Summer, and all the vacation days and potential travel that implies, is upon us. And whether flying internationally or taking time off at home, you can’t beat a good British crime drama as the ultimate self-soother (especially in summer when the U.K.’s inevitable drizzly city streets and windswept moors can provide at least visual relief from the heat). The genre is varied, the casts inevitably fine and justice almost always prevails. So here are 15 shows, new and old, to watch. (And if that’s not enough, you can find 15 more here.)
‘Young Sherlock’ (Prime Video)
Will we ever tire of reimagining Sherlock Holmes? Not anytime soon, apparently. Created by Matthew Parkhill and developed by Guy Ritchie (who directed two episodes), this version gives us a college-aged Sherlock (Hero Fiennes Tiffin) banished to the role of Oxford University porter by his fed-up older brother, Mycroft (Max Irons), who hopes to put the arrogant young rip on a steadier path. Alas, before you can say “Sir Bucephalus Hodge” (the Oxford bigwig played by Colin Firth), young Sherlock is up to his flat cap in murder and mystery, which he is determined to solve with the aid of his new best bud — wait for it — James Moriarty (Dónal Finn). An over-the-top romp that proves, if nothing else, the near-miraculous elasticity of Arthur Conan Doyle’s iconic creation.
‘Bookish’ (PBS)
Speaking of Holmes, “Sherlock” co-creator and co-star Mark Gatiss is up to it again, this time in the leading role. In post-World War II London, Gabriel Book (Gatiss) runs a secondhand bookshop, above which he and his beloved wife, Trottie (Polly Walker), live. But all is not what it seems, as Jack (Connor Finch), the young orphan ex-con they take under their wing, soon discovers. Gabriel apparently did something so important during the war that he is now the neighborhood’s go-to crime solver (with a letter from Winston Churchill to ensure VIP access). He also has a personal stake in Jack’s reclamation, which gives the series a fascinating and pathos-filled LGBTQ-history subtext.
‘Grantchester’ (PBS)
The sacred meets the secular in this long-running pairing of a young vicar with a worldly police detective in the titular idyllic Cambridgeshire village during the 1950s and ‘60s. In Seasons 1-4, that vicar is Sidney Chambers (James Norton), a jazz enthusiast plagued by memories of WWII who offers unsolicited insights to gruff and initially ungrateful Det. Inspector Geordie Keating (Robson Green). Friendship inevitably blooms, and when Sidney leaves the scene (and Norton the series) at the end of Season 4, many hearts (including Geordie’s) are broken. But subsequent replacement vicars — Will Davenport (Tom Brittney) in Seasons 5-9 and Alphy Kotteram (Rishi Nair) in Seasons 9-11 — each find their way to Geordie’s side, bringing their own charms, detectival insights and personal woes. The final season premieres June 14.
‘Touching Evil’ (BritBox)
DI Dave Creegan (a young Robson Green) is brought in to help DI Susan Taylor (an even younger Nicola Walker) of the Organized and Serial Crime Unit solve a series of abductions that Creegan comes to believe have been committed by a serial killer. The relationship sticks and the pair goes on to track down all manner of nasty killers with a combination of unconventional techniques and good police work. Green’s Creegan gets top billing, and a deeply resonant personal story, but seeing Walker (who would go on to star in so many fine series, including the terrific crime dramas “River” and “Unforgotten”) play a finely tuned second fiddle is great fun too.
‘Karen Pirie’ (BritBox)
For fans of Scottish crime drama (see also “Case Histories,” “Shetland” and “Dept. Q”), Det. Inspector Karen Pirie (“Outlander’s” Lauren Lyle) is a refreshing historic cases hero. Smart, ambitious and dogged, she is not burdened by a dark past or traumatic pain or the generally dour outlook that plague so many of her peers. Based on the books of Val McDermid, the series is set on the Scottish peninsula of Fife (the first season involves the picturesque town of St. Andrews) and all the gloriously broody scenery that implies. Murder mystery plus vicarious international mini-break.
‘Sister Boniface Mysteries’ (BritBox)
This cheeky spinoff of the iconic “Father Brown” puts a sweet-faced Catholic nun (Lorna Watson) at the center of all manner of murder in the fictional 1960s Cotswolds town of Great Slaughter. Sister Boniface is, of course, not just any nun. Having served as a codebreaker at Bletchley Park during WWII before entering the convent, she holds a PhD in chemistry, which makes her the perfect, if most unlikely, forensic specialist. (She also rides a red Vespa and serves as the convent’s vintner.) Unflappably brilliant and sincere in her vocation, she proves that faith in action can be both serious and great fun to watch.
‘The Bletchley Circle’ (BritBox)
Like Sister Boniface, Susan Grey (Anna Maxwell Martin) served her country as a codebreaker, but she is finding post-WWII life a bit more, well, boring. Forced back into the traditional roles of wife and mother, Susan tries to make do until a series of murders suggests to her a pattern unnoticed by the police. Gathering her former and still formidable colleagues who are also languishing in a sexist world, she creates, for two marvelous seasons, her own private crime unit. (See also, the one-season spinoff, “The Bletchley Circle: San Francisco.”)
‘Sherwood’ (BritBox)
When truculent Gary Jackson (Alun Armstrong) is murdered by an arrow outside his home in Nottinghamshire, near Sherwood Forest, Det. Chief Supt. Ian St. Clair (David Morrissey) is quick to put down any Robin Hood references and look instead at the town’s 30-year-old but still roiling divisions over the U.K.’s 1984-85 miners’ strike. Based on real events, “Sherwood” is both a murder mystery and a contemplation of the damage done by class-based strife and longheld grudges, often based on misinformation. With an incredible cast, including Lesley Manville, Kevin Doyle and Lorraine Ashbourne, it is deeply moving drama that illuminates the personal price of social divisions. Season 3 premieres this year.
