The trope of the obsessive detective coming dangerously close to insanity in their quest to understand the criminal mind is a well-worn one, but former special agent John Douglas, one of the FBI’s first criminal profilers, has more right to the story than most. After all, it really happened to him. Executive produced by David Fincher and Charlize Theron, Netflix’s upcoming true-crime drama Mindhunter is based on Douglas’ book with Mark Olshaker, Mind Hunter: Inside The FBI’s Elite Serial Crime Unit.
Set in 1979, when the term “serial killer” was first starting to come into popular use, the show stars Holt McCallany as FBI Agent Bill Tench, who teams up with Jonathan Groff’s Holden Ford to interview convicted serial killers in an attempt to track their behavioral patterns. Fincher directs an as-yet-unnamed number of episodes of the show, along with Asif Kapadia (Amy, Senna), Tobias Lindholm (A War, A Hijacking) and Andrew Douglas (The Amityville Horror).
Mindhunter premieres on Netflix on October 13.