Working-class detective Frank Thiel and upper-crust forensic pathologist Professor Karl-Friedrich Boerne have almost nothing in common — except that Thiel lives in an apartment owned by Boerne and they solve crimes together. This odd-couple bromance is the highest-rated team in the entire long-running Tatort franchise, and with good reason: the cases are clever, the bickering is brilliant, and the city of Münster provides a wonderfully bike-friendly backdrop for their investigations.

Offbeat and unforgettable, Captain Marleau solves crimes in her own Columbo-style way — disheveled, deceptively bumbling, and always several steps ahead of everyone in the room. Created by Elsa Marpeau, this addictive French series is the one that launched a whole universe of idiosyncratic investigators on MHz Choice.

Bored in retirement, former German chancellor Angela Merkel moves to the rural district of Uckermark along with her husband, her bodyguard, and her pug Helmut, and turns her attention to solving murders. It’s as delightfully absurd as it sounds. Part political satire, part cozy mystery, Miss Merkel is a whodunit comedy with a premise so idiosyncratic it couldn’t be anything but German.

Captain Antoine Verlay is a no-nonsense cop with zero interest in art. Florence Chassagne is an art historian with anxiety issues and an uncanny ability to spot patterns nobody else can see. Together, this mismatched pair solve murders by decoding the lives and work of famous artists — and in Florence’s case, that sometimes means consulting with the artists themselves, long-dead as they may be.

Quirky and comic Italian mysteries from the producers of Detective Montalbano, filmed in the sun-washed beauty of Tuscany. The local bar is the hub of village life — and apparently also of homicide. A warm, funny series full of lovable eccentrics and the kind of small-town chaos that only Italians could make this charming.