Best tv shows like Dickensian
Last updated March 2024
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Plot Summary:
Dickensian intertwines the realm of fictional characters in Charles Dickens’ novels—including Scrooge, Fagin and Miss Havisham—in half-hour episodes, as their lives intertwine in 19th century London. The Old Curiosity Shop sits next door to The Three Cripples Pub, while Fagin’s Den is hidden down a murky alley off a bustling Victorian street.
IMDB Rating: 7.6
IMDB Votes: 4000
Genere: Adventure, Crime, Drama, Mystery
Country: UK
Duration: 60 min
Plot tags: costume drama, period piece, atmospheric, serious, captivating, stylized, historical drama, controversial, period drama
Best tv shows and movies like Dickensian (2015):
Similar in 86%
The Moonstone (1996)
Plot Summary:
Greg Wise (Sense and Sensibility) and Keeley Hawes (Karaoke) star in this sumptuous adaptation of Wilkie Collins' classic mystery, the first detective novel ever written. The Moonstone, a sacred Hindu diamond was stolen from the head of the Moon God, in its shrine by John Herncastle in 1799. The stone is said to be cursed if it is removed from the shrine. In 1848, a man named Franklin Blake announces to Rachel that the Moonstone has been bequeathed to her by Herncastle. Blake gives her the jewel on her birthday and offers to mount the jewel for her, in order that she might wear it. Inevitably, the jewel is found missing the next morning and Rachel believes Blake stole it. Determined to prove his innocence, Blake leaves in order to pursue the real truth behind the theft.
IMDB Rating: 6.6
IMDB Votes: 536
Genere: Crime, Drama, Mystery
Country: UK
Duration: 120 min
Plot tags: costume drama, period piece, period drama
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Similar in 89%
Jamaica Inn (2014)
Plot Summary:
Set in 1820 against the forbidding backdrop of windswept Cornish moors, the story follows the journey of young and spirited Mary who is forced to live with her Aunt Patience after the death of her mother. Mary arrives at the isolated Jamaica Inn to discover her Aunt is a shell of the carefree woman she remembers from her childhood, and instead finds a drudge who is firmly under the spell of her domineering husband Joss. The Inn has no guests - the rooms are locked and kept for storage - but it soon becomes clear that it’s a cover, as Joss is the leader of a smuggling ring, and Jamaica Inn the hub of his ‘free’ trade.
IMDB Rating: 6.4
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama
Country: UK
Duration: 177 min
Plot tags: touching, serious, suspenseful, tense, bleak, realistic, costume drama, historical drama, period piece, period drama
Similar in 78%
The Essex Serpent (2022)
Plot Summary:
London widow Cora Seaborne moves to Essex to investigate reports of a mythical serpent. She forms an unlikely bond with the village vicar, but when tragedy strikes, locals accuse her of attracting the creature.
IMDB Rating: 6.3
IMDB Votes: 7000
Genere: Drama, Fantasy, Mystery
Country: UK
Duration: 288 min
Plot tags: tense, captivating, disturbing, gothic, spiritual, costume drama, period drama, beautiful
Similar in 77%
The Crimson Petal and the White (2011)
Plot Summary:
Follow Sugar into the underbelly of Victorian London seething with vitality, sexuality, ambition and emotion.
IMDB Rating: 7.5
IMDB Votes: 4000
Genere: Drama, Romance
Country: UK
Duration: 274 min
Plot tags: costume drama, historical drama, serious, captivating, realistic, stylized, sexual, psychological thriller, rough, grim
Similar in 76%
Oliver Twist (1999)
Plot Summary:
Based on Charles Dickens' novel, this adaptation traces the childhood of an orphan whose mother dies giving birth to him in an English work-house in the 1820s.
