Investigation Discovery will begin dipping its toes into scripted programming this summer. The channel is set to release Serial Thriller, a three-episode mini-series based on an undisclosed true-crime story involving a famed serial killer, one which will remain a mystery likely until well into the series’ three-hour runtime. Teasing the subject matter of the mini-series, Henry Schleiff, group president of Discovery Communications, which owns Investigation, said that viewers will know which famed killer the series is focused on before the series’ climactic finale, but the glut of Serial Thriller will be centered on the everyday people that surrounded the cases, the community that were involved in the details of the case.

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Image via Investigation Discovery

That being said, the main character will, perhaps inevitably, be the detective assigned to the case. Talking to The Hollywood Reporter, Schleiff was quick to make comparisons to both The Killing, which recently had its last season shown via Netflix, and HBO’s True Detective, and there is clearly a similarity in subject material. The difference will come in how attentive to detail Serial Thriller proves, how strong its fidelity to the facts of the case in question. Considering the fact that each year brings another series or mini-series based around a murder, or a line of killings, Serial Thriller will have to find a way of cutting away from the pack, either in terms of visual style or narrative tone. Otherwise, there’s every reason to believe that Serial Thriller will, at the very least, be an interesting first foray into scripted programming for the channel, which plans to add more written series to its roster by the end of 2016.