Detectives trace the last day of a murder victim’s life
About Dateline: The Last Day
Dateline: The Last Day is a Dateline spin-off that presents murder cases through the perspective of the victim’s last day (much like The Last 24). The tone surrounding the true crime show is more serious than Dateline, but it features regular Dateline correspondents Keith Morrison, Josh Mankiewicz, and Andrea Canning, along with additional contributor Stephanie Gosk.
Each episode follows the events of the victim’s last day and the key people they interacted with during those events, described by the investigators involved, victims’ friends and families, and through police interviews.
In the first season, the show has less emphasis on intimate partner homicide than Dateline and includes murders by strangers, friends, and others. And unlike Dateline, it omits lengthy trial clips or description of the trials. Instead, the focus is squarely on the timeline of the victim.
If you can’t get enough Dateline in your life, this show is for you.
Dateline NBC: “Under a Halloween Moon” (Season 22, Episode 6)
In this episode, Josh Mankiewicz details the murder of Joel Lovelien, which occurred outside a bar he went to with his fiancée for a Halloween party in 2007 in North Dakota. Lovelien was beaten to death in the parking lot, and police search for the killer among the large group of people in costume. This one has a surprise ending.
Dateline NBC: “The Halloween Party” (Season 26, Episode 5)
Keith Morrison lends his spooky narration to the story of Chelsea Bruck, who attends a Halloween party as Poison Ivy at a rural property in Michigan in 2014. She disappears that night, and police find her body several months later. She had been sexually assaulted and died from blunt force trauma.
Stream on Peacock and Hulu
Killer Kids: “Vampire and the Essay” (Season 4, Episode 8)
The 16-year-old leader of a vampire cult murders Naomi Ruth Queen and Richard Wendorf in 1996 in Florida, the parents of a 15-year-old girl who ran away from home with his group. Although the ringleader was convicted of murder, she was never charged.
Stream on Amazon Prime Video and the Roku Channel
City Confidential: “Monsters on Main Street” (Season 7, Episode 1)
An 11-year-old girl, Shauna Howe, disappears on the way home from a Halloween party in a small town in Pennsylvania in 1992. Police discover her body three days later, but the murder goes unsolved until 2003. The town banned nighttime trick-or-treating for 15 years after the murder. The case is also covered in Cold Case Files.
Stream on Amazon Prime Video, Hulu, Discovery+, and the Roku Channel
In 1984, pregnant mother Doreen Erbert is murdered on Halloween in California by a man in a wolf mask wielding a machete. The episode is rare coverage of a male killer on the female-focused series.
In a ritualistic killing, a teen interested in the occult kills an elderly woman, removes her heart, and drinks her blood. The episode is based on the story of the murder of Maybel Leyshon in the UK in 2001.
Stream on Tubi, True Crime Network, and the Roku Channel
Killer Cases: “Murder Under a Blue Moon” (Season 1, Episode 5)
The triple homicide by a man who killed his mother, Voncile Smith, and two half-brothers, Richard Thomas Smith and John William Smith, in Florida in 2015. The murder occurs close to the blue moon, and the positioning of the bodies and the killer’s pagan practices make detectives mistakenly think it is a result of witchcraft. Also featured on Family Massacre.
Stream on Amazon Prime Video, Hulu, and True Crime Network
A true crime classic for junkies and newbies alike
About Dateline
Dateline is the type of show that, back in the days of channel-surfing, would suck you in because you just had to know who the murderer was.
This long-running NBC show focuses mostly on murders (and murders of romantic partners), with other investigative pieces thrown in here and there. Dateline previously included other series like To Catch a Predator, but now concentrates on true crime.
Although it can sometimes be predictable, the show pulls the audience into the investigation through correspondents’ interviews with witnesses and suspects, leading the viewers through the case to the end of the trial in a more intimate way than most shows. Not to mention Keith Morrison‘s chilling, yet compelling, narrations.
Dateline’s storytelling, and the correspondents’ empathy for victims’ families and friends, makes it a standout. Morrison, Andrea Canning, Dennis Murphy, and Josh Mankiewicz often interview suspects before or after their conviction—a rarity in the genre—and their hard-nosed questioning is a highlight. When there is a trial, the show gives it ample attention, often with trial clips. Recommended.
The Show Elements
Seasons: 33 (1992-)
Where to stream: Peacock, Hulu, Amazon Prime Video
True Crime Docket 