--- title: "Major Crimes" year: 2012 kind: "series" canonical: "https://film.one/tv/major-crimes" fi1m_id: "major-crimes" imdb_id: "tt1936532" tmdb_id: 39483 wikidata_id: "Q738219" fi1m_score: 66 critics_reviews: 2 published: "2026-09-23T13:48:54.076370+00:00" updated: "2026-09-23T13:49:05.484977+00:00" region: "NO" licence: "© Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL." --- # Major Crimes (2012) Created by James Duff · 43m · Crime, Drama ## Identity Major Crimes - **Canonical:** https://film.one/tv/major-crimes - **Type:** Series - **Fi1m ID:** major-crimes - **IMDb ID:** tt1936532 - **TMDB ID:** 39483 - **Wikidata ID:** Q738219 - **Same entity:** https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1936532/, https://www.themoviedb.org/tv/39483, https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q738219 **Fi1m score: 66** · Critics: 2 of 6 reviews so far *In a sentence:* Los Angeles cannot afford a trial, so Mary McDonnell quietly talks everyone into confessing > *The Closer* without Kyra Sedgwick turns out to be a steadier, drier programme than anyone expected, held up by Mary McDonnell’s patient captain and G. W. Bailey’s grumbling. It is also, week to week, the same programme, and it knows it. ## Synopsis Los Angeles, 2012. The LAPD’s Major Crimes division has lost its chief and gained Captain Sharon Raydor (Mary McDonnell), who arrives with a folder and new orders from Assistant Chief Taylor (Robert Gossett): the city can no longer afford long murder trials, so the squad is to close cases with confessions and plea deals instead. Lieutenant Louie Provenza (G. W. Bailey) expected the job himself and does not hide it; Lieutenant Andy Flynn (Anthony Denison) backs him. Working the cases around them are Mike Tao (Michael Paul Chan), Julio Sanchez (Raymond Cruz), Buzz Watson (Phillip P. Keene) behind his camera, and new detective Amy Sykes (Kearran Giovanni). Meanwhile Rusty Beck (Graham Patrick Martin), a teenage witness the department needs kept safe, has nowhere to live, and Raydor takes him home. ## Review James Duff has made a spin-off out of the moment most series end. When Kyra Sedgwick left *The Closer*, he kept the squad room, the squad and the corpses, and replaced the chief who charmed confessions out of suspects with a captain who reads the rulebook aloud. Captain Sharon Raydor (Mary McDonnell) arrives with new orders: the city cannot afford long trials, so the division is to close cases with confessions and plea deals instead. Lieutenant Louie Provenza (G. W. Bailey) wanted her job and says so. That is the whole of the premise, and it is a better one than it sounds. McDonnell is the reason to keep watching. She plays Raydor as a woman who has decided that being disliked is a cost of doing the job properly. She stands to one side with a folder, waits, and says something quiet that changes what everyone else is doing; when she does raise her voice it is perhaps once a season. Bailey’s Provenza grumbles from his first scene, and the programme knows exactly how much grumbling an episode can carry, which is about three lines. Anthony Denison’s Flynn is his straight man, Michael Paul Chan’s Tao explains the forensics, Raymond Cruz’s Sanchez does the shouting in the interview room, and Phillip P. Keene’s Buzz films everything from the doorway. The premise gives the writers something the genre usually lacks: a reason not to want a trial. In the ordinary cop programme the arrest is the ending. Here it is the middle, and the last ten minutes of an episode are a negotiation, with the suspect, a lawyer, and a deputy district attorney (Nadine Velazquez’s Emma Rios) who has to defend the deal in court. The writers, Duff, Adam Belanoff, Mike Berchem and Jim Leonard among them, understand that this is where the drama is: a murderer being offered twenty-five years and told it is a kindness. What surprised us was the other half. Raydor takes in Rusty Beck (Graham Patrick Martin), a teenage witness with nowhere to live, and the scenes between them, at a kitchen table with a plate of something neither of them wants, moved us more than a procedural has any business doing. Martin plays a boy who has learned to distrust every adult’s kindness, and McDonnell gives him none to distrust; she keeps turning up. It is patient writing, spread across whole seasons, and it is what we remembered afterwards. Now the caveats. Directed by Michael M. Robin, Rick Wallace, Anthony Hemingway and others, it looks as *The Closer* looked: the same flat, bright Los Angeles daylight, the same murder room with the screens along one wall, the same walk from the lift to the desk. Not a shot in a hundred and five episodes would tell you which director was working that week. The cases are the usual run: a body in a car park, a body in a house in the hills, a body that turns out to belong to someone richer than expected. By the second season we could set our watches by the confession, and somewhere in the fourth we caught ourselves waiting for the Rusty scenes and letting the murder go by. The first season leans hard on friction. Provenza and Flynn oppose Raydor because the programme needs them to, not for any reason the writers have found. Robert Gossett’s Assistant Chief Taylor exists to disapprove. It settles once Kearran Giovanni’s Amy Sykes stops being the new one, but that takes ten episodes. Most of the reviews asked why the programme needed a new title when so little else had changed. We think the answer is McDonnell, and that the question is fair. This is *The Closer* run at a lower temperature, with a lead who does not need to be loved, and it is a more honest way to run a division and a less exciting way to run a drama. It began on 13 August 2012 and ran for six seasons, 43 minutes an episode, with a 15 certificate. Watch it an episode at a time, with the kettle on; that is the pace it was made for. *Fi1m score 66, published 23 September 2026.