot McNairy, who has a background in crime thrillers including True Detective Season 3 and Narcos Mexico, is fantastic as the person whom Alice interacts with regularly.

While the subject matter of Furious is definitely tough to watch, I’m interested to see how Alice and Catherine’s stories will wrap up in the last two episodes. If you catch up, then you can watch Episode 7 on Aug. 24, 2026, and Episode 8 on August 31.