IMDB Rating: 7.7
IMDB Votes: 829
Genere: Crime, Drama
Country: UK
Duration: 386 min
Plot tags: costume drama, period piece, bleak, serious, emotional, realistic, gloomy, period drama
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Similar in 80%
Bleak House (2005)
Plot Summary:
A suspenseful tale about the injustices of the 19th Century English legal system.
IMDB Rating: 8.3
IMDB Votes: 10000
Genere: Crime, Drama
Country: UK, USA
Duration: 510 min
Plot tags: captivating, costume drama, bleak, serious, period piece, historical drama, suspense, educational, realistic, mysterious
Similar in 83%
The Mystery of Edwin Drood (2012)
Plot Summary:
An exploration of Charles Dickens's unfinished work in which the mystery of the murder of Edwin Drood is examined.
IMDB Rating: 6.8
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Drama, Mystery
Country: UK
Duration: 120 min
Plot tags: tense, atmospheric, serious, captivating, psychological, historical drama, realistic, stylized, fairy tale, period drama
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Similar in 75%
He Knew He Was Right (2004)
Plot Summary:
He Knew He Was Right was a 2004 BBC TV adaptation of the Anthony Trollope novel He Knew He Was Right. The mini-series portrays the failure of a marriage caused by the unreasonable jealousy of a husband exacerbated by the stubbornness of a wilful wife.
IMDB Rating: 6.9
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Drama
Country: UK
Duration: 240 min
Plot tags: serious, realistic, stylized, historical drama, period piece, costume drama, romantic drama, period drama
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Similar in 90%
The Forsyte Saga (1967)
Plot Summary:
Adaptation from John Galsworthy's novels.
IMDB Rating: 8.5
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Drama, Romance
Country: UK
Duration: 50 min
Plot tags: family saga, costume drama, stylized, spiritual, historical drama, touching, epic, serious, captivating, realistic
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Similar in 90%
Doctor Thorne (2016)
Plot Summary:
The story of the penniless Mary Thorne, who grows up with her rich aunt/cousins at Greshamsbury Park estate.
IMDB Rating: 7.3
IMDB Votes: 5000
Genere: Drama
Country: UK
Duration: 48 min
Plot tags: costume drama, captivating, cynical, historical drama, sentimental, thought provoking, touching, period piece, period drama
Similar in 79%
Our Mutual Friend (1998)
Plot Summary:
Intertwining tales of love, greed, and secret identities in Charles Dickens's 1860s London.
IMDB Rating: 8.1
IMDB Votes: 3000
Genere: Drama
Country: UK
Duration: 350 min
Plot tags: costume drama, period piece, historical drama, serious, captivating, realistic, period drama
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Similar in 85%
The Ruby in the Smoke (2006)
Plot Summary:
In Victorian England, Sally Lockhart receives an anonymous note sending her on a mysterious quest. Her father has recently died and feeling suffocated living with her elderly aunt moves in with newfound friends, a photographer and his sister. She is soon made aware that the mysterious Mrs. Holland is out to kill her. In the end, she realizes the solution to the mystery is rooted in events that occurred long ago when she lived with her father in India and a recurring dream she has had ever since.
IMDB Rating: 6.6
IMDB Votes: 955
Genere: Crime, Drama, Mystery
Country: UK
Duration: 95 min
Plot tags: tense, enigmatic, captivating, suspense, disturbing, detective, costume drama, period drama, weird
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Similar in 82%
The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby (2001)
Plot Summary:
Adaptation of the Dickens novel.
IMDB Rating: 7.5
IMDB Votes: 1000
Genere: Comedy, Drama
Country: UK
Duration: 200 min
Plot tags: serious, sentimental, atmospheric, uplifting, touching, captivating, juvenile, historical drama, emotional, realistic
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Similar in 80%
Alias Grace (2017)
Plot Summary:
Based on the true story of Grace Marks, a housemaid and immigrant from Ireland who was imprisoned in 1843, perhaps wrongly, for the murder of her employer Thomas Kinnear. Grace claims to have no memory of the murder yet the facts are irrefutable. A decade after, Dr. Simon Jordan tries to help Grace recall her past.
