White Collar showcased Neal Caffrey and FBI Agent Peter Burke’s unique partnership and how they took down criminals. The duo tangled with various criminals who preferred heists and defeated them using creative methods. The crime-fightingconcept of a law enforcement officerpartnered with a civilian isn’t new, but the show offered a fresh perspective.
Neal Caffrey was a criminal himself and his experience as a con man solving crimes became an instant hit among viewers. Many viewers hoped the duo would make a comeback after the show went off-air. There’s good news as White Collar is being revived and there are also some other shows like it to binge while you wait, or even after you’ve seen it.
8Lupin
A Gentleman Thief Uses His Skills To Take Revenge
Lupin follows the main character Assane Diop as he scorches the earth to take revenge for the death of his father. Diop’s father was wrongfully convicted by his employer, Hubert Pellegrini, and died in prison. Assane uses his skills as a con man and a master of disguise to expose the Pellegrini family’s crimes.
Lupin may be the closest thing to White Collar you may find in a show, as Assane is quite similar to Neal. Both use their charisma to entice and manipulate others into doing their bidding and the elaborate heists both are capable of planning and conducting are a major element of White Collar and Lupin.
7Suits
A Fake Lawyer With A Photographic Memory
Michael Ross is a fake lawyer who joins Person Hardman and becomes a partner of sorts to the legendary Harvey Specter. Mike lacks a degree but more than makes up for it through the experience he has thanks to his photographic memory.
Suits is different from White Collar because it doesn’t have law enforcement catching criminals. However, Mike and Harvey’s partnership is similar to Burke and Caffrey’s. Harvey’s charismatic charm and his obsession with tailored suits to look well-presentable will definitely remind you of Neal.
6Person Of Interest
A Billionaire And A Former CIA Agent
Harold Finch is a genius who made a computer that can predict crime before it occurs. He doesn’t trust anyone else to use the computer for good, so he starts to try and prevent crimes himself. Finch comes across the presumed dead CIA agent John Resee and the duo become unexpected partners.
Finch and Resee follow the names the computer gives them to try and save as many innocents as they can. The crimes range from murders to kidnapping, and anything in between. The two save many lives throughout the show and their crime-solving partnership is similar to the premise of White Collar.
5Leverage
A Group Of Ex-Criminals Take Down The Corrupt
Leverage follows a team of experienced con artists who perform massive scams to help victims of corporate greed. The team is led by Nathan Ford, an ex-insurance investigator who recovered millions of dollars from some of the most dangerous thieves in the world. He has a change of heart when the company he works for refuses to cover his ill son’s treatment.
Nate starts working with a group of thieves he previously chased and targets corrupt people who nobody else can bring to justice. The basic premise of a con man working to bring criminals to justice is the same in both shows. However, Leverage does it in a bigger way by taking away valuable assets from the criminals.
4Burn Notice
A Former Spy Starts Working Cases
A US spy, Michael Westen, is cut off from the world of espionage when his identity is revealed. Westen solves cases and tries to identify the people who caused his current predicament. The show features many action scenes as Michael has experience with combat because of his past as a spy.
The biggest similarity between White Collar and Burn Notice is that they feature main characters who use their skills to track down criminals and solve cases. Neal is an ex-criminal and con man who uses his experience to help Peter. Michael is a former spy who was burned and starts working as a freelancer of sorts.
3The Blacklist
A Felon Partners With The FBI
Raymond Reddington is on the top of the FBI’s most wanted list and one day he just gives himself up. He says he has a list of people that the FBI doesn’t even know about and will help them take the criminals down, but will only talk to Agent Elizabeth Keen, more commonly known as Liz. While Red is an informant for the FBI and is only helping them apprehend criminals, the relationship between him and Liz sometimes becomes more personal.
The Blacklist ticks almost all the boxes for the criteria to be similar to White Collar, but the show is significantly darker. White Collar focused more on art thieves and other heists, but The Blacklist focuses on the worst kind of criminals there are.
2The Mentalist
A Psychic And A Cop
Patrick Jane joins the CBI, helping Teresa Lisbon and her team with unique observation skills. He used to claim to be a psychic, but after Red John murdered his wife and daughter, he claimed he was a fraud. While Jane refuses to accept he is a psychic, his skills at getting into the minds of other characters and solving crimes are uncanny.
Jane and Lisbon’s partnership is interesting, and it may remind you of Peter trying to control the childish behavior of Neal. While Jane is grieving for his family, the team becomes an important part of his life, and he starts to rebuild himself while helping them solve crimes.
1Castle
A Playboy Writer And An NYPD Detective
Castle starts off with thefamous mystery writerRichard Castle,played by Nathan Fillion, being arrested. He is accused of a murder because of a crime scene following an exact scene from one of his books. Castle is innocent, but he gets intrigued and excited to find murderers and is also allured by the mesmerizing NYPD detective Kate Beckett. Using his connections with the mayor, Richard finds a way onto Beckett’s team and helps her find the real murderer.
The partnership of the writer and detective continues with the inexperienced civilian offering unique tips and making for some very interesting comedic moments. Castle and Beckett’s relationship is more romantic than Peter and Neal’s father-son dynamic, but the duo’s crime-solving skills are reminiscent of White Collar.
