This psychological thriller from a House of Cards alum is one of the best shows of 2025. Here's why

If you loved watching The House of Cards and have missed it since it ended, a show led by one of the show's alums should be your next watch if you're looking for a psychological thriller. In a year crowded with prestige TV, The Girlfriend quietly emerged as one of 2025’s most unsettling and addictive watches. Adapted from Michelle Frances’ novel, the six episode miniseries turns domestic suspicion into something far darker. It is glossy, tense, and deeply uncomfortable in the best way, and it has a wonderful connection to Netflix's House of Cards.

If you like thrillers that unravel slowly with unreliable narrators, ugly sides and brutal relationships, here's why The Girlfriend should be next on your watchlist.

Why you should tune into The Girlfriend

The Girlfriend follows Laura, a wealthy gallery owner, who believes her son Daniel’s new girlfriend Cherry is hiding something. She thinks of her as a gold digger and someone who's out to get her son. What starts as a depiction of a protective mother spirals into intense paranoia, as she grapples with her own anxiety and jealousy and is hellbent on separating them. Laura is played by Robin Wright, the brilliant actress who gave us House of Cards' Claire Underwood and this is another one of her dark, intense roles that will constantly remind you of her manipulation and nature in the iconic show.

Cherry, on the other hand isn't exactly playing fair and square either. She sees Laura as a challenge, and has a dark past of her own that Daniel knows nothing about. She's playing a whole other game, one that is helping her win Daniel against Laura and the way all of it unravels is thrilling and exciting especially for how it's told. Each episode peels back on more layers of manipulation, class tension and emotional control as the tension between Cherry and Laura plays out like psychological chess, with Daniel caught in the middle as collateral damage.

One of the best parts of the show is that all the episodes are divided in two parts, with the first one telling the story from one woman's perspective and the second one exploring the other's perspective. Slowly you realize they both are unreliable narrators. The series never fully confirms whose version of reality is correct, and that ambiguity becomes its sharpest weapon.

Why The Girlfriend is so much like House of Cards

Robin Wright's performance as Laura is where this comparison is most prominent as the actress brings the same moral flexibility, composure and ethical decline as Claire Underwood in House of Cards to this show. In the Netflix thriller, Wright perfected the art of quiet domination, and she brings that same energy here. Laura rarely raises her voice, but every action is calculated.

Wright isn't the only comparison between both shows. Both the shows' fascination with power dynamics inside intimate spaces. Where the political thriller explored political ambition, the former turns that lens inward as we see how power operates within families. Laura believes she is protecting her son, just as Claire believed she was protecting her legacy in House of Cards.

Ultimately, The Girlfriend feels like a spiritual cousin to The House of Cards, but instead of Washington drama, there's domestic warfare here. It shows Wright's power in roles where she's terrifying but you also root for them constantly because of how she portrays them. For that alone, and for its sharp writing and nerve-wracking performances, The Girlfriend earns its place as one of the best shows of 2025.

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The Girlfriend is available to stream on Prime Video.

House of Cards is available to stream on Netflix.

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