12 best mind-bending series on Netflix with an IMDb rating of 7 and above

IMDb rating: 7.6

Created by: David Benioff; D. B. Weiss; Alexander Woo

Cast: Eiza González, Benedict Wong, Jess Hong, Liam Cunningham, Marlo Kelly

Episodes: 8

Synopsis: Ye Wenjie, an astrophysicist who sees her father beaten to death during the Chinese Cultural Revolution is forced to use her scientific expertise in a secret military base in a remote region. She decides to discreetly respond to contact from an alien planet, which implicates a group of scientists in the present day as they gear up to confront humanity’s greatest threat.

About the series: The hit Netflix series is based on the award–winning Chinese novel The Three-Body Problem by Liu Cixin. This is the second live-action adaptation after a Chinese television version in 2023.

IMDb rating: 7.1

Created by: Jeff Rake

Cast: Melissa Roxburgh, Josh Dallas, Athena Karkanis, J. R. Ramirez, Luna Blaise, Jack Messina, Parveen Kaur, Matt Long, Holly Taylor

Episodes: 62

Synopsis: A plane full of 191 passengers goes missing, only to reappear five years later. The passengers now find themselves in a world which has moved on without them. They also face disturbing realities as they try to reintegrate into the society.

About the series: The first three seasons of the four-season show were originally aired on NBC. The final season was streamed on Netflix in two 10-episode parts in 2022 and 2023.

IMDb rating: 7.6

Created by: Sergei Belbel

Cast: Pablo Derqui, Andrea Ros, Javier Beltrán, Mercedes Sampietro

Episodes: 10

Synopsis: Eduard (Derqui) is overcome with guilt and remorse after his wife Elisa (Ros) and kids are killed in a car accident. He has given up all his will to live and tries to commit suicide. A stranger named Dr Everest (Sampietro) somehow stops him and shows him a portal to travel to an alternate universe where his family is still alive. Will Eduard’s love and faith be enough to save his family in a parallel dimension?

Image: Courtesy If I Hadn’t Met You/ IMDb

IMDb rating: 7.7

Created by: Patrick Somerville

Cast: Emma Stone, Jonah Hill, Justin Theroux, Sonoya Mizuno, Gabriel Byrne

Episodes: 10

Synopsis: Annie Landsberg (Stone) and Owen Milgrim (Hill) are two strangers in a post-apocalyptic New York, who meet when they sign up for a peculiar pharmaceutical trial. It takes place over three days during which their consciousnesses are made to travel across timelines and various worlds, all for the sake of healing their minds. However, sinister consequences await them when the experiment derails as the computer which the creator used to connect the minds goes awry.

IMDb rating: 7.7

Created by: Natasha Lyonne, Amy Poehler, Leslye Headland

Cast: Natasha Lyonne, Charlie Barnett, Greta Lee, Jeremy Bobb

Episodes: 15

Synopsis: A young game developer Nadia Vulvokov (Lyonne) gets trapped in a strange situation where she dies on her 36th birthday only to resurrect unharmed for the birthday party. As this continues, Nadia becomes befuddled and vows to find answers to how to stop the loop. Every encounter with life and death and life again sheds light on herself and her relationships.

Awards won: Russian Doll has won three Primetime Emmy Awards.

IMDb rating: 7.8

Created by: Brit Marling, Zal Batmanglij

Cast: Brit Marling, Emory Cohen, Phyllis Smith, Jason Isaacs, Patrick Gibson

Episodes: 16

Synopsis: Prairie Johnson (Marling) refers to herself as The OA after she escapes from being held captive in a technology-driven glass cage by a sociopath named Hap (Isaacs). Despite being previously blind, she returns home seven years later with perfect vision. While many rejoice at her reappearance and think this to be a miracle, some sinister minds are not so pleased. The FBI and Prairie’s parents want to know the truth, but will she ever talk about it?

IMDb rating: 7.9

Created by: Derek Simonds

Cast: Bill Pullman, Jessica Biel, Jessica Hecht, Frances Fisher, Alice Kremelberg, Neal Huff

Episodes: 32

Synopsis: Detective Harry Ambrose (Pullman) investigates a gruelling homicide case each season. Haunted by his dark past, Harry often forms dangerously close and intimate bonds with his suspects to get to the truth. He dives into the darkest corners of their psyche and uncovers the secrets behind these grey lives and deaths.

