Netflix’s 3-Part Crime Miniseries Instantly Becomes One of 2026’s Biggest Hits

2 weeks ago 10

Image via Netflix

Published Mar 10, 2026, 10:18 AM EDT

Rohan Naahar is a Weekend News Writer for Collider. From Francois Ozon to David Fincher, he'll watch anything once.

He has covered everything from Marvel to the Oscars, and Marvel at the Oscars. He also writes obsessively about the box office, charting the many hits and misses that are released weekly, and how their commercial performance shapes public perception. In his time at Collider, he has also helped drive diversity by writing stories about the multiple Indian film industries, with a goal of introducing audiences to a whole new world of cinema.

Netflix has emerged as a hub for Scandi-noir shows — these are gripping detective dramas typically set in the icy regions of Northern Europe, revolving around a tormented character's quest for the truth. They frequently involve serial killers and ghastly murders, and their aesthetic was popularized in Hollywood by David Fincher's 2011 film The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. Over the years, shows such as The Bridge and The Killing have become hugely popular worldwide; others, such as The Breakthrough, The Åre Murders, and Trapped, have benefited greatly from runs on Netflix. Now, a true-crime documentary series that leans heavily on Nordic noir tropes is emerging as a hit on the Netflix streaming charts, mere days after its debut.

The show follows several people involved, directly and indirectly, in a haunting case that unfolded in Denmark over the last decade. The story begins in 2016, when a 17-year-old girl went missing while walking home late at night from a party. Her murder remained unsolved even after her body was discovered in a swamp. Some years later, another teenage girl alleged that she was nearly kidnapped by a man who fled the scene when he sensed that he might be spotted. The case was finally solved when the police tracked down a possible suspect following the abduction of a third teenager. As the title of the three-part documentary series suggests, the narrative revolves around the suspect's closest friends — people who had no idea what he had done.

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The series is titled A Friend, A Murderer. It's set across three episodes told from the perspectives of the alleged criminal's three closest friends. It also features people tangential to the search missions, and commentary from a journalist who covered the case. Noticeably, however, the show doesn't include anyone from the victim's family or the survivors' families, nor any legal representatives or members of law enforcement. According to FlixPatrol, A Friend, A Murderer was among the most-watched shows on Netflix this week, both domestically and worldwide. Like so many other Netflix true-crime documentaries, it relies on talking-head testimony and recreations. The recent film The Zodiac Killer Project dissected these tropes with a wry observational tone, and should be highly amusing for audiences interested in true-crime. Stay tuned to Collider for more updates.