When you hear “British murder mystery with retiree detectives,” it’s easy to conjure what that looks like: a Miss Marple send-up, perhaps with a plot device revolving around a poisoned cup of tea, and a murder weapon that’s appropriately cozy, like... a knitting needle. The Thursday Murder Club, Netflix’s murder mystery movie from acclaimed director Chris Columbus, certainly looks like it fits that description, but it actually goes much further than you’d expect.
The result is a wide-ranging story that manages to solve three murders in a row without getting too cloying. Yes, there are some jokes about the titular detectives not being able to understand what a PDF is, but there’s also discussion of everything from shell companies to human trafficking. This is the next evolution of this subgenre, and could be Netflix’s next Knives Out.