About the series: Featuring some stellar charismatic performances, The Sinner started as a limited series but was renewed for four seasons. It is adapted from Petra Hammesfahr’s novel of the same name.

Image: Courtesy The Sinner/ Photo by USA Network/Peter Kramer/USA Network – © 2017 USA Network Media, LLC/ IMDb

IMDb rating: 7.9

Created by: Laeta Kalogridis

Cast: Chris Conner, Renée Elise Goldsberry, Dichen Lachman, Joel Kinnaman, Anthony Mackie, James Purefoy

Episodes: 18

Synopsis: In the distant future, humans can live indefinitely as long as they sustain themselves. Their consciousness can be digitised and stored in cortical stacks which are implanted in bodies called “sleeves”. People can come to life when these memories and experiences are simply “re-sleeved” into new bodies. Former trained Envoy soldier Takeshi Kovacs (Kinnaman in season one and Mackie in season two) is made to enter a combat-ready sleeve by influential aristocrat Laurens Bancroft (Purefoy) to investigate the latter’s own murder.

About the series: Altered Carbon is based on Richard K. Morgan’s sci-fi novel of the same name.

IMDb rating: 8

Created by: Brad Wright

Cast: Eric McCormack, MacKenzie Porter, Nesta Cooper, Patrick Gilmore, Jared Abrahamson

Episodes: 34

Synopsis: Earth’s population is dwindling. A group of last surviving human beings called travellers — comprising FBI Special Agent and team leader Grant MacLaren (McCormack); Marcy Warton (Porter), a young, intellectually disabled woman in the care of a social worker David Mailer (Gilmore); Trevor Holden (Abrahamson); a high school quarterback Carly Shannon (Cooper); a single mom in an abusive relationship; and Philip Pearson (Reilly Dolman) a heroin-addicted college student — have developed a technology to send their consciousness to the 21st century via time travel. They disguise themselves as seemingly ordinary people but work united as a team to alter the course of events to reshape human history and avert catastrophic events.

IMDb rating: 8.2

Created by: J. Michael Straczynski, Lana Wachowski, Lilly Wachowski

Cast: Brian J. Smith, Tuppence Middleton, Jamie Clayton, Miguel Angel Silvestre, Tina Desai, Bae Doona, Max Riemelt, Aml Ameen, Terrence Mann

Episodes: 24

Synopsis: Eight strangers, Will Gorski (Smith), Riley Blue (Middleton), Capheus (Ameen), Sun Bak (Bae), Lito Rodriguez (Silvestre), Kala Dandekar (Desai), Wolfgang Bogdanow (Riemelt) and Nomi Marks (Clayton), suddenly feel mentally and emotionally connected. Despite residing in different parts of the world and coming from various walks of life, they begin to see dreams and visions that bring them telepathically close. However, as they begin to look for answers behind these happenings, someone who goes by Whispers (Mann) is on the hunt to destroy them.

About the series: Sense8 marks the first television directorial for filmmakers Lana and Lilly Wachowski.

IMDb rating: 8.7

Created by: Charlie Brooker

Cast: Daniel Kaluuya, Bryce Dallas Howard, Wyatt Russell, Salma Hayek

Episodes: 27

Synopsis: The mind-bending sci-fi anthology series dwells on the adverse effects of cutting-edge technology on the human condition and the dystopic future. Each episode tells a standalone story which ranges from an obsession with social media ratings to record every moment of their lives.

Awards won: This Netflix show has won six Primetime Emmy awards.

IMDb rating: 8.7

Created by: Baran bo Odar, Jantje Friese

Cast: Louis Hofmann, Karoline Eichhorn, Lisa Vicari, Maja Schöne, Andreas Pietschmann, Daan Lennard Liebrenz, Paul Radom

Episodes: 26

Synopsis: This classic German sci-fi series revolves around four main families — Kahnwald, Nielsen, Doppler and Tiedemann. They live in a dark and gloomy small town called Winden. When two children, Mikkel Nielsen (Liebrenz) and Erik Obendorf (Radom) go missing, the residents begin to unravel strange secrets and mysteries that cover several timelines. The first season begins in the present but soon includes realities in 1986 and 1953. As more members start disappearing after they get to know about a wormhole, the families try to reunite in the ensuing seasons by going into the past and travelling to a dystopian future in 2053.

About the series: The first German original production for Netflix, Dark blended several genres and topped Netflix charts as one of the most popular shows during its run.