When the world seems too strange to bear, these sci-fi films are here to remind you that things can always get weirder.

The 16 best sci-fi movies on HBO Max that will make you think

When the world seems too strange to bear, these sci-fi films are here to remind you that things can always get weirder.

By Ilana Gordon,

Ilana Gordon is an entertainment, culture, and comedy writer originally from Connecticut. She currently lives in Los Angeles.

EW's editorial guidelines

Alex Galbraith,

and Kevin Jacobsen

May 9, 2026 5:00 p.m. ET

Leave a Comment

Jamie Lee Curtis as Deirdre Beaubeirdre in 'Everything Everywhere All at Once'; Andy Serkis as Caesar in 'War for the Planet of the Apes'; Sophie Thatcher as Iris in 'Companion'. Credit:

Allyson Riggs/A24; Twentieth Century Fox; Cara Howe/Warner Bros

When real life starts to feel too dystopian, it's time to turn on a sci-fi film. Aliens, vengeful companion robots, space colonies, and hyperintelligent apes might not inspire total confidence in the fate of humanity, but they do remind viewers how many different ways things could go spectacularly wrong.

Escapism looks different for everyone. Take a mental vacation to the future, with **'s 16 best sci-fi films on HBO Max.

2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)

Keir Dullea as David Bowman in '2001: A Space Odyssey'. MGM/Stanley Kubrick Productions/Kobal/REX/Shutterstock

Stanley Kubrick's claustrophobic, space-faring epic confronted audiences with a hard truth: No matter how far forward technology leaps, humans will still launch themselves into ultimately doomed quests toward somewhere else in service of whatever deities the universe provides. In spite of that ultimately bleak idea, the 1968 masterpiece is a gorgeous marvel of filmmaking, so grand in scope and design that it was originally screened on specially made curved screens to better envelop the audience in Kubrick's wild vision. We promise the "Also sprach Zarathustra" opening still lands on your television screen with the weight of an otherworldly monolith. *—Alex Galbraith*

Where to watch *2001: A Space Odyssey*: HBO Max

**Director: **Stanley Kubrick

**Cast: **Keir Dullea, Gary Lockwood

The Blob (1958)

The Blob in front of a movie theater in 'The Blob'. Everett Collection

Where later sci-fi features would have to come up with ever more arcane reasons for their alien assailant's destruction, 1958's *The Blob* had the luxury of needing no explanation. An otherworldly goop from the far-off reaches of space has crash landed in a small town — and it's hungry. Beyond its ability to make food coloring and jelly frightening, the B-movie schlockfest is notable for being Steve McQueen's first leading role.

As the monster grows in size and color on its tyrannical tirade on Norman Rockwell's small-town America, McQueen gamely carries this slow-burn movie to its electrifying ending, with the angry red Blob meeting its match while consuming the local diner whole. The straightforward creature feature made a seismic impact on the sci-fi film genre. *—A.G.*

Where to watch *The Blob*: HBO Max

**EW grade: **B

**Director: **Irvin Yeaworth

**Cast: **Steven McQueen, Aneta Corsaut, Earl Rowe, Olin Howland

Companion (2025)

Jack Quaid as Josh and Sophie Thatcher as Iris in 'Companion'.

Warner Bros. Pictures

If you’re looking for a restful retreat, *Companion* is not your movie. A dark comedy about a couple named Josh and Iris (Jack Quaid and Sophie Thatcher) who head to a lake house for a weekend away, the film takes a turn when Iris learns she is a companion robot and breaks free from Josh’s control. A combination romantic comedy, thriller, and sci-fi crime movie, the script investigates issues around technology, masculinity, power dynamics, and relationships through a tongue-in-cheek lens: Think a darker and more toxically male spin on Spike Jonze’s *Her *(2013). EW’s critic promises, “[Drew] Hancock's feature directorial debut is a hell of an invigorating revenge fantasy.” *—Ilana Gordon*

Where to watch *Companion*: HBO Max

**EW grade: **B+

**Director: **Drew Hancock

**Cast: **Sophie Thatcher, Jack Quaid, Lukas Gage, Megan Suri, Harvey Guillén

Dune (2021)

Timothée Chalamet as Paul Atreides in 'Dune'.

