The topic 3 chilling Paramount+ thrillers to watch this week (July 21-26) is currently the subject of lively discussion — readers and analysts are keeping a close eye on developments.
This is taking place in a dynamic environment: companies’ decisions and competitors’ reactions can quickly change the picture.
There’s a reason Paramount+’s fast-paced new movie Wardriver sits at the top of the streamer’s Top 10 rankings—it’s a thriller, and people love them. In fact, according to the data FlixPatrol, most of the biggest streaming services currently have thrillers among their top five because they offer mystery, crank up the tension, and dare you to look away lest you miss something.
And while Paramount+ staples like the Mission: Impossible saga get watched on repeat, allow me to offer a few other suggestions for a weekday adrenaline-pumper, with my number one pick a David Fincher classic about one of America’s most notorious serial killers.
Before Tom Cruise and Steven Spielberg had their much-publicized falling out around the time of their second and last movie together, War of the Worlds, they collaborated on what is one of the best and most influential sci-fi thrillers ever made—Minority Report. The iconic 2002 film, an adaptation of Philip K. Dick’s 1956 short story of the same name, is still one of the best screen adaptations of Dick’s work, alongside Blade Runner and Total Recall.
In 2054, where psychics known as “precogs” can look into the future and see murders before they’re committed, law enforcement officers who are part of a unit known as PreCrime can use the information to apprehend perpetrators, often before they even know they’re about to kill. Heading up the PreCrime unit is John Anderton (Cruise), who’s very good at his job and believes in the system, until the precogs finger him as a future killer. This triggers a high-stakes manhunt, led by agent Danny Witwer (Colin Farrell), as Anderton races to clear his name and uncover the conspiracy behind the accusation.
Minority Report is not only a classic mold-breaking sci-fi thriller, but nerds will tip their hats to the film’s prediction of gesture-controlled screens and eyeball-scanning tech. The film has a solid 89% rating on Rotten Tomatoes.
With Matt Damon leading the cast of what is quickly becoming the movie event of 2026 in Christopher Nolan’s massive The Odyssey, why not set aside a couple of hours this week to pay homage to one of the actor’s most sinister roles in the psychological thriller The Talented Mr. Ripley.
Nominated for five Oscars, Anthony Minghella’s 1999 adaptation of Patricia Highsmith’s 1955 novel is a gorgeously chilling movie about stolen identity—shot across some of the most beautiful corners of Italy, as if the scenery were there to soften the evil unfolding within it. Damon plays Tom Ripley, a young New York go-getter who’s sent to a beautiful Italian coastal town to retrieve Dickie Greenleaf (Jude Law), the pampered, work-dodging son of a shipping magnate. But once Tom tastes Dickie’s frivolous, sun-drenched lifestyle and glamorous circle of friends (including Gwyneth Paltrow and Cate Blanchett), bringing him home is driven from Tom’s mind—and something far darker takes its place.
From twisted mysteries to edge-of-your-seat suspense — can you identify these Netflix thrillers from a single clue?
In which Netflix thriller does a woman discover that her seemingly perfect husband has been living a secret double life, complete with a second family in another city?
Which Netflix thriller follows a brilliant but obsessive stalker named Joe Goldberg who works in a bookstore and uses social media to insert himself into his targets’ lives?
In Bird Box, the characters must keep their eyes covered to avoid a mysterious force. Which actress plays the lead character Malorie?
Which Netflix thriller is set in the fictional German town of Winden and involves time travel through a cave system spanning multiple generations of intertwined families?
In Ozark, Marty Byrde is a financial advisor who is forced to launder money for a Mexican drug cartel. Which actor plays Marty?
Behind Her Eyes is a psychological thriller famous for its shocking finale. What supernatural concept drives the story’s climactic twist?
Which Netflix thriller is based on true events and follows a con artist who posed as a German heiress named Anna Delvey to scam New York’s elite social circles?
In the Netflix thriller Squid Game, what is the prize money (in South Korean won) offered to the winner of the deadly competition?
Highsmith’s character has been adapted many times since, from 1960 French classic Purple Noon to Netflix’s 2024 series starring Fleabag’s Andrew Scott, but Damon’s deranged con man remains the definitive big-screen Ripley.
Widely considered one of director David Fincher’s (Mindhunter, Fight Club) best movies, Zodiac trades the religion-driven flash of his film Se7en for a meticulous, creeping dread—made all the more haunting because it’s all true.
Based on San Francisco Chronicle political cartoonist Robert Graysmith’s non-fiction books Zodiac (1986) and Zodiac Unmasked (2002), Fincher’s critically acclaimed film tells the true story of the serial killer who famously taunted police with his handwritten ciphers and letters while terrorizing the San Francisco Bay Area in the late 1960s and ’70s.
Jake Gyllenhaal plays the out-of-his-league but determined Graysmith, whose puzzle-solving fixartion morphs into full obsession as he chases a suspect the cops can’t quite pinpoint. Robert Downey Jr. is cynical crime reporter Paul Avery, and Mark Ruffalo is homicide detective Dave Toschi, both run ragged while on the hunt for Zodiac, who was never caught. The 2007 film lives up to Fincher’s superb library of work and has a 90% critics’ rating on RT.
Whichever of these acclaimed thrillers you start with, you’ll surely be second-guessing someone’s motives by the end credits. But if, for some reason, none of these movies is doing it for you, How-To Geek’s streaming section has an endless array of movie recommendations for you to help you find something great to watch.
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