‘Magpie Murders’ (PBS)
Season 3 of “Magpie Murders” — titled ”Marble Hall Murders” — is also set to bow this year, so now is a good time to catch up on the previous adaptations of Anthony Horowitz’s Susan Ryeland novels, which both satirize and honor the murder-mystery genre. Ryeland (Lesley Manville) is a book editor whose most famous — and tiresome — author, Alan Conway (Conleth Hill), has just turned in his final murder mystery called “Magpie Murders.” Only the last chapter is missing and Conway has just been found dead at his country home. So it’s up to Ryeland, working with Conway’s literary detective Atticus Pünd (Tim McMullan), to figure out what happened, both in real life and in the book. This mystery-within-a-mystery launches two vivid characters, Ryeland and Pünd, working separately and together to solve crimes, sometimes in two different timelines.
‘The Inspector Lynley Mysteries’ (BritBox)
The many, and voluminous, novels of Elizabeth George are being adapted in “Lynley,” a new series that has its charms. Still, I’m sticking with the older version, which ran from 2001 to 2008. Over six seasons, the unlikely partnership of Det. Inspector Thomas Lynley, eighth earl of Asherton and generally natty guy played by Nathaniel Parker, and his distinctly working-class and perpetually disheveled sergeant, Barbara Havers (Sharon Small), creates a classic odd-couple mix that allows some actual insight into issues of class and gender. But mostly, they make a great detective team, often using their differences to their advantage. The mysteries range far and wide over the U.K., from gritty streets to posh country homes, and 24 90-minute episodes are enough to keep you going all summer long.
‘Cadfael’ (BritBox)
Though the oldest series on this list (1994-1998), “Cadfael,” based on the books of Ellis Peters, remains a classic and constant recommendation. The great Derek Jacobi plays the titular 12th century monk who was once a soldier of the Crusades. Now a botanist and apothecary, Cadfael aids the local sheriff in solving all manner of crimes committed in and near Shrewsbury Abbey during England’s 15-year civil war known now as the Anarchy. Though the series does not delve as deeply into the politics of the time as the novels do, it creates an uncertain world in which violence runs rampant. Mercifully, there is a monk who knows his stuff, and if Jacobi isn’t enough reason to watch, the costumes and landscape are pretty great too.
‘No Offence’ (BritBox)
Joanna Scanlan was punk rock long before her turn in “Riot Women,” especially as the wildly frank, slightly raunchy, take-no-prisoners DI Viv Deering in this blackly funny depiction of the wayward Friday Street division of the Manchester Police. They are not misfits exactly — Deering knows what she’s doing as does her team, including the ambitious Det. Constable Dinah Kowalski (Elaine Cassidy), the self-doubting Det. Sgt. Joy Freers (Alexandra Roach) and Paul Ritter’s wise-cracking Randolph Miller (OK, maybe he is a misfit) — but they are much more recognizably human than most TV coppers. We know they’ll get their man, but it will take some time, and more than a few hilarious and heartbreaking misfires.
‘Inspector George Gently’ (Acorn TV)
After the murder of his wife, Inspector George Gently (Martin Shaw)leaves London’s Metropolitan police force in search of a more peaceful life in 1960s Northumberland. But as anyone who has seen “Vera” could tell him, Newcastle Upon Tyne is far from peaceful. Still brokenhearted, Gently finds himself solving crimes, and trying to teach his sergeant John Bacchus (Lee Ingleby) to be an honorable man in a time of shifting social mores and political upset.
‘Whitechapel’ (Hulu)
Come for the Jack the Ripper overtones, stay for the always great character actor Phil Davis (“Trying,” “Vera Drake”). He plays old-school Det. Sgt. Ray Miles, a member of an East End squad that is less than thrilled by their new guy, opposite the smooth and ambitious Det. Inspector Joseph Chandler (Rupert Penry-Jones), who shows up to his first crime scene in a tux and doesn’t appear to understand that this is the East End. But with what seems like a Ripper copycat on the loose, everyone needs to put aside their preconceived notions and figure out what’s going on. The series is wildly atmospheric with plenty of gallows humor and more than a few truly loopy plotlines, but great fun with Davis managing, as ever, to sell even the most preposterous scene.
Death Comes to Pemberley (PBS)
This adaptation of P.D. James’ sequel to “Pride and Prejudice” is a miniseries, and just three episodes long, so this might be a bit of a cheat. But if you haven’t seen it, you should. Elizabeth Darcy (nee Bennet) (Anna Maxwell Martin) and Fitzwilliam Darcy (Matthew Rhys) are happily married and planning a ball. Sure, a couple of servants see a ghost in the woods (where Elizabeth encounters a suspicious woman), and Col. Fitzwilliam (Tom Ward) clearly wants to marry Georgiana (Eleanor Tomlinson), who doesn’t seem too keen, but what of it? Then Elizabeth’s sister Lydia (Jenna Coleman) shows up uninvited and hysterical; her still-caddish husband, George Wickham (Matthew Goode), had an argument with his friend Capt. Denny (Tom Canton), and the two vanished into the woods where shots were subsequently heard. Once again, Mr. Darcy must do what he can to protect the dreaded Wickham, and in doing so all manner of secrets are revealed. Jane Austen meets Agatha Christie with a cast either writer would kill for.
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