Warner Bros. Pictures/Legendary Pictures

Frank Herbert's *Dune *novels are dense treatises on colonialism, climate change, and the nature of power. The spice-addled mish-mash of spiritualism and Sun Tzu was considered nigh unfilmable, especially after David Lynch's unfortunate 1984 attempt. But that was before director Denis Villeneuve wowed audiences by cutting the first book in half and plopping a tousle-haired waif (Timothée Chalamet) into an unforgiving landscape riddled with monstrous, holy worms.

The resulting film throws the viewer into the confusing tumult of young Paul Atreides' life, using the foreboding nature of the source material to ramp up the story's internal tension and confusion. A score of war drums and whispers never lets the viewer find their feet on the ever-shifting sands of Arrakis. *—A.G.*

Where to watch *Dune*: HBO Max

**EW grade: **B

**Director: **Denis Villeneuve

**Cast: **Timothée Chalamet, Rebecca Ferguson, Oscar Isaac, Josh Brolin, Stellan Skarsgård

Dune: Part Two (2024)

Zendaya as Chani in 'Dune: Part Two'.

Warner Bros. Pictures/LegendaryPictures

*Dune** *fans who felt let down by the amount of screentime enjoyed by Zendaya’s character, Chani, are in for a treat during the second part of Denis Villeneuve’s ongoing adaptation. Now a fully fleshed-out person with far more autonomy and substance than the character enjoyed in the original book, Chani invites Paul Atreides (Timothée Chalamet) into her community and teaches him the ways of the Fremen.

But Chani’s feelings for Paul — the would-be colonizer of her people’s home — are complicated, and Villeneuve does a great job of allowing Zendaya and Chalamet to explore this nuanced relationship, centering their love as a grounding force amidst the rest of the film’s bonkers plot. *—I.G.*

Where to watch *Dune: Part Two*: HBO Max

**Director: **Denis Villeneuve

**Cast: **Timothée Chalamet, Zendaya, Rebecca Ferguson, Josh Brolin, Austin Butler

Everything Everywhere All at Once (2022)

Michelle Yeoh as Evelyn Wang in 'Everything Everywhere All at Once'.

Allyson Riggs/A24

The Oscar-winning film from codirectors the Daniels, *Everything Everywhere All at Once* is an absurdist comedy and action film about multiverses and multigenerational families. Michelle Yeoh and Ke Huy Quan star as a married couple whose tax audit for their dry cleaning business is interrupted when Evelyn (Yeoh) is recruited to help save the multiverse from a parallel version of her daughter, Joy (Stephanie Hsu), who has set out to destroy it.

As Evelyn hops between universes, occupying parallel versions of herself, she goes on a journey of self-discovery and acceptance for her family. A singular viewing experience, this is the only movie to contain both hot dog fingers and a thoughtful and heartwarming depiction of generational trauma and the immigrant experience.*—I.G.*

Where to watch *Everything Everywhere All at Once*: HBO Max

**Directors:** Daniel Kwan, Daniel Scheinert

**Cast:** Michelle Yeoh, Ke Huy Quan, Jamie Lee Curtis, Stephanie Hsu, James Hong

Fantastic Planet (1973)

Terr (voice: Eric Baugin) and Tiwa (voice: Jennifer Drake) in ‘Fantastic Planet’.

Courtesy Everett

The award for the sci-fi movie most likely to make you ask, “What am I watching?” goes to *Fantastic Planet*, a surrealist art film made using stop-motion cutout animation. This sci-fi film was a collaboration between production companies in France and Czechoslovakia, and its story about an alien planet where giant blue humanoids abuse and kill their human cohabitants has been interpreted as an allegory for both animal and civil rights.

When the humans fight back, the conflict escalates until both species are at risk of wiping each other out. Released in the middle of the Cold War, *Fantastic Planet *is visually arresting — at times even disturbing — and for how odd the film is, it remains a relevant piece of cinema. *—I.G.*

Where to watch *Fantastic Planet*: HBO Max

**Director: **René Laloux

**Cast: **Jean Valmont, Jennifer Drake, Eric Baugin, Jean Topart, Yves Barsacq

Mickey 17 (2025)

Robert Pattinson as Mickey 17 in 'Mickey 17'.

