Nine gripping TV mysteries to stream tonight

A season-long, twisty tale to puzzle over until the shocking reveal – what, it was that guy?! Or better yet, that smug feeling of superiority you have when you figure it out first.

So strap in into your armchair and get those little grey cells working with these addictive mystery TV shows you can stream right now. I’ll even lend you my deerstalker.

AND THEN THERE WERE NONE (iTunes)

Agatha Christie’s classic tale was revamped in 2015 as a three-part BBC miniseries that is genuinely scary and more than a little bit gothic, starring Game of Thrones’ Charles Dance, Sam Neill, Aidan Turner and Australian actor Maeve Dermody. Set in 1939, eight strangers are invited to a dinner on an isolated island but when they arrive, their hosts aren’t present. Not long after a recorded message accuses them all of murder, one of them dies from poisoning. Not many, if any, will survive the night.

TRUE DETECTIVE (Foxtel Now)

The narrative might jump on all over the place – the better to confound you – but every moment of the first season of True Detective is gripping, always imbued with a sense of unease. Following two homicide cops in Louisiana, the story tracks their investigation into the murder of a prostitute 17 years earlier, her body posed as if in prayer, surrounded by an elaborate twig latticework. Then a similar crime scene turns up.

MARCELLA (Netflix)

Solving a series of three cold case murders is made all the harder when you’re an amnesiac detective prone to rage blackouts. When we first meet Marcella, she’s covered in blood and forest detritus, barely remembering that she has buried a murder victim in Hampstead Heath. Not just any murder victim but the pregnant mistress of her estranged husband. Is she the serial killer she’s been chasing all these years?

TWIN PEAKS (Stan)

“She’s dead, wrapped in plastic”. Ever since those iconic words were spoken almost three decades ago, Twin Peaks has set the template for so many TV mysteries that came after. Who killed Laura Palmer was the question everyone was asking in 1990. A popular homecoming queen with a secret dark side – like, really dark – there are numerous suspects in her death, including her cheating boyfriend, the quiet biker she was having an affair with, a local drug dealer or even her psychiatrist. Often it’s those who are closest to us who hurt us the most.

THE SINNER (Netflix)

To onlookers, Cora Tannetti (Jessica Biel) seems like a normal mum — she’s always a little too rushed and her in-laws are too close. On a family outing to the beach, she turns from cutting up a pear for her son to madly stabbing a young doctor nearby. Afterwards, she has no memory of the event. She pleads guilty to second-degree murder but the mysteries of her past, and what drove her to such an action proves too intriguing to the cops on the case.

DARK (Netflix)

This German series is a real puzzler, with supernatural forces and time travel thrown in for good measure, upping the mystery stakes. When children start to vanish from a small town, it exposes the raw emotional state of several relationships – cheating partners, vicious secrets and generations-old grudges. And then there’s the sprawling cave system under the town.

THE FALL (Netflix)

While she’s had a brilliant career after The X-Files, it was The Fall that made people realise that Gillian Anderson can embody a character as iconic as Dana Scully. Brilliant investigator Stella Gibson is seconded to Belfast on a 28-day review into the investigation of Alice Monroe’s death and drawn into a cat-and-mouse game with a seemingly respectable family man with dark, serial killer-y urges.

DAMAGES (Amazon Prime Video)

Ellen Parsons (Rose Byrne) is a promising young lawyer who’s hired by the most influential and intimidating lawyer in town, Patty Hewes (Glenn Close). It should be one of the best moves of her career. But before her time with Patty is up, she’ll find herself sitting in an interrogation room, soaked in someone else’s blood while her fiance lies dead in their bathroom. Damages ran for five seasons and features some of the most compelling characters on TV, especially Close’s villainous and emotionally fragile Patty.

STATE OF PLAY (Stan)

Forget about the American film remake, the original BBC miniseries is the bomb. Full of political intrigue and really tight plotting, you will end up bingeing State of Play in one sitting, even when you didn’t mean to. When two seemingly unrelated killings occur one morning – a young researcher on the Underground and a young black man in an alley – it sets off a team of reporters who sniff out a wide-ranging conspiracy.

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