Netflix’s new thriller series has viewers fascinated with its mind-blowing turns.
The platform has hit the jackpot again with its latest contribution to the m*rder mystery genre. It’s a s**y thriller that has many hooked just days after it came out.
The streaming giant’s newest show has rapidly made it to the Top 10 on the site, adding to Netflix’s growing collection of gripping drama series.
People in the industry say that this new thriller is the perfect follow-up to a number of successful shows that have ended.
CBR says that the series is the perfect substitute for dramas like Big Little Lies, The Perfect Couple, or Desperate Housewives.
Its path to Netflix is an interesting example of how current television is distributed.
The series was first made for Starz, which ordered eight episodes in October 2023. However, due to changes in corporate structures, it ended up on Netflix.
After Starz Inc. became its own entity and split off from Lionsgate Studios, Lionsgate Television got the rights back from Starz.
According to Deadline, Netflix bought the U.S. rights to the show in June 2025 for a year. The show premiered on the site on July 21.
Critics have mostly given the series good reviews. It started with a 70% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, which has subsequently gone up to 80% as more reviews have come in.
The Hollywood Reporter said, “In terms of pure over-the-top fun, I think it’ll be hard to beat Margo and Sophie and friends screwing and backstabbing their way through Maple Brook, all the way to some vicious bloody end.”
The review said that “no one is likely to mistake it for the deepest show of the summer, and certainly not for the nicest.” It does, however, succeed as entertainment that “takes a lot of smarts to make something this pleasurably stupid.”
Paste Magazine also liked the show’s summer escapism appeal, calling it “the televisual equivalent of a beach read,” a soapy thriller that feels like it was intended for summer viewing.
Fans are also applauding the episode. One person said, “Talk about a plot twist!” I enjoy it when I think I know what’s going on in a program and it surprises me.
Another person said it was a “wild time” and that the “crazy drama and twists” were just what they “needed.”
A third person just wrote, “Mind blowing.” Turns. 10 out of 10 for Texas
Since it first came out on Netflix, the series has done very well on the service. The show started on the site on July 21, 2025, and rapidly became popular with viewers.
FlixPatrol said that since it came out, it has been climbing the rankings and is now at No. 2 in the Top 10 TV charts.
Brittany Snow plays Sophie O’Neil, the main character in the show. She moves from Cambridge, Massachusetts to the made-up community of Maple Brook in deep East Texas.
What starts off as a simple moving story quickly turns into something much worse.
Sophie gets caught up with a wealthy socialite who is very attractive. She becomes a primary suspect in the de@th of a teenage girl when she learns that a group of housewives is hiding serious secrets.
Sophie leaves New England for East Texas, where she meets a rich socialite who has a group of housewives who keep terrible secrets.
Margo Banks is the charming leader of the wealthy socialite organization called the Hunting Wives. Malin Åkerman plays her.
The supporting cast includes several well-known TV actors: Dermot Mulroney as Jed Banks, Margo’s rich husband who is both an oil tycoon and a candidate for governor of Texas; Chrissy Metz as Starr, a working-class single mother whose daughter gets caught up in the main mystery; and Katie Lowes as Jill, the reverend’s wife and a member of the Hunting Wives whose teenage son Brad becomes a key figure in the unfolding drama.
George Ferrier plays Brad, Jill’s adolescent son who is having an affair with Margo, and Jaime Ray Newman plays Callie, the town sheriff’s wife and the “number two” of the Hunting Wives.
The show is based on May Cobb’s novel series of the same name, and Gotham’s Rebecca Cutter is the creator.
Forbes said that the show’s great performance has naturally led to real talks regarding future seasons.
Rebecca Cutter, the show’s creator, talked in depth about possible plans for Season 2 in a recent interview with Variety.
Cutter said that she thought we should do a little bit of a time jump, not a year, but a time, to move the tale forward.
Cutter has figured out what the main things that would make a second season work are: By the time we were done filming, I knew that the two main parts of the show were the mystery and the friendship between Margo and Sophie, and how those two things fit together.
When asked about adding new storylines, Cutter said he was open to new mysteries as long as the current cast stayed the same.
I think it would be a good idea to start a fresh m**der mystery. But it’s still in the early phases. I still don’t know who did it or who got done!
The official description of the show encapsulates its alluring premise: The Hunting Wives follows a woman and her family as they migrate from Boston to Texas.
There, she gets too close to a socialite and becomes obsessed with m*rder, seduction, and m*rder.
The series is another achievement for Netflix’s plan to turn bestselling books into TV shows.
The platform has made a series that gets both good reviews and a lot of viewers by using a well-known source material, a skilled creative team, and a well-known cast.
Not all of them became famous around the world, but many of them achieved quiet success on the platform and kept going for several seasons.
Some of these include Virgin River, Ginny and Georgia, Sweet Magnolias, and Ransom Canyon. The Hunting Wives might keep going in the same direction, it seems.
Below is the trailer for The Hunting Wives…
