'My Life is Murder' Gets 'Our Flag Means Death' Star for Season 5
Rhys Darby and Taika Waititi star as the opposites-attract pair Stede and Blackbeard in Our Flag Means Death.
Aaron Epstein/HBO Max
AMC Networks will face its first reckoning of 2025 in mid-February, when the final numbers come in for 2024, and the parent company of the little federation of streaming services headed up by AMC+ has to admit if its strategy is working. (Signs aren't good, but we live in hope.) However, the two bright spots among its holdings, the horror-focused Shudder and the Cozy Crime/Oceania-centric Acorn TV, continue to bring their subscribers top-quality series. Acorn TV has been especially productive recently, with multiple new series in the works and several returning favorites, including the Lucy Lawless-led My Life Is Murder, which has been officially renewed for Season 5.
It was pretty much assumed Lawless' series would be back, considering that the formula for many of Acorn TV's cozy crime series follows the one started by My Life is Murder. Take a U.K./Australian/New Zealand actor well-known in the States from ~15-25 years ago, and build a crime of the week series around them set in their home country. (Lather, rinse, repeat.) The series is one of Acorn TV's most successful so far, so the chances of cancelation were low. However, the announcement that Season 5 would premiere before the end of 2025 was a welcome one.
What fans might not expect, however, is the quality of guest star My Life is Murder is attracting in its fifth season, which will include Keisha Castle-Hughes (famous for starring in Whale Rider, though younger American audiences know her better from the police procedural FBI) and Rhys Darby, of the late lamented Our Flag Means Death. It says quite a bit about Lawless' series that while it is on a less mainstream streamer, she's picking up refugees from series that have sunk beneath the waves.
Here's the Season 5 synopsis:
Season 5 sees eight thrilling new cases featuring dangerous villains that only Alexa Crowe can catch, but as always, she’s bringing her friends and family along for the ride. Tech guru Madison is stepping up and contributing her considerable technical skills to the investigations, while cafe owner Reuben is always there to lend a helping hand, shockingly, it turns out that Detective Harry has been hiding a rather big secret. Moreover, just to complicate things, Alexa’s bad-boy brother Will drops by with a dilemma of his own. Additionally, in the series’ highest-stakes episode to date, Alexa’s beloved cat, Chowder, is caught up in a risky game of cat-and-mouse!
Lawless returns as Alexa Crowe, with Ebony Vagulans as her bestie/tech guru/partner in crime solving, Madison. Also returning for Season 5: Joe Naufahu (Game of Thrones) as cafe owner Reuben, Rawiri Jobe (Shortland Street) as Detective Harry, Martin Henderson (Virgin River) as Will, and our personal favorite here at Telly Visions: Zeppelin as the much-put-upon real star of the series, Chowder the Cat.
The series is executive produced by Lawless alongside Rachel Antony, Claire Tonkin, Harriet Crampton, Nicky Davies Williams, Pilar Perez for DCD Rights, and Don Klees for Acorn TV. My Life Is Murder is a Greenstone TV Production for TVNZ, Acorn TV, and DCD Rights Ltd., in association with Network 10.
My Life is Murder Season 5 is currently in production and expected to debut on Acorn TV before the end of 2025.
