Apple TV+’s Lady In The Lake is a gripping, stylish crime drama that will fill the gap left by David Fincher’s Mindhunter. The untimely cancelation of the Netflix series, following fictional agents at the birth of the FBI’s criminal profiling unit, was a huge disappointment. Fincher gave an in-depth explanation for Mindhunter’s season 3 cancelation, citing budgeting issues. Despite attempts at negotiation, he ultimately declined to continue the show. Luckily, this new Natalie Portman series has many of the elements that made Mindhunter so great.

Viewers may find similarities in the series’ retro settings, grounded by great soundtracks and period memorabilia. Like Mindhunter,Lady in the Lake’s murders are inspired by true stories. But there’s more than setting and subject matter tying these shows together. Both touch upon the social climate in the mid-20th century, and how the politics of murder investigation complicate their main characters’ pursuit of killers.

These Gripping Thrillers Are Rooted In Real Life Crime Stories

Ed Kemper (Cameron Britton) taunts Agent Ford (Jonathan Groff) by touching his face in Mindhunter.
Image of Cameron Britton's portrayal of Ed Kemper in Mindhunter.
Oliver Cooper's portrayal of David Berkowitz, the Son of Sam killer, in Mindhunter. Damon Herriman as Charles Manson sits on top of a chair in Mindhunter. Holden Ford (Jonathan Groff) speaks to a woman adding a photo to a board of missing children in Mindhunter.

Mindhunter and Lady In The Lake give the guilty pleasure of true crime a prestige TV makeover. They know their subject matter is sordid and sensational – Mindhunter cast eerily identical actors to play real-life serial killers, whose entrances in the show feel like true crime celebrity cameos. It tempers this with critical self-reflection on society’s grim fascination with murder.Lady In The Lake also scrutinizes the motives of Portman’s Maddie as she investigates the mysterious drownings of eleven-year-old Tessie Durst and bartender Cleo Johnson.

The retro settings of Lady In The Lake and Mindhunter give them their cool, stylish feel. Their soundtrack choices are more than gratuitous needle drops. Though Mindhunter’s use of “Psycho Killer” in its first episode was a bit indulgent, it perfectly paired Led Zeppelin’s “In The Light” with Holden’s panic attack in episode 10 after his solo interview with Kemper. LadyIn The Lake’s great soundtrack moments show the same creative genius.

Lady In The Lake’s Setting & Crime Story Are Very Similar To Mindhunter Season 2

Like Agent Holden Ford, Lady In The Lake’s Maddie Schwartz Is Blinded By Ambition

Edited image juxtaposing Mindhunter's Holden Ford (Jonathan Groff) and Bill Tench (Holt McCallany) with Lady In The Lake's Maddie Schwartz (Natalie Portman) as they interview convicted killers.

Mindhunter came into its own in its second season. Season 1 set up the revolutionary technique of criminal profiling and the maverick agents who founded it, then season 2 confronted some of the problems with the discipline. Mindhunter changed the true story of the Atlanta child murders slightly, allowing it to focus on Holden’s reckoning with his own practice. The question of whether Wayne Williams was guilty became: did the FBI profiling of Williams create a catch-all suspect that allowed other killers to remain at large?

Holden’s faith in the technique he pioneered blinds him to its flaws. Holdenconfuses personal fulfillment with the pursuit of truth. The same can be said for Lady In The Lake’s Maddie. Her commitment to uncovering Cleo’s killer is equally tied to her own journalistic ambitions. Cleo’s narration spells out the tensions in a white woman seeking recognition by exploiting a Black woman’s story. “Your writing dreams ruined your life,” she says. “Now you want those same dreams to rewrite it. But did you have to drag my dead body into it?”

How Lady In The Lake’s Reviews Compare To Mindhunter

Lady In The Lake’s Lower Rotten Tomatoes Score Shouldn’t Cause Viewers To Dismiss It

Moses Ingram as Cleo in Lady In The Lake.

Mindhunter was a critical darling when it aired. David Fincher managed to meet the precedent set by season 1 in the follow-up season, which is no easy feat. On the other hand, responses to Lady In The Lake thus far haven’t expressed such unanimous approval. It has been praised for its execution and compelling characters. Moses Ingram’s portrayal of Cleo, whose story was expanded from the Laura Lippman novel, has been widely celebrated.

Show
Average RT Critics Score
Average RT Audience Score

Mindhunter
97%
95%

Lady In The Lake
76%
74%

Lady In The Lake’s 76% is still nothing to be sneered at, considering the miniseries is both new and much shorter than Mindhunter. It sets itself a challenge in confronting the fraught political landscape of the 1960s. Mindhunter season 2 acknowledges the racial tensions still at play in the late 70s in its Altanta storyline, but this was never at its center. Lady In The Lake should be praised for facing the knotty intersections of race and women’s liberation head-on, making it a great show to fill the gap left by Mindhunter’s absent finale.