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Mystery Movie was a " wheel show", or "umbrella program." That is, it rotated several shows within the same time slot throughout the season. In its initial 1971-1972 season, it premiered with a rotation of three detective dramas that ran on Wednesday night from 8:30-10:00 in the Eastern Time Zone.

The three original 1971-72 shows were:

• McCloud, which starred Dennis Weaver as a New Mexico lawman reassigned to the New York Police Department, had debuted the previous season as part of the hour-long NBC wheel show Four in One .
• Columbo, which starred Peter Falk as a bumbling but deceptively clever Los Angeles police detective, was a new series created from a 1968 made-for-television movie, Prescription for Murder, which starred Falk in the same role.
• McMillan and Wife was a new show that starred Rock Hudson and Susan St. James as a husband-and-wife crime-fighting duo. Hudson's character was the San FranciscoFor other meanings, see San Francisco (disambiguation). Bay Bridge. In the distance is fog covering the western third of the city. Click for additional information The City and County of San Francisco (population 776,773), the fourth-largest city in the s police commissioner.

The umbrella series was counted a great success in its first season and finished at number 14 in the Nielsen ratings for the 1971-72 season. Columbo was nominated for eight Emmy AwardThe Emmy Awards are United States television production awards, similar to the Peabody Awards but more focused on entertainment. There are two types of Emmy Awards, the Daytime Awards and the Primetime Awards. The National Academy of Television Arts & Scis and won in four categories.

The success of Mystery Movie prompted NBC to move the original three shows to the competitive 8:30-10:00 Sunday evening for the second season as the The NBC Sunday Mystery Movie. A fourth series, Hec Ramsey , starring Richard BooneRichard Allen Boone ( June 18 1917 January 10 1981) was an American actor who starred in over fifty films. Boone was born in Los Angeles, California. He worked in several odd jobs, including boxing and painting, before serving in World War II in the US Na as a crime-fighter in the Old West, was added to the rotation.

In addition, a clone of the umbrella series, The NBC Wednesday Mystery Movie debuted in the original time slot and featured three new shows:

• BanacekThe rather short lived TV series Banacek was a rather light hearted detective show on NBC from 1972 to 1974. George Peppard played Thomas Banacek, a Boston-based freelance investigator who worked mostly for insurance companies in solving difficult theft c, starred George PeppardGeorge Peppard George Peppard ( October 1, 1928 May 8, 1994) was an American film and television actor. He starred alongside Audrey Hepburn in Breakfast at Tiffany's ( 1961), although he is probaby more famous among younger viewers for his role as Col. as a free-lance insurance investigator in Boston.
• Cool Million
• Madigan

The Mystery Movie theme music was composed by Henry Mancini.