IMDB Rating: 7.6
IMDB Votes: 37000
Genere: Biography, Crime, Drama, Thriller
Country: Canada
Duration: 267 min
Plot tags: period piece, costume drama, historical drama, psychological, atmospheric, captivating, psychological thriller, thought provoking, gothic, dark
Similar in 86%
The Forsyte Saga (2002)
Plot Summary:
In 2002, the first two books and the first interlude of John Galsworthy's trilogy The Forsyte Saga were adapted by Granada Television for the ITV network. Additional funding for this production was provided by American PBS station WGBH, the 1967 BBC version having been a success on PBS in the early 1970s.
IMDB Rating: 8.1
IMDB Votes: 6000
Genere: Drama, History, Romance
Country: UK
Duration: 276 min
Plot tags: period piece, family saga, realistic, costume drama, serious, saga, historical drama, touching, stylized, romantic drama
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Similar in 80%
The Tenant of Wildfell Hall (1996)
Plot Summary:
Based on a little known 1848 novel by Anne Bronte, Tara Fitzgerald stars as an enigmatic young woman who moves to 19th Century Yorkshire with a young son. Distancing herself from everyone in the village and their prying questions, she remains totally aloof until a charming neighbor farmer gets her to reveal her past through his persistence. Only then does she reveal she is hiding away from a womanizing, belittling husband.
IMDB Rating: 7.3
IMDB Votes: 3000
Genere: Drama
Country: UK
Duration: 159 min
Plot tags: costume drama, period piece, historical drama, gothic, serious, realistic, period drama
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Similar in 77%
Belgravia (2020)
Plot Summary:
A tale of secrets and scandals set in 1840s London. When the Trenchards accept an invitation to the now legendary ball hosted by the Duchess of Richmond on the fateful evening of the Battle of Waterloo, it sets in motion a series of events that will have consequences for decades to come as secrets unravel behind the porticoed doors of London’s grandest postcode.
IMDB Rating: 7.5
IMDB Votes: 8000
Genere: Drama, Romance
Country: UK, USA
Duration: 60 min
Plot tags: costume drama, captivating, romantic, period piece, exciting, sincere, atmospheric, historical drama, talky, period drama
Similar in 81%
Little Dorrit (2008)
Plot Summary:
The series tells the story of Amy Dorrit, who spends her days earning money for the family and looking after her proud father, who is a long term inmate of Marshalsea debtors' prison in London. Amy and her family's world is transformed when her boss's son, Arthur Clennam, returns from overseas to solve his family's mysterious legacy and discovers that their lives are interlinked.
IMDB Rating: 8.2
IMDB Votes: 10000
Genere: Drama, Mystery, Romance
Country: UK, USA
Duration: 420 min
Plot tags: captivating, costume drama, sincere, period piece, historical drama, heartbreaking, romantic drama, historical romance, atmospheric, serious
Similar in 89%
The Suspicions of Mr Whicher: The Murder at Road Hill House (2011)
Plot Summary:
In 1860 Scotland Yard's 'Prince of Sleuths' Jack Whicher is sent to rural Wiltshire to investigate the murder of three-year-old Saville Kent,snatched from his bed at night and killed.
IMDB Rating: 6.8
IMDB Votes: 2000
Genere: Crime, Drama, Mystery
Country: UK
Duration: 95 min
Plot tags: psychological, tense, suspenseful, stylized, historical drama, detective, serious, realistic, factual, period drama
Similar in 82%
Murdoch Mysteries (2008)
Plot Summary:
A Victorian-era Toronto detective uses then-cutting edge forensic techniques to solve crimes, with the assistance of a female coroner who is also struggling for recognition in the face of tradition, based on the books by Maureen Jennings.