Courtesy of Warner Bros. Pictures

After dominating the 2020 awards circuit with *Parasite*, Bong Joon Ho returns with *Mickey 17*, a black comedy sci-fi film starring Robert Pattinson as multiple versions of the same character, Mickey Barnes. Set in the year 2054, the movie follows Mickey as he flees Earth — and his unpaid debts — to join a space colony. Mickey finds a job as an “Expendable,” a worker who engages in dangerous tasks and is cloned every time he dies. But when Mickey is cloned prematurely, resulting in multiple Mickeys, both Mickeys find themselves in danger of extermination. Pattinson continues to choose the weirdest roles in the most interesting projects, and in *Mickey 17*, he gets his money’s worth, which comes in the form of ample characters and death scenes. *—I.G.*

Where to watch *Mickey 17*: HBO Max

**Director: **Bong Joon Ho

**Cast: **Robert Pattinson, Naomi Ackie, Steven Yeun, Toni Collette, Mark Ruffalo

The 50 best shows to watch on HBO Max

The 13 best sci-fi series on Hulu that are out of this world

Night of the Living Dead (1968)

Undead zombies in 'Night of the Living Dead'.

Pictorial Parade/Getty

George Romero thought *Night of the Living Dead* would be a “one-off,” but his seminal zombie flick has persevered to fundamentally shape the modern horror landscape. The *Dead* franchise spawned numerous entries and imitators, most notably *Dawn of the Dead* (1978) and its well-regarded 2004 remake, and one of the most successful TV series of this century — *The Walking Dead* — wouldn’t exist without this low-budget lark. Named one of EW’s scariest movies of all time, Romero’s slow-burn, documentary-like approach to the apocalypse is as mundane as it is violent; the end comes not with an explosion, but the slow encroachment of our dead loved ones. *—I.G.*

Where to watch *Night of the Living Dead*: HBO Max

**EW grade:** A+

**Director: **George Romero

**Cast: **Duane Jones, Judith O'Dea, Marilyn Eastman, Karl Hardman, Judith Ridley

Prometheus (2012)

Charlize Theron as Meredith Vickers and Idris Elba as Janek in 'Prometheus'.

Kerry Brown/20th Century Fox

In this prequel to the *Alien* film series, Noomi Rapace stars as an archaeologist aboard a spacecraft with a team of fellow explorers looking for the genesis of humankind. They travel to a distant moon and come to discover the threatening creatures that could jeopardize their existence — despite the crew members' best (and differing) intentions.

Directed by Ridley Scott with a screenplay co-written by Damon Lindelof, there's still plenty to ponder with *Prometheus*, even all these years later. As EW's critic wrote at the time, "This is jumbo-size science fiction, with a handsome, impermeable titanium gleam — and a thick coating of creationism lite." *—K.J.*

Where to watch *Prometheus*: HBO Max

**EW grade:** B+

**Director: **Ridley Scott

**Cast: **Noomi Rapace, Michael Fassbender, Guy Pearce, Idris Elba, Logan Marshall-Green

Scanners (1981)

Michael Ironside as Darryl Revok in 'Scanners'. Everett Collection

David Cronenberg's visceral blend of body horror and sci-fi first came to American audiences thanks to this Canadian cult classic. Before he was turning the ravishing good looks of Jeff Goldblum and Geena Davis on their heads via a not-so-sterile experimental machine in *The Fly *(1986), Cronenberg confronted audiences with the goop inside our heads with *Scanners*.

In this bombastic dystopia, the heightened fear of the Cold War and the rise of a revitalized right wing tears the psyches of former hippies turned yuppies inside out, a phenomenon that Cronenberg realizes in vivid shades of red. These "scanners" harbor psychic and telekinetic powers, making waves in underground rings, national security, and in the unsuspecting heads of those around them. The subsequent story is nothing short of mind-bending (and blowing, considering the famous head explosion stunt). *—A.G.*

Where to watch *Scanners*: HBO Max

**Director: **David Cronenberg

**Cast: **Jennifer O'Neill, Stephen Lack, Patrick McGoohan, Lawrence Dane, Michael Ironside

Solaris (1972)

Natalya Bondarchuk as Hari and Donatas Banionis as Kris Kelvin in 'Solaris'. Everett Collection

Consider Andrei Tarkovsky's moody and meditative space story a graduate-level response to *2001: A Space Odyssey*. Just as grand in ambition, though less likely to be a hit if you throw it on at a party, this 1972 film dares to ask what the rules are in an endless cosmos while intentionally avoiding spoon-feeding us easy answers.

