Netflix’s Forgotten 5-Part Harlan Coben Thriller Is Officially the Perfect Weekend Binge

Published Oct 9, 2026, 4:02 PM EDT

Giovana Gelhoren is a High-Trending Topics Writer at Collider, covering the most-talked-about stars, movies, and TV shows. Before joining Collider, she was a Digital News Writer at People Magazine and served as Associate Editor at SheKnows, where she honed her expertise in celebrity coverage and entertainment journalism.

A proud Latina from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Giovana graduated from Northwestern University with a degree in Journalism and International Studies. She has interviewed countless celebrities, including Anne Hathaway, Halle Berry, Pamela Anderson, Jamie Lee Curtis, and Brenda Song, and is known for her encyclopedic knowledge of film, TV, and pop culture.

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When Harlan Coben's thriller Run Away premiered on Netflix on January 1, 2026, it was destined to be a hit. After all, with a plot filled with unexpected twists and turns, and incredible performances from the cast, the series was the perfect thriller for everyone to binge over the New Year. Within days of its premiere, Run Away had officially beaten Stranger Things to become Netflix's top title worldwide, per FlixPatrol.

In the series, James Nesbitt plays Simon Greene, a dad of three who's determined to find his eldest daughter Paige (Ellie de Lange) after she's gone missing. But after a brutal confrontation with Paige's boyfriend, Aaron Corval (Thomas Flynn), who turns up dead on the same day, Simon also becomes the prime suspect in his murder. But while Nesbitt's lead performance in Run Away certainly carries the show, fans of Coben and Netflix's TV shows have seen him command the screen before. In Missing You, which premiered on January 1, 2025, Nesbitt played a powerful and shady gangster named Calligan, and it showed a whole new side of him.

What Is 'Missing You' About?

Missing You follows hardened detective Kat Donovan (Rosalind Eleazar) after she finds her former fiancé Josh (Ashley Walters), who disappeared 11 years ago without a trace, on a random dating app. When she interrogates him online, he blocks her and leaves her with no explanation – again. In her job at the head of the missing persons unit, Kat is investigating the disappearance of Rishi Magari (Rudi Dharmalingam). But after a boy approaches her to find his missing mother, who last went out with Josh, the mystery deepens, and Kat uncovers a secret that makes her come face to face with the ghosts of her past.

Collider Exclusive · 8 Questions · 2 Minutes Which Netflix Character Would Be Your Best Friend? Dustin · Emily · Wednesday · Gi-hun

Some friends drag you out of the house. Some sit with you on the worst night of your life. Netflix has written both, plus the one who tells you the truth you have been avoiding all week. Answer eight quick questions about how you actually do friendship, and find out which of them was always going to end up in your corner.

🧢Dustin(Stranger Things)

🗼Emily(Emily in Paris)

🕷️Wednesday(Wednesday)

🟢Gi-hun(Squid Game)

FIND YOUR BEST FRIEND →

01

How do you usually end up making a new friend? The origin story says a lot about the friendship that follows it.

AWe got loud about the same obsession and never stopped. BThey invited me somewhere before we had properly met. CWe bonded over disliking exactly the same thing. DThey noticed I was struggling and stayed with me.

NEXT QUESTION →

02

What is a perfect Saturday with your best friend? Friendship is mostly built out of very ordinary hours.

AA ridiculous plan neither of us should attempt. BSomewhere new, photographed heavily, ending very late. CSomewhere quiet, few people, zero small talk. DSomething simple, and a conversation that actually matters.

NEXT QUESTION →

03

You call them at two in the morning. What happens? This is the real test of a friendship, and everybody knows it.

AThey are already putting their shoes on. BThey answer instantly and turn it into a plan. CThey answer and say something unflattering and true. DThey listen for an hour and never check the time.

NEXT QUESTION →

04

What do you want from them when you are clearly wrong? The best friendships are the ones that survive being corrected.

ASupport first. We can review the mistake later. BA relentlessly positive reframe of the entire disaster. CThe blunt version. Do not soften it for me. DPatience, and no judgment about how I got here.

NEXT QUESTION →

05

What do your friends actually value about you? The friend you attract says something about the friend you are.

AI am all in, always, about everything. BI can turn almost any situation into a good time. CI say the thing nobody else in the room will. DI look after whoever is having the worst day.

NEXT QUESTION →

06

You have a falling out. How does it go? How a friendship repairs itself matters more than how it breaks.

ALoudly, briefly, then back to normal by Tuesday. BThey apologise first, enthusiastically, with a gift. CCold silence, then one dry joke that fixes everything. DWe talk until we both understand what actually happened.

