Netflix TV Recommendation: Mindhunter (2017-)

Quote from Mindhunter by Bill Tench: “I can choke down the bile, manufacture empathy – when our subjects are at least informative.”

mindhunter

Creator: Joe Penhall

Executive Producers: Christopher Daniel, Lone Korslund, Marc Schmidheiny, Petter Skavlan, Johan Christopher Stenersen, Dario Suter, Peter Watson, Henrik Zein, and Harald Zwart

Directors: David Fincher, Carl Franklin, Andrew Douglas, Asif Kapadia, Tobias Lindholm, and Andrew Dominik

Writers: John Douglas, Mark Olshaker, Joe Penhall, Joshua Donen, Courtenay Miles, Jennifer Haley, Liz Hannah, Doug Jung, Erin Levy, Tobias Lindholm, Dominic Orlando, Ruby Rae Spiegel, Carly Wray, Pamela Cederquist, Shaun Grant, Phillip Howze, Jason Johnson, Colin J. Louro, and Alex Metcalf

Major Cast (season one and two): Jonathan Groff as Holden Ford, Holt McCallany as Bill Tench, Anna Torv as Wendy Carr, Cotter Smith as Robert Shepard, Stacey Roca as Nancy Tench, Joe Tuttle as Gregg Smith, Albert Jones as Jim Barney

Supporting Cast (season one): Hannah Gross as Debbie Mitford and Lena Olin as Annaliese Stilman

Supporting Cast (season two): Joseph Cross as Benjamin Barnwright, Regi Davis as Maynard Jackson, Gareth Williams as Redding, Dohn Norwood as Lee Brown, Brent Sexton as Garland Periwinkle, Nate Corddry as Detective Art Spencer

Supporting Cast (season one and two) Michael Cerveris as Ted Gunn, Lauren Glazier as Kay Manz, Sierra McClain as Tanya Clifton, June Carryl as Camille Bell

Supporting Cast (playing bad people): , Cameron Britton as Ed Kemper, Happy Anderson as Jerry Brudos, Sam Strike as Montie Rissell, Jack Erdie as Richard Speck, Oliver Cooper as David Berkowitz, Robert Aramayo as Elmer Wayne Henley, Jr., Michael Filipowich as William “Junior” Pierce, Corey Allen as William Henry Hance, Damon Herriman as Charles Manson, Christopher Backus as Tex Watson, Morgan Kelly as Paul Bateson, Christopher Livingston as Wayne Williams, and Sonny Valicenti as Dennis Rader

TV Rating: TV-M

Running Time: 60 minutes

*******

This adaptation from the book I’m currently reading is about the beginnings of the FBI’s Behavioral Science Unit where the old way of catching criminals needed to be revamped in order to catch the evolving criminal. These serial killers John Douglas studied while at Quantico led to a different kind of method used to catch them. No longer was only MMO, means, motive, and opportunity, used but their backgrounds, behaviors, and drives. By cataloguing the findings of these certain killers, it gave further access into the sociopathic mind and impacted law enforcement investigations from a criminal profiling and psychlogical standpoint.

The character of Holden Ford is based from John Douglas himself while the character of Bill Tench is based from Robert K. Ressler. They work closely with Wendy Carr and her character is based from Ann Wolbert Burgess. Some of the most notable killers mentioned and interviewed are Ed Kemper, Jerry Brudos, Montie Rissell, Richard Speck, David Berkowitz, Elmer Wayne Henley, Jr., William “Junior” Pierce, William Henry Hance, Charles Manson, Tex Watson, and Paul Bateson. The second season has slowly been revealing Dennis Rader while Ford and Tench investigate the Atlanta murders, which eventually leads to an arrest of another kind. David Fincher plans to make five seasons so three more to go and one more year to wait for the continuation of further Dennis Rader discovery.

I give credit to all the actors who portray the serial killers and FBI agents/law enforcement, but most to Holt McCallany for playing FBI detective Bill Tench. You might remember him from Fight Club (picture below) with Brad Pitt. I don’t know what it is, but I’m very drawn to his acting and interaction with other characters. I can’t wait to see how his personal story evolves because it ended on a cliffhanger (as much as relationships can offer). Go watch the show because it’s more than just catching the bad guys although it’s a large part of it. Seriously, can you go wrong with a show based from real life interviews? Can you go wrong with something with David Fincher’s name attached to it? The answer to both is no, you can’t.