IMDB Rating: 8.2
IMDB Votes: 17000
Genere: Crime, Drama, Mystery
Country: Canada, UK
Duration: 48 min
Plot tags: atmospheric, clever, stylized, detective, sad, costume drama, crime drama, historical drama, serious, mind bending
Similar in 84%
The Frankenstein Chronicles (2015)
Plot Summary:
Inspector John Marlott investigates a series of crimes in 19th Century London, which may have been committed by a scientist intent on re-animating the dead.
IMDB Rating: 7.2
IMDB Votes: 12000
Genere: Crime, Drama, Fantasy, History, Mystery
Country: UK
Duration: 48 min
Plot tags: tense, stylized, suspenseful, detective, costume drama, enigmatic, gothic, suspense, captivating, atmospheric
Similar in 89%
Endeavour (2012)
Plot Summary:
The early days of a young Endeavour Morse, whose experiences as a detective constable with the Oxford City Police will ultimately shape his future.
IMDB Rating: 8.6
IMDB Votes: 32000
Genere: Crime, Drama, Mystery
Country: UK
Duration: 89 min
Plot tags: serious, detective, intellectual, realistic, atmospheric, crime drama, period piece, captivating, melancholic, costume drama
Similar in 77%
The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes (1984)
Plot Summary:
The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes (1984–1985), The Return of Sherlock Holmes (1986–1988), The Case-Book of Sherlock Holmes (1991–1993) and The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes (1994), collectively known as Sherlock Holmes, are a series of adaptations of Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes stories which were produced by Granada Television and originally broadcast by ITV in the United Kingdom. The series starred Jeremy Brett as Holmes and David Burke (in the Adventures series) and Edward Hardwicke (Return, Case-Book, Memoirs) as Dr. Watson. The programme adapted 42 of the original stories in 41 episodes, with 36 running for 50 minutes (in a one-hour timeslot), and five being feature-length specials. Adventures ran for two series totalling 13 episodes, from April to June 1984 and August to September 1985. Return ran for two series from July to August 1986 and April to August 1988, as well as the specials "The Sign of Four" and "The Hound of the Baskervilles", which aired on 29 December 1987 and 31 August 1988 respectively. Case-Book ran for one series from February to March 1991 and three specials which aired on 2 January 1992 and 27 January and 3 February 1993. Memoirs ran for one series from March to April 1994. A short episode was also produced as part of "The Four Oaks Mystery" which aired during the ITV Telethon in 1992. Sherlock Holmes appeared in the first part, with the casts of Van der Valk, Taggart and Inspector Wexford appearing in the second, third and fourth parts respectively.
IMDB Rating: 8.7
IMDB Votes: 24000
Genere: Crime, Drama, Mystery
Country: UK
Duration: 60 min
Plot tags: detective, serious, stylized, suspenseful, realistic, captivating, atmospheric, intellectual, gothic, spiritual
Similar in 76%
Agatha Christie's Poirot (1989)
Plot Summary:
From England to Egypt, accompanied by his elegant and trustworthy sidekicks, the intelligent yet eccentrically-refined Belgian detective Hercule Poirot pits his wits against a collection of first class deceptions.
IMDB Rating: 8.6
IMDB Votes: 50000
Genere: Crime, Drama, Mystery, Thriller
Country: UK
Duration: 100 min
Plot tags: clever, realistic, captivating, detective, serious, suspenseful, exciting, stylized, crime drama, spiritual
Similar in 85%
The Bletchley Circle (2012)
Plot Summary:
The Bletchley Circle follows the journey of four ordinary women with extraordinary skills that helped to end World War II. Set in 1952, Susan, Millie, Lucy and Jean have returned to their normal lives, modestly setting aside the part they played in producing crucial intelligence, which helped the Allies to victory and shortened the war. When Susan discovers a hidden code behind an unsolved murder she is met by skepticism from the police. She quickly realises she can only begin to crack the murders and bring the culprit to justice with her former friends. The Bletchley Circle paints a vivid portrait of post-war Britain in this fictional tale of unsung heroes.
