Four Netflix heist shows to stream if you loved ‘Lupin’
Netflix crime dramas have got us so used to watching some miserable detective chase criminals around that Lupin feels like a breath of fresh air, and thank goodness for that. Netflix gives us a thief who seems to have the whole French police force wrapped around his little finger, and we’re here for that.
But the clever thing about Lupin is that all those elaborate heists have a purpose, because Assane is out to clear his father’s name after he was framed for stealing a valuable necklace. And the more you learn about the wealthy Pellegrini family, the more you want him to bring the whole lot down.
And Omar Sy… what a performance! He brings so much charm to Assane that you almost forget he is committing crimes, while his tricks, inspired by Maurice Leblanc’s gentleman thief Arsène Lupin, make for some bloody good telly.
But come on, one gentleman thief cannot carry the entire crime genre on his shoulders, can he? Netflix has a few other shows worth your time, especially if watching clever criminals give the authorities the runaround is your cup of tea.
Four Netflix heist shows to stream if you loved ‘Lupin’
Money Heist (2017-2021)
Money Heist doesn’t need an introduction at this point and was probably the first show that hits you when you think about Lupin. Those red jumpsuits and Dalí masks were everywhere when the Spanish series became a massive Netflix hit, and you couldn’t escape Bella Ciao for ages. But there’s a reason people went mad for this show, and it’s not just the Professor’s brilliant plan to print €2.4 billion inside Spain’s Royal Mint. He had spent months preparing for the police, and it was all working fine until his own gang started crumbling from the inside, which is where things get interesting.
And that’s what makes it such a good show if you loved Lupin, because while Assane has a knack for staying one step ahead of everyone, the Professor has to deal with a gang who won’t stop making his life difficult. You’ve got Inspector Raquel Murillo trying to negotiate with the robbers while Berlin’s running the operation inside. No wonder this Spanish series became such a phenomenon.
Berlin and the Jewels of Paris (2023)
And since we’re talking about Money Heist, there’s no way Berlin was going to miss out on this list. Pedro Alonso gets his own prequel, set before the Royal Mint robbery, and this time the bloke’s in Paris plotting to nick €44 million worth of jewels from an auction house in a single night. Now, that’s quite an ambitious job, even for someone like Berlin, but he’s got Damián helping him put the plan together, so you’d think he’d have his head in the game.
Except… the silly guy goes and falls for Camille, whose husband happens to run the auction house he is planning to rob. Oh, for God’s sake, Berlin! You’ve got millions riding on this job, and you’re getting involved with the boss’s wife? And with Raquel Murillo and Alicia Sierra leading the investigation, things aren’t looking good. There’s a touch of Lupin in the Parisian setting and all the elaborate trickery, though Berlin’s love life causes him far more pain than Assane’s disguises.
Kaleidoscope (2023)
Now, Kaleidoscope has a rather interesting trick up its sleeve, because Netflix made this eight-part heist thriller so you can watch the first seven episodes in different orders and still end up at the same finale. We know, we know, it might sound like a headache, but there’s a reason for it. Giancarlo Esposito plays Leo Pap, a career criminal who’s planning to steal $7 billion worth of bonds from a vault protected by one of the toughest security systems around. Seven billion dollars… that’s quite a payday, even by Money Heist standards.
And the smartest thing here is the story jumps across 25 years, so you might discover what happened after the robbery before finding out what led to it. It’s got that same pleasure of piecing together Assane’s schemes in Lupin, except Leo’s got a whole gang to manage, and trusting the wrong person could cost him everything.
The Gentlemen (2024-)
Now, Guy Ritchie’s The Gentlemen has its second season released on Netflix recently and has been a massive hit. The show has always had a soft spot for British gangsters, but The Gentlemen takes the whole business somewhere rather posh. Theo James plays Eddie Horniman, a former soldier who inherits his father’s enormous country estate instead of his older brother Freddy, which sounds like he’s hit the jackpot. Well, hold your horses, because he soon discovers there’s a massive cannabis operation running beneath his land, and the criminals behind it have no intention of packing up and leaving.
And this is where Kaya Scodelario’s Susie Glass comes in, because she’s running the operation for her gangster father, Bobby, and Eddie soon learns that getting these people off his property isn’t going to be a walk in the park. It’s got that same pleasure of watching someone use their wits to get out of trouble that made Lupin such a hit, except Eddie’s dealing with British gangsters who can threaten your life.