One of cable’s most-watched shows during its six-season run on Starz from June 2014 to February 2020, Power tells the story of James “Ghost” St. Patrick (Omari Hardwick), a ruthless New York City nightclub owner who moonlights as a drug kingpin.
All six seasons of Power are streaming on Hulu.
Balancing nefarious crime with legitimate business, Ghost leads a double life populated with characters like his hot-headed partner, Tommy Egan (Joseph Sikora); his wife and the mother of his children, Tasha (Naturi Naughton); and his former mentor-turned-rival, Kanan Stark (Curtis “50 Cent” Jackson, who also serves as an executive producer).
Over 63 episodes and, later, four spinoff series, Power depicted how loyalties and alliances shift, family dynamics warp and morality is compromised under the weight of money, violence and status. The same themes are explored in these shows like Power to watch next, from The Wire to Ozark.
Breaking Bad
This American crime saga created by Vince Gilligan centers on Walter White (Bryan Cranston), an Albuquerque-based chemistry teacher who turns to cooking and selling methamphetamine with a former student, Jesse Pinkman (Aaron Paul), to secure his family’s financial future after he’s diagnosed with terminal lung cancer.
Across five seasons and 62 episodes, which aired on AMC in January 2008 and concluded in September 2013, that seemingly “noble” pursuit is traded for a true anti-hero arc, following Walter as he falls further and further into moral darkness and becomes the hubris-filled figure known as “Heisenberg.” Walt’s continued descent into the criminal underworld unearths his own ruthlessness, vanity and greed, and tragically pulls in his family, including his wife Skyler (Anna Gunn) and his DEA agent brother-in-law Hank (Dean Norris), making for a crime drama widely praised as one of the greatest television series of all time.
Stream on Netflix
The Wire
Like Power, this gritty, Peabody-winning HBO drama also centers on the criminal underbelly of a major American city, only here it’s Baltimore, Maryland. Airing from June 2002 to March 2008, each of the series’ six seasons examines a different institution in Charm City and how it connects back to local law enforcement, from the port system to city government to the print news media.
At the center of it all is an ever-changing ensemble cast that includes Dominic West as homicide detective Jimmy McNulty, Wood Harris as gang leader Avon Barksdale, John Doman as police commissioner William Rawls, Idris Elba as drug kingpin Russell “Stringer” Bell and the late, great Michael K. Williams as stick-up man Omar Little.
Stream on Max
Top Boy
This gripping British series created and written by Ronan Bennett transports viewers into the housing estates of east London via two young drug dealers, Dushane (Ashley Walters) and Sully (Kane Robinson), as they navigate inner-city gang culture. Like similarly-focused genre shows, Top Boy interweaves the characters’ personal struggles with larger societal issues, including domestic abuse, immigration law and the intersectionality of Blackness and queerness.
Over five seasons — it aired its first two seasons on Channel 4 before being revived on Netflix for three more—the drama also gave a spotlight to some of the brightest young stars from the British Isles, including Michaela Cole, Barry Keoghan and Letitia Wright.
Stream on Netflix
The Deuce
Armed with crime-drama bonafides — co-creator David Simon is also the brain behind The Wire and We Own This City — The Deuce gamely explores the prostitution and pornography industries in 1970s New York City, when Times Square was more known for its sex shops and shady dealings than Broadway shows and cartoon characters.
As we follow characters like twin brothers Vincent and Frankie Martino (both played by James Franco), a bartender-gambler duo who become fronts for the Mafia, and Eileen “Candy” Merrell (in a Golden Globe-nominated turn by Maggie Gyllenhaal), a former sex worker with ambitions of becoming an adult filmmaker, we become immersed in all of the police corruption, drug culture and general debauchery of the era.
Watch on Max
Ozark
Created by Bill Dubuque (The Accountant, The Judge), this Emmy-winning Netflix thriller stars Jason Bateman as Marty Byrde, a Chicago-based financial adviser who launders money for a Mexican drug cartel. After his laundering partner is killed by the cartel, Marty moves his wife Wendy (Laura Linney) and their two children Charlotte (Sofia Hublitz) and Jonah (Skylar Gaertner) to the Ozarks region of Missouri.
There, they become entangled with local lawbreakers, including heroin producer Jacob Snell (Peter Mullan) and petty criminal Ruth Langmore (Julia Garner). With clever turns (this show is not afraid to kill off a character) and complex performances (especially Linney’s Lady MacBeth-esque transformation as Wendy), the tension cranks up with every chapter of this four-season crime story.
Watch on Netflix
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