Jesse Stone movies in order | How to watch Tom Selleck crime films
He is hired as Paradise’s top cop despite showing up to his interview drunk: indeed, this red flag convinces the council chief, who assumes that Stone will not be smart enough to take up his shady dealings. He’s wrong, of course, and Stone’s investigation will soon shed light on the dark side of the seemingly idyllic city, including its deep connections to organized crime, institutional corruption and the Boston mob.
The first adaptation, Stone Cold, came out on CBS in 2005, and Selleck has since reprized the role for eight more films. Most are based on Parker’s stories, with the later films featuring original screenplays written by Selleck and Michael Brandman. The ninth film, Lost in Paradise, began airing on Hallmark Channel in 2015, though Selleck revealed earlier this year that he’s “still working on a script for a potential tenth film.”
“It’s not the same cumulative narrative anymore,” he told TV Insider. “I’ve gotten older over time and Jesse Stone audiences have to be held accountable for that. He’s at a different point in his life. That’s interesting, but that’s not the script we started on after we finished the ninth film.”
While we wait, here’s what you need to know about the series so far…
Best order to watch Jesse Stone movies
If you want to dive into the world of Paradise, the series chronology is relatively simple: one only has to remember that the first film to come out, Stone Cold, should be considered the second Jesse Stone story in Parker’s series. The second film Night Passage, released a year later in 2006, should be watched first as it introduces us to Stone’s LA backstory. I have it? From then on, the films follow a simple chronological order.
Jesse Stone: Night Passage (2006)
Based on the first novel in Parker’s series, “Night Passage” sees Stone travel from Los Angeles (after being forced to quit his role as a homicide detective after drinking alcohol on duty) to Paradise, a small town on the Massachusetts coast. He is soon hired as Paradise’s police chief as the seedy council leader, noticing Stone’s drinking problem, assumes he will be a soft touch and ignore his money laundering schemes.
However, he is wrong. When the body of the former police chief is found, who was out of character after learning of the plan, Stone sets out to prove his death was no accident and becomes embroiled in the dark world of the local gangsters. they have some unsavory ties to the boston mob. Viola Davis plays fellow police officer Molly Crane alongside Sellick (she also appears in Stone Cold, Death in Paradise and Sea Change).
Watch Jesse Stone: Night Passage on Amazon Prime Video
Jesse Stone: Ice Cold (2005)
The sleepy town of Paradise is reeling after a body shot twice in the heart with a .22 caliber pistol is discovered on the shore. Not long after, two more victims are discovered, all killed in the same way. Stone, who is also investigating the rape of a young girl, begins to put together a profile of a potential suspect by matching the gun register to the license plate number of a red truck seen fleeing the scene.
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He’s soon discovered not one, but two potential killers acting as a couple – but without concrete evidence or a clear motive, he must wait to enact a scenario that will prove their guilt. It’s a high-stakes plan, and one that will ultimately come at a great personal cost to Stone.
Watch Jesse Stone: Stone Cold on Amazon Prime Video
Jesse Stone: Death in Paradise (2006)
In Stone’s next case, he investigates the death of a teenage girl whose body is discovered floating in a lake. An autopsy revealed that she was pregnant and that she had alcohol and muscle relaxants in her bloodstream at the time of death. An initialed ring found on the body provides the first lead that eventually leads Stone and fellow co-worker Luther Simpson (Kohl Sudduth) to discover that the victim is Billie Bishop, a high school student who died Was kicked out of her family home after her behavior changed. Her grades have dropped.
Further investigation reveals that Billie was in the orbit of wealthy local writer Norman Shaw, a man with alleged ties to the criminal underworld who was working on a book about Boston mobster Leo Finn. The case will once again lead Stone into dangerous territory.
Watch Jesse Stone: Death in Paradise on Amazon Prime Video
Jesse Stone: Sea Change (2007)
After Stone admits to his psychologist that he drinks more when he’s not on a case, Stone challenges his new colleague Rose Gammon (Kathy Baker) to find the list of local unsolved cases. (Gammon has replaced Davis’ Officer Crane, who has resigned from the squad since the events of Death in Paradise.) He then decides to reopen the investigation into the 1992 death of a bank teller who was taken hostage during a robbery.
