Tag: murder in small towns

Show: Nightmare Next Door

Murders in small towns

Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com

About Nightmare Next Door

No one expects their neighbor to be the victim of a murder, especially residents of small towns, where everything seems idyllic and protected from big-city crime. But these homicides do happen, and Nightmare Next Door tells their stories.

The show focuses on murder cases in small towns, and a few smaller cities. These cases are mostly stranger murders and often occur in the person’s home.

Early episodes incorporate brief glimpses into detectives’ or prosecutors’ backgrounds or hobbies, which do not connect to any aspect of the case and so seem oddly included. Perhaps the show was trying to make law enforcement seem like everyday people, but this attempt falls flat.

In general, the show is pretty low-quality and not all that interesting. Skip it unless you’re looking for emphasis on murders in small towns, or a show with a lot of seasons. Try Murder Comes to Town or Heartland Homicide, instead.

The Show Elements

Seasons: 10 (2011-2021)

Where to stream: Tubi, The Roku Channel, Discovery+, HBO Max, Hulu, Amazon Prime Video

More shows like Nightmare Next Door: Murder Comes to Town, Murder in the Heartland, Heartland Homicide

See also this list of true crime shows

✘ Police interviews
✘ Trial clips
✓ Narration
✓ Re-creations
✘ Experts
✓ Victims’ families and friends

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Show: Murder in the Heartland

Small towns learn that they aren’t immune to murder

About Murder In The Heartland

A sleepy small town is awakened by a shocking murder. So is the premise of Murder in the Heartland.

Similar to Heartland Homicide and Murder Comes to Town, this true crime show focuses on homicides occurring in quiet, languid small towns across the US, rural areas not just in the “heartland” of the country. From Idaho to Indiana, the show travels to small towns to interview families and detectives in their surroundings, showing them going about their daily lives, feeding pets or making dinner, as they tell the stories of the murders (with motives ranging from robbery to jealousy) that changed them forever. It’s a slice of life that illustrates the ordinariness of their lives in juxtaposition with shocking murders that jarred them from a normal existence supposedly safe from murder.

Murder in the Heartland combines interviews with detectives and victims’ families and friends, photos of ordinary family life, re-creations, and police interviews, and omits any narration, letting those involved tell the stories themselves. Detectives sometimes walk the audience through the crime scene, adding another realistic element to the story.

True crime shows

The Show Elements

Seasons: 6 (2017-)

Where to stream: Amazon Prime Video, The Roku Channel, Hulu, and Discovery+

More shows like Murder in the Heartland: Murder Comes to Town, Heartland Homicide, Hometown Homicide

See also this list of true crime shows

✓ Police interviews
✘ Trial clips
✘ Narration
✓ Re-creations
✘ Experts
✓ Victims’ families and friends

Latest Posts

Show: Murder Comes to Town

Murder fractures the facades of small towns

About Murder Comes to Town

Murder Comes to Town is a show that is as quiet as the small towns where the murder cases occurred, murders that fractured their tranquil facades and made residents think twice about leaving their doors unlocked.

Through re-creations (with dialogue), stories told by investigators and victims’ families and friends, a little background on the towns themselves, and sometimes police interviews, episodes detail murders that come to small towns across the US. They range the gamut from drug-related crimes, to crimes between romantic partners, to robberies.

The show is narrated by voice actor Joe Alaskey (a highlight for fans of creepy narration), who sounds like the voice-child of Paul Winfield and Vincent Price. Alaskey reads words like “murder” and “bloody corpse” with a chill that seems to ripple across the screen. Following Alaskey’s death in 2016, actor Anthony Call took over narration duties in the fourth and fifth seasons.

The true crime show is a reserved storyteller that gets the point across without a lot of drama or flash.

Murder Comes to Town
Photo by Josh Sorenson on Pexels.com

The Show Elements

Seasons: 5 (2014-2018)

Where to stream: Hulu, Amazon Prime Video, Discovery+, and the Roku Channel

More shows like Murder Comes to Town: City Confidential, Murder in the Heartland, Hometown Homicide, Heartland Homicide

See also this list of true crime shows

✓ Police interviews
✘ Trial clips
✓ Narration
✓ Re-creations
✘ Experts
✓ Victims’ families and friends

Latest Posts

Show: Heartland Homicide

Murder interrupts the tranquility of small towns

heartland homicide
Photo by Josh Sorenson on Pexels.com

About Heartland Homicide

Murder doesn’t happen here. But no one is safe from violent crime, and Heartland Homicide tells the stories of those small-town murders no one thought could happen.

It spotlights murders in the “heartland” of the US and Canada and shatters the small-town belief that residents cling to, that murder will never happen in their tranquil communities.

It’s a true crime show that details a bit on each town’s history and culture before relating some background on the victim’s and suspect’s lives, work, family, and relationship prior to the crime. Episodes use third-person narrative as they dive into the murder and its investigation through the end of the trial, sentencing, and any appeals.

Heartland Homicide only sometimes includes detectives and others who have worked on the case (and not much archival news footage), but instead relies heavily on narration and re-creations, along with a stock group of experts, who describe legal concepts, law enforcement techniques, and aspects of forensic pathology relevant to the case. The experts often explain basic concepts like what a dating app, blunt force trauma, or Luminol is, so newbies to true crime shows can jump right in.

Note: Very few episodes include police interviews or trial footage. One notable exception is the Kunz case, detailed in Season 1, Episode 2.

True crime shows

The Show Elements

Seasons: 1 (2022-)

Where to stream: True Crime Network

More shows like Heartland Homicide: City Confidential, Murder Comes to Town, Murder in the Heartland, Hometown Homicide

See also this list of true crime shows

✘ Police interviews
✘ Trial clips
✓ Narration
✓ Re-creations
✓ Experts
✓ Victims’ families and friends

Latest Posts