Tarkovsky eschews the flash of his non-Soviet contemporaries, opting to use sci-fi in the manner of the era's novelists as a way to examine the as yet undiscovered contours of the human mind. The resulting film is short on special effects and long on philosophy, luxuriating in its nearly three-hour runtime to ponder human nature, unchanged even in the far-off era of long-distance space travel. *—A.G.*

Where to watch *Solaris*: Max

**EW grade: **B

**Director: **Andrei Tarkovsky

**Cast: **Donatas Banionis, Natalya Bondarchuk, Jüri Järvet, Vladislav Dvorzhetsky, Nikolai Grinko

Stalker (1979)

Alexander Kaidanovsky as the Stalker in 'Stalker'. Mary Evans/Ronald Grant/Everett

Another film by Andrei Tarkovsky, *Stalker *shares *Solaris' *preoccupation with the human mind and soul. The film's title refers to the main character, a guide known as the Stalker who works as an escort, ushering interested parties through an ominous and hazardous wasteland to a site called the Zone. Inside the Zone is a room that is said to be capable of granting visitors their innermost desires — though often at a heavy cost.

*Stalker *sees a writer and a professor journey into the Zone; along the way, they meditate on the nature of human desire, selfishness, and what it means to truly know oneself. Considered one of the greatest films of all time — sci-fi or otherwise — *Stalker *is a movie that asks many questions but provides few conclusive answers. *—I.G.*

Where to watch *Stalker*: HBO Max

**Director: **Andrei Tarkovsky

**Cast: **Alexander Kaidanovsky, Anatoly Solonitsyn, Alisa Freindlich, Nikolai Grinko

The Substance (2024)

Demi Moore as Elisabeth Sparkle in 'The Substance'.

Christine Tamalet/Courtesy of TIFF

Demi Moore takes on her best role yet in *The Substance*, a body horror satire about celebrity, aging, and Hollywood's pressure on women to look perfect. Moore stars as Elisabeth Sparkle, a Jane Fonda-esque TV personality who is fired from her aerobics show when she turns 50. To save her career, Elisabeth takes a single-use substance that creates Sue (Margaret Qualley), a younger version of herself. But when Sue and Elisabeth struggle for control over Elisabeth’s body and life, it’s unclear who will win. Moore’s work on the film earned her an Academy Award nod for Best Actress, and *The Substance* comes well-recommended by critics and filmmakers for its fun script, audacious execution, and clever premise and performances. —*I.G.*

Where to watch *The Substance*: HBO Max

**EW grade: **B+

**Director:** Coralie Fargeat

**Cast: **Demi Moore, Margaret Qualley, Dennis Quaid

The Terminator (1984)

Arnold Schwarzenegger as the Terminator in 'The Terminator'.

Orion Pictures Corporation/Everett

One of the most action-packed sci-fi flicks of the 1980s is also one of the most enduring. The movie that launched the careers of director James Cameron and star Arnold Schwarzenegger tells the story of a cyborg assassin sent back in time to hunt and terminate one woman: Sarah Connor. Sarah finds help in Kyle Reese, a human soldier who was sent back in time to protect her from the Terminator.

Schwarzenegger wasn’t joking when he said, “I’ll be back”. *The Terminator*'s success created a launch pad for five movie sequels, plus a TV show, a web series, and an anime series. In a review of *Terminator 2: Judgement Day *(1991), EW's writer calls the first film in the franchise “one of the most original movies of the 1980s.” *—I.G.*

Where to watch *The Terminator*: HBO Max

**EW grade:** A

**Director: **James Cameron

**Cast: **Arnold Schwarzenegger, Michael Biehn, Linda Hamilton, Paul Winfield

War for the Planet of the Apes (2017)

Andy Serkis as Caesar in 'War for the Planet of the Apes'.

Twentieth Century Fox

The original *Planet of the Apes* (1968) was a sci-fi classic that provided audiences with a metaphor through which to process their fears about civil rights, shifting power systems, and gender dynamics. White Americans were not used to seeing themselves represented as a powerless minority, and *Apes* tells the story of a world where intelligent apes rule, and humans are considered primitive and disposable.

The series rebooted for the modern era with *Rise of the Planet of the Apes* (2011), with* Dawn of the Planet of the Apes* (2014), *War for the Planet of the Apes* (2017), and *Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes* (2024) following shortly after. EW’s critic calls *War* the “best *Apes* installment yet,” writing, “like Caesar and company, the films seem to be getting more intelligent and human as they evolve.” —*I.G.*

Where to watch *War for the Planet of the Apes*: HBO Max

**EW grade: **B+

**Director: **Matt Reeves

**Cast: **Andy Serkis, Woody Harrelson, Steve Zahn

- Movie Reviews & Recommendations

Original Article on Source

Source: “EW Movie”