IMDB Rating: 7.9
IMDB Votes: 14000
Genere: Crime, Drama, Mystery, Thriller
Country: UK, Canada
Duration: 45 min
Plot tags: tense, detective, serious, suspenseful, realistic, crime drama, intellectual, period piece, costume drama, historical drama
Similar in 82%
Great Expectations (1989)
Plot Summary:
Phillip Pirrip, known as Pip, meets a convict or two in a graveyard and sets into motion a series of events that lead him from a comfortable life in his brother-in-law's forge to a mysterious inheritance and his acquaintance with the eerie Miss Havisham, her beautiful ward Estella, and the unusual lawyer Jaggers.
IMDB Rating: 7.5
IMDB Votes: 456
Genere: Drama
Country: USA, UK
Duration: 303 min
Plot tags: historical drama, period drama
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Similar in 89%
Great Expectations (2011)
Plot Summary:
'Great Expectations' opens with Pip as a boy (played as an young man by newcomer Douglas Booth, 'The Pillars of the Earth') on the marshes near his home, where he encounters the desperate escapee Magwitch (Winstone). Pip is coerced into stealing a metal file to break Magwitch's chains, but the boy willingly snares a piece of meat pie to feed the famished man. So begins a classic coming-of-age story about innate kindness and learned indifference. Young Pip expects no more from life than to join his brother-in-law Joe at the blacksmith's forge. But fate intervenes when the neighboring rich eccentric Miss Havisham (Anderson) seeks Pip out as a playmate for her adopted daughter, Estella (Vanessa Kirby, 'The Hour'). This sets Pip on a course that sees him tested in many ways, not least in being thrown into a wish-fulfillment paradise for a young man, where he has the pleasures of London at his disposal and true love - and great expectations - in his future. Or so he thinks.
IMDB Rating: 7.5
IMDB Votes: 8000
Genere: Drama
Country: UK, USA
Duration: 60 min
Plot tags: atmospheric, historical drama, serious, captivating, emotional, realistic, costume drama, period piece, gothic, stylized
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Similar in 76%
Cranford (2007)
Plot Summary:
In the 1840s, Cranford is ruled by the ladies. They adore good gossip; and romance and change is in the air, as the unwelcome grasp of the Industrial Revolution rapidly approaches their beloved rural market-town.
IMDB Rating: 8.3
IMDB Votes: 10000
Genere: Drama
Country: UK, USA
Duration: 469 min
Plot tags: sincere, atmospheric, costume drama, clever, period piece, historical drama, sitcom, historical romance, realistic, stylized
Similar in 84%
Ripper Street (2012)
Plot Summary:
A drama set in the East End of London in 1889, during the aftermath of the "Ripper" murders. The action centres around the notorious H Division – the police precinct from hell – which is charged with keeping order in the chaotic streets of Whitechapel. Ripper Street explores the lives of characters trying to recover from the Ripper's legacy, from crimes that have not only irretrievably altered their lives, but the very fabric of their city. At the drama's heart our detectives try to bring a little light into the dark world they inhabit.
IMDB Rating: 8.1
IMDB Votes: 22000
Genere: Crime, Drama, Mystery
Country: UK, Ireland
Duration: 59 min
Plot tags: atmospheric, serious, tense, suspenseful, stylized, detective, costume drama, historical drama, crime drama, realistic
Similar in 82%
Peaky Blinders (2013)
Plot Summary:
A gangster family epic set in 1919 Birmingham, England and centered on a gang who sew razor blades in the peaks of their caps, and their fierce boss Tommy Shelby, who means to move up in the world.
IMDB Rating: 8.8
IMDB Votes: 621000
Genere: Crime, Drama
Country: UK
Duration: 2109 min
Plot tags: serious, atmospheric, tense, stylized, captivating, clever, suspenseful, rough, historical drama, realistic