10 Most Underrated TV Shows Of The Last 10 Years

Spinning off from the film of the same name, Mystery Road is a gripping crime series set in the Australian outback.

Each series finds Aboriginal cop Jay Swan investigate a crime in a community full of secrets and corruption. If that all sounds trite in the wake of Broadchurch or The Killing then it's worth pointing out that Mystery Road shares more in common with the Western genre than it does the murder mystery.

There are certainly mysteries to be solved, but each series builds to a showdown between lawman Jay and whichever criminals are responsible for the tragic crime he's investigating.

The sweeping desert vistas lend the series a far more cinematic sheen than a lot of similar shows out there. The extra dimension that lifts Mystery Road above things you've seen before is the treatment of racial tensions between Australians and the indigenous Aboriginal people. This provides a compelling backbone to each series and to the character of Jay Swan himself.

Mystery Road airs on BBC4 in the UK in their weekend crime slot, so is usually missed by people out partying. It's worth catching, a gripping crime thriller with beautiful cinematography, a stoic central performance from Aaron Pedersen as Jay and some cracking action sequences.