August 4, 20262 min read

The best thrillers on Netflix right now

Netflix's thriller lineup right now swings from a classic that's decades old to franchise entries still finding their footing, with a few genuine surprises in between.

Elize: Shadows of a Woman is the least known name on this list, a Brazilian crime thriller drawn from the real Elize Matsunaga case, with Lorena Comparato as a wife whose discovery of her wealthy husband's infidelity slowly poisons the marriage. It landed on Netflix in late July and climbed the platform's charts within days.

Apex follows a convicted man dropped onto an island and hunted for sport by wealthy clients, a blunt spin on the hunted human premise that trades subtlety for momentum.

War Machine, Netflix's own satire, casts Brad Pitt as a general who tries to win an unwinnable war through sheer force of personality. It's based on Michael Hastings's reporting on General Stanley McChrystal, and it's sharper as commentary than as comedy.

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28 Years Later: The Bone Temple continues Danny Boyle and Alex Garland's revived franchise, picking up the infection story where the previous film left off under new director Nia DaCosta.

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The Rip follows a group of officers who stumble onto a stash of drug money seized during a raid, and have to decide what to do once they realize no one is watching.

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Memento tells its story backward, following a man who can't form new memories hunting for his wife's killer using notes, photographs and tattoos. Christopher Nolan's early breakthrough remains one of the tightest structural experiments in mainstream thriller filmmaking.

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Sniper: No Nation keeps the long running franchise's formula intact, tracking an elite marksman through another mission where the real target is never quite who it first seems.

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28 Years Later revives the original outbreak story decades on, following a small island community that's stayed isolated from the mainland infection, led by Jodie Comer, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, and Ralph Fiennes.

Kraven the Hunter gives Sony's Spider-Man universe its most vicious antihero yet, with Aaron Taylor-Johnson playing a man who turns his father's brutal training into a personal code of honor among killers.

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Gone Girl remains the gold standard for the modern marriage thriller, following a husband under suspicion after his wife disappears on their anniversary. David Fincher and Gillian Flynn build a plot that keeps recalibrating who deserves the audience's sympathy.

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Jurassic World Dominion closes out the trilogy by finally letting dinosaurs loose across the whole world rather than one island, bringing back Laura Dern, Sam Neill and Jeff Goldblum alongside the newer cast.

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Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery brings Daniel Craig's Benoit Blanc back for a third case, with Rian Johnson again building a mystery where the fun is watching Blanc work out what the audience has already half guessed.

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Twelve very different kinds of tension, from a decades old classic to this year's biggest whodunit. Start wherever your patience for slow burns runs out.

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