NEXT QUESTION →

07

What do you actually need a best friend for? Everybody is missing something. The right friend fills that gap.

ATo make my life bigger than it would be alone. BTo push me out of the house and into my own life. CTo catch me when I start lying to myself. DTo be the person who never gave up on me.

NEXT QUESTION →

08

Ten years from now, what keeps the two of you close? Eight questions in, this is the one that decides who you get.

AWe would still drop everything for each other, instantly. BWe still make plans, and we still actually go. CWe still cut through each other's nonsense in one sentence. DThey stood by me once when it cost them something.

REVEAL MY BEST FRIEND →

The Group Chat Has Spoken Your Best Friend Is…

Four Netflix characters, four completely different ways of showing up for somebody. This is the one who fits how you actually do friendship, and what having them in your life would be like.

Dustin Henderson

You do not do friendship at half volume, and neither does he. What you want is somebody who says yes to the plan before you have finished describing the plan.

• Dustin is the friend the entire show runs on: loyal past the point of sense, enthusiastic about everything, and incapable of leaving anybody behind.
• You have the same instinct. Your friendships are loud, specific and slightly ridiculous, and they last for decades because of it.
• He is also the one person who would take your strangest interest completely seriously, which is far rarer than it sounds.
• You would have a group chat. It would never once be quiet.

Emily Cooper

You are the friend who makes things happen, and so is she. Together you would be mildly exhausting to everyone around you and completely delighted with yourselves.

• Emily treats an ordinary Tuesday as something that could be turned into an occasion, which is either the best or the worst quality in a friend depending on your energy levels.
• You share her refusal to sit still. Neither of you has ever accepted a night in when something was happening somewhere else.
• She is far more loyal than people give her credit for. She defends her friends loudly, publicly, and occasionally before checking the facts.
• She would post the photo without asking. You would forgive her, because it is a very good photo.

Wednesday Addams

You have no patience for pleasant lies, and she has no ability to tell them. What looks like coldness from the outside is the most reliable friendship on this list.

• Wednesday never says a kind thing she does not mean, which makes the rare ones count for an enormous amount.
• You would rather be told the truth than be made comfortable. She is constitutionally incapable of offering you anything else.
• Underneath all of it she is ferociously protective. She simply refuses to make a performance out of caring.
• Do not expect a birthday message. Do expect her to ruin anyone who wrongs you.

Seong Gi-hun

You look after whoever is having the worst day. So does he. It is the least strategic way to move through the world and the best possible quality in a friend.

• Gi-hun is not the strongest player in Squid Game, or the cleverest. He is the one who keeps choosing to protect somebody else, over and over, at genuine cost to himself.
• You have the same instinct. You notice who is struggling and you stay with them, long after anybody would blame you for leaving.
• He is a flawed friend, and that is part of why it lands. He lets people down, then comes back and tries again, which is more than most manage.
• He would give you his last chance and never once mention that he had done it.

↻ RETAKE THE QUIZ

In the meantime, Kat continues looking into the unsolved murder of her father (Lenny Henry), who died shortly before Josh's first disappearance. In doing so, she discovers some of her dad's deepest secrets – including his corrupt ties to Nesbitt's Calligan. In Coben's signature style, the miniseries follows each of these mysteries as they take unexpected turns, make shocking connections, and come to a satisfying conclusion by the end.

James Nesbitt Shows Another Side of Himself in 'Missing You'

Image via Netflix

In Run Away, Nesbitt captivates audiences as a relentless and desperate dad. Looking for answers in every corner, and feeling like his wife Ingrid (Minnie Driver) isn't exactly helping, Simon goes to great lengths to find out what happened, even if it means he goes viral online for beating his daughter's boyfriend. But while Simon is every bit helpless and distraught, Nesbitt's portrayal of Calligan is confident, arrogant and manipulative. In his first meeting with Kat, in an art museum no less, he's calm and collected, proving to Kat that while he's no saint, he could be quite an asset to her investigation.

Together, Kat and Calligan establish a so-called "détente," one in which he helps her in her investigation, and she looks the other way the next time his name pops up. By the end of their conversation, Calligan gives Kat a vital hint about her dad's killer, and the motives the one person who confessed to his murder might have for lying. Kat is one step closer to finding the truth, and Calligan becomes the unexpected helper.

With that said, while Run Away delivers twists and turns until the very last scene, another one of Coben's miniseries, Missing You, is certainly worth a watch. In the five-episode series, another set of mysteries unravels, and the performances, including Nesbitt's cold and calculating gangster, leave viewers on the edge of their seats.