Visiting the site where the body was found, they discover what appears to be the shooter’s clothing, covered in marks consistent with a gunshot wound – a clue proving that this case is much more complex, than the police had previously assumed.
Watch Jesse Stone: Sea Change on Amazon Prime Video
Jesse Stone: Thin Ice (2009)
As Thin Ice opens, Stone comes to the rescue of fellow State Police Captain Healy (Stephen McHattie), who is being attacked while keeping tabs on his nephew, who he believes is in a relationship with his saxophone teacher. Stone begins investigating the shooting, a move that doesn’t sit well with the local council, who wonder why he spends most of his time getting involved in shootings instead of solving lucrative parking tickets and fines.
While he continues to work the case despite her wishes, Stone is contacted by a woman who wants him to investigate the disappearance of her baby seven years ago. Although a body with a name tag was found at the time, she was never convinced it was her child – and later received an anonymous message claiming ‘your child is loved’. Though sympathetic to her plight, Stone decides not to pursue her, thinking that opening another cold case would only anger the Council more. However, Gammon is determined to investigate.
Watch Jesse Stone: Thin Ice on Amazon Prime Video
Jesse Stone: No Regrets (2010)
Stone has been suspended from his position as Paradise Police Chief and is barred from contacting his colleagues. He drinks heavily, much to the concern of Gammon and Healy. After a series of murders in a parking lot, Stone is hired as a private adviser to the Boston Police Department investigating the murders.
The first victim, he soon learns, had ties to Gino Fish, a Boston Mafia figure who figured in earlier investigations. When not on the case in Boston, Stone is also investigating a series of attacks on a local grocery store.
Watch Jesse Stone: No Remorse on Amazon Prime Video
Jesse Stone: Innocents Lost (2011)
This time, Stone was forced out of his job and replaced by the City Council President’s son-in-law, who cares more about Paradise’s public image than fighting crime. Naturally, Stone is confident he’ll be reinstated one day, and is unimpressed when Butler, the new boss, tries to get him to relinquish his “concealed gun” license.
Even without an official police role, Stone still finds himself involved in two murder investigations. One involves the death of a friend, which the new police chief ruled out as a suicide rather than investigating the case further, while another reunites him with his old pal Healy as a consultant for the Massachusetts State Police in a murder and robbery where Healy has doubts at the guilt of the prime suspect.
Watch Jesse Stone: Innocents Lost on Amazon Prime Video
Jesse Stone: Benefit of the Doubt (2012)
Butler and one of his officers are killed in a suspicious explosion in a police car, and Stone is temporarily reinstated as chief of police by Mayor Carter Hansen. He soon discovers that Hansen’s predecessor, Hathaway, who appeared in a handful of previous stories, apparently knew of the death before Hansen was officially notified.
A note in Butler’s calendar appears to indicate his involvement in police corruption, and Stone’s investigation will once again draw him into the web of local gangsters and their organized crime rings. However, he must conduct it alone as his old associates Gammon and Simpson left the troupe after struggling to work with Stone’s replacement.
Watch Jesse Stone: Benefit of the Doubt on Amazon Prime Video
Jesse Stone: Lost in Paradise (2015)
Meanwhile, Stone is back as police chief, but has once again agreed to serve as an adviser to the Massachusetts State Police, feeling bored with the lack of significant cases in Paradise lately. He has gained access to case files on several Boston-area murders, including one involving a woman named Mavis Davies, the fourth victim of a serial killer known as the Boston Ripper. When Stone visits the killer in prison, he proudly admits to the first three murders – but insists he didn’t commit the fourth.
Stone believes he’s telling the truth, but has trouble convincing both Davie’s widower and Detective Leary, the officer who caught the Ripper, that the case could be a lot more complicated than they first thought. The advice of his psychologist Dr. However, Dix (who happens to be an ex-cop) helps put him on the right track, and while dealing with the cold case, Stone also befriends a troubled 13-year-old, who is her mother’s abused.
Watch Jesse Stone: Lost in Paradise on Amazon Prime Video
How to watch Jesse Stone movies
The Jesse Stone films have aired on CBS and the Hallmark Channel in the US, but fans this side of the Atlantic can find all nine films to rent on Amazon Prime Video.
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