From Stranger Things to Star Trek to Doctor Who to Black Mirror to a whole pile of Marvel TV series, Netflix isn’t short of a few adventures in space and time.
Check out the best sci-fi series available on Netflix right now – and if you want a slightly wider selection, read our guide to the best box sets to watch on Netflix UK.
Updated 11th September 2018
Altered Carbon
Based on the 2002 novel by Richard Morgan, Altered Carbon has one of those great sci-fi premises that feels like it has existed forever, even though it’s based on futuristic technology. 400 years in the future, human minds can be downloaded and transplanted into new bodies, meaning that those who can afford to keep ‘resleeving’ themselves can theoretically live forever. Hardboiled kercenary (yes, this is cyberpunk) Takeshi Kovacs (Joel Kinnaman) is hired to investigate the murder of one of the world’s wealthiest men. His client: the dead man himself.
The Netflix adaptation loses a lot of the sheer weirdness of the novel, but the central idea is intriguing enough to roll around your head for weeks. A second series starring Anthony Mackie as Kovacs (remember: ‘resleeving’) has been announced.
Mystery Science Theatre 3000
An acquired taste, but it’s impossible to like Mystery Science Theatre 3000 – it either leaves you cold or it’s your favourite thing ever. Starting as a low (and we mean low) budget cable show in the states, an astronaut and his two robot friends are forced by a mad scientist to watch real terrible B-movies, in a bid to drive them insane. You watch it with them, as they crack jokes at the rubber monsters and wooden acting. That’s it.
And yet, and yet…MST3K is one of the most relentlessly, breathlessly funny shows ever made. MST3K was so far ahead of its time, we’ve not caught up yet. Misties (as we die-hard fans call ourselves) have somehow kept it alive since 1988, almost shaping the course of technology through their passion. Before the Internet, fans swapped VHS tapes with each other. In the days of dial-up, it was one of the first major forces in file sharing. Every snarky YouTuber owes Joel and the bots and debt, and now Netflix has brought it back with a surprisingly fun reboot starring Felicia Day. The archive also features some gems from the old show: try out the episode ‘Space Mutiny’ for a sense of whether it’s for you.
Oh, and if you’re wondering whether this qualifies as ‘true’ sci-fi, just repeat to yourself: “it’s just a show, I should really just relax.”
Cowboy Bebop
Probably the coolest sci-fi ever made – although that’s not hard in a genre where bobbly headed aliens come as standard – Cowboy Bebop was one of the first Japanese anime to find a committed audience in the West. Looking back, it wasn’t just down to novelty. The adventures of bounty hunters Spike, Faye, Ed, Jet and the good ship Bebop herself remain just as fun, funny, exciting and (there’s that word again) cool as ever – an all too brief glimpse of a solar system that runs like the wild west with a better soundtrack. In fact, most episodes take their inspiration from different genres, whether that’s jazz, blues, heavy metal or the Rolling Stones.
Black Mirror
With each episode of Black Mirror, Charlie Brooker creates a unique dystopian universe, which, eerily, is never too distant from our own. One minute, a foul-mouthed cartoon celebrity is running for president (ring any bells?), the next people are vying against one another for Uber-like ratings on social media which have major real-life consequences.
The show smartly touches upon our anxieties about the future of society, blending dark humour, drama and psychological thrills into hour-long vignettes. You won’t be able to look away.
Star Trek: The Next Generation
The series that launched Sir Patrick Stewart’s transformation from “an unknown British Shakespearean actor” into the global superstar that he is today. Star Trek: The Next Generation is held as dearly as the original series by the die hard fans, and offers more than double the amount of episodes, accommodating a long and fruitful binge.
Sense8
The presence of Lost’s Naveen Andrews (Sayid) is a minor clue into the intricacies of Sense8, another sprawling sci-fi piece from the minds of The Wachowskis (The Matrix series, Jupiter Ascending). It follows a group of eight strangers from different corners of the globe who are connected by shared prophetic visions, known as Sensates. What follows is a tailspin of sex, acrobatic fight scenes and endless intrigue – all sadly cancelled after two seasons.
Doctor Who
Now is as good a time as any to explore the NuWho back catalogue, with eight seasons of adventures through space and time loaded up and ready to go, featuring a pre-The Crown Matt Smith, David Tennant and the current Time Lord, Peter Capaldi.
Stranger Things
2016’s breakout hit is a horror masterpiece steeped in nostalgia. Set in 1980s small-town USA, the series is littered with throwbacks to the most revered films from the 1980s. The young protagonists, who are thrust into action when their friend Will is smuggled into another dimension (known as the ‘upside-down’) by a mysterious demon, mirror the characters from The Goonies and ET, against an incredible soundtrack of 80s hits. It’s at turns moving and terrifying: one of the few shows that live up to astronomical levels of hype.
Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency
A loose adaptation of the Douglas Adams novel of the same name, Dirk Gently is a sci-fi mystery quirked up to the nines. Mark Landis’ adaptation transports the action from miserable Blighty to Seattle, and knocks the energy levels of the protagonist, played by Samuel Barnett, up a few notches. Elijah Woods, very far from the Shire, plays the Watson to his Holmes.
Rick and Morty
Picking up where Matt Groening’s Futurama left off, Rick and Morty is a sci-fi animation based around the adventures of an alcoholic mad scientist Rick and his grandson Morty, a relationship which shadows that of Doc and Marty McFly from the Back to the Future series. It was created by former Community showrunner Dan Harmon, and is full of the same madcap humour, with an added pinch of cynicism.
from Radio Times https://ift.tt/2MjfUSr