* ## Straight answers **Is Major Crimes worth watching?** *Major Crimes* is worth watching for anyone who wants a patient, dry police procedural to take an episode at a time, and we scored it 66. Mary McDonnell's captain and the scenes with Graham Patrick Martin's Rusty are the reasons to stay; the cases themselves run to a pattern you will have learned by the second season. **How long is Major Crimes, and what is it rated?** *Major Crimes* has episodes of about 43m. It is a crime and drama series. **Where can I watch Major Crimes in Norway?** *Major Crimes* is not on any streaming or rental service in Norway at the moment. It is available in 7 other countries; change your country at the top of the page to see where. Availability is checked daily. **How violent or frightening is Major Crimes, and is it suitable for children?** *Major Crimes* carries a 15 certificate in the UK, and the violence is that of a murder procedural: a body found at the start of each episode, then talk in interview rooms rather than gore. It is not frightening and there is little on screen to shock, but the subject matter and the plea negotiations make it a programme for older teenagers and adults, not children. **How does Major Crimes compare to Homicide: Life on the Street?** *Major Crimes* is the gentler, more repetitive programme; [*Homicide: Life on the Street*](https://film.one/tv/homicide-life-on-the-street) is the richer and more demanding one, with detectives as absorbing as their cases and Andre Braugher at its centre. Choose *Major Crimes* if you want the same squad room every week with the kettle on, and *Homicide* if you want a police drama that asks more of you and gives more back. **What should I watch after Major Crimes?** After *Major Crimes*, try [*Homicide: Life on the Street*](https://film.one/tv/homicide-life-on-the-street) (1993, Fi1m 89): Baltimore detectives, a whiteboard of names, and the interview room as the whole show. Then [*Engrenages*](https://film.one/tv/spiral) (2005, Fi1m 86): Paris police and prosecutors arguing over what a case is worth; grubbier and angrier; and [*Unforgotten*](https://film.one/tv/unforgotten) (2015, Fi1m 64): British cold cases solved by two quiet people who are decent to everyone, including suspects. ### Reviews we read (2) - **The AV Club**, Emily St. James (64/100, inferred): The critic sees promise in the show's novel premise about a cash-strapped LAPD prioritizing plea deals over death-penalty trials, but finds it undercut by overly heightened interpersonal conflicts and a reliance on familiar cop-drama tropes. [Read](https://www.avclub.com/major-crimes-1798173815) - **Variety**, Brian Lowry (53/100, inferred): The critic questions why the show warrants a new name as a spinoff of The Closer, noting minimal differences beyond Mary McDonnell replacing Kyra Sedgwick and stylistic similarities. The procedural elements and cast holdovers provide some appeal for fans of the original, but the show is seen as largely more of the same. [Read](https://variety.com/2012/tv/reviews/major-crimes-1117948031/) ## Details - **Created by:** James Duff - **Creator:** James Duff - **Director:** Stacey K. Black, Michael M. Robin, David McWhirter, Sheelin Choksey, Sylvain White, Jon Tenney, Steve Robin, James Duff, Anthony Hemingway, Rick Wallace - **Writer:** Michael Alaimo, James Duff, Carson Moore, Adam Belanoff, Ralph Gifford, Mike Berchem, Jim Leonard, Leo Geter, Duppy Demetrius, Nick Zayas - **Producer:** Michael M. Robin, James Duff, Greer Shephard - **Cast:** Mary McDonnell as Captain Sharon Raydor; G. W. Bailey as Lt. Louie Provenza; Anthony Denison as Lt. Andy Flynn; Michael Paul Chan as Lt. Mike Tao; Raymond Cruz as Detective Julio Sanchez; Phillip P. Keene as Buzz Watson; Kearran Giovanni as Amy Sykes; Graham Patrick Martin as Rusty Beck - **Runtime:** 43m - **Release (Norway):** 13 August 2012 - **Genres:** Crime, Drama ## Where to watch in Norway Not streaming, renting or buying in Norway at the last check. Also available in: AT, AU, CA, DE, FR, GB, US. Add `?region=XX` to this URL for another country. ## If you liked this - *The Closer* (2005): The parent series: same squad room, warmer lead, and the confessions come with a southern accent. - *Homicide: Life on the Street* (1993), Fi1m 89: Baltimore detectives, a whiteboard of names, and the interview room as the whole show. — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/tv/homicide-life-on-the-street.md) - *Engrenages* (2005), Fi1m 86: Paris police and prosecutors arguing over what a case is worth; grubbier and angrier. — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/tv/spiral.md) - *Unforgotten* (2015), Fi1m 64: British cold cases solved by two quiet people who are decent to everyone, including suspects. — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/tv/unforgotten.md) - *Bosch* (2014): Los Angeles homicide with the same daylight and a detective who prefers trials to deals. --- © Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL. Canonical: https://film.one/tv/major-crimes