When we started compiling this list, we thought there’d be a tonne of sci-fi movies on Amazon Prime Video, so many that it was going to be hard to cull them all down into a ‘best’ list. To our surprise, that isn’t the case, but there are still a bunch of hidden science fiction gems on the shopping giant’s video streaming platform.
We’ve found you 15 sci-fi movies on Prime Video that we think you should watch if you’re a fan of the genre.
Best sci-fi movies on Prime Video
In no particular order, here are the best sci-fi movies on Prime Video worth your time, according to Gizmodo Australia.
Moonfall
Roland Emmerich really likes to blow up Earth and in his latest disaster film, he did it again. This time though, it’s not climate change, Godzilla, or giant spaceships: it’s the Moon. Here’s the plot: the world stands on the brink of annihilation when a mysterious force knocks the moon from its orbit and sends it hurtling toward a collision course with Earth. With only weeks before impact, NASA executive Jocinda “Jo” Fowler teams up with a man from her past and a conspiracy theorist for an impossible mission into space to save humanity.
Assassin’s Creed
Merging sci-fi with historical fiction, Assassin’s Creed is an adaption of the video game series of the same name, set during the Spanish Inquisition and following a modern-day assassin reliving the memories of his ancestor. Fans of the game might feel a bit underwhelmed by the movie, but it’s a good science-history adventure.
Firestarter
Based on the Stephen King novel, Blumhouse’s Firestarter centres around Charlie, a child with pyrokinetic powers, whose father swears to protect against federal agents that seek to weaponise his daughter. When their cover is blown by a freak accident, their location is compromised and those after Charlie and her family don’t know what they’re truly up against. It’s sci-fi, but horror too, so just be warned.
The Hunger Games
All four Hunger Games movies are on Prime Video, following Katniss Everdeen, a talented archer and resident of District 12, as she’s entered into the annual Hunger Games, which pits young people from all districts against each other in a brutal deathmatch. It’s a brilliant sci-fi action series of movies.
Samaritan
More superhero than sci-fi, in Samaritan, a young boy suspects that his mysterious and reclusive neighbour Mr Smith is actually a legend hiding in plain sight. We’ve got a lot of thoughts on this Sylvester Stallone flick that only debuted this year, mostly that it does well enough in the genre, despite not having the history many other superhero flicks do. It’s worth a watch, at the very least.
Divergent
In Divergent, Tris Prior lives in a futuristic world in which society is divided into five factions. As each person enters adulthood, he or she must choose a faction and commit to it for life. Tris chooses Dauntless — those who pursue bravery above all else. However, her initiation leads to the discovery that she is a Divergent and will never be able to fit into just one faction. Warned that she must conceal her status, Tris uncovers a looming war which threatens everyone she loves. This is more a rite-of-passage film that also includes action (with the obvious romance and self-realisation parts, too).
Chaos Walking
Chaos Walking is set on a distant alien planet called New World. The first wave of human colonists discover that men, and only men, develop a psychic ability known as “The Noise” that perpetually projects their inner monologue in a cloud around their heads. (Oh, seemingly every woman in society has been wiped out, but don’t fear for there is Viola, a young survivor of a crash-landed shuttlecraft from the incoming second wave of human resettlers, who know nothing of what’s happened to their predecessors). Anyway, it’s an interesting premise, but it’s been criticised for its surface-level approach. See for yourself, it’s worth a watch regardless.
The Tomorrow War
Between its iffy concept of time travel, predictable plot points, and rather shoddy sense of internal logic, The Tomorrow War was a movie that left you feeling as if Amazon insisted on letting one of its algorithms make tweaks to the final product before launching it online. Instead of improving on the many similar films it clearly borrowed notes from like Edge of Tomorrow and Independence Day, The Tomorrow War instead phoned it in by merely invoking the general tones of those classics when it easily could have tried to one-up or reimagine them. That being said, it’s a satisfying story and has plenty of entertaining action.
Last Survivors
Last Survivors is a mystery/sci-fi movie about a father and son who live off-grid and battle to survive against that which lies beyond the barriers of the woodland Utopia they have built together. It’s a typical survivalist film, but it deals with how best to endure a crisis and it’s actually quite an engaging watch.
Minority Report
There are lots of good Spielberg sci-fi movies, but one of (arguably) the best is this Tom Cruise film about a man who stops criminals before they commit crimes, and is then accused of committing a future crime himself. Rewatching Minority Report in 2022 (its 20th anniversary, mind you) a few things instantly became clear. First, this film hasn’t aged at all. One or two shots look a little wonky effects-wise but everything else, from the visual and practical effects to the compelling story, award-worthy production design and hugely talented cast, all feel timeless.
Ready Player One
This one is divisive among the team. It isn’t so much a movie about loving old video games and other cultural artifacts. It’s about loving to love those things, which makes Steven Spielberg’s film adaptation of the bestselling novel feel hollow despite – or maybe because of – the relentless pop culture references it throws at you. Many references are now outdated, but Ready Player One does make a good social commentary with a little bit of Spielberg sci-fi spectacle sprinkled in.
Back To The Future
It’s shocking how few truly great science fiction comedy films there are, but BTTF would still tower above the rest even if there were tonnes. It’s clever and yet never stops being about Marty McFly and his family. It manages to come up with a coherent theory of time travel, in which you can rewrite the past and the effects are seen nearly instantaneously (luckily, Marty is only missing like an arm and a leg before the timestream rights itself) and never becomes inconsistent. And it’s surprisingly daring, jumping feet first into the tricky waters of time-travelling incest. Plus, it’s one of those science fiction movies that everybody, even genre-hating snobs, will admit to loving.
The Blackout: Invasion Earth
The Blackout: Invasion Earth comes to us from Russia and packs sci-fi tropes in the first half and flat-out action in the second. The plot for this one is quite simple: life on Earth is rapidly destroyed except for a small area in Eastern Europe. Contact between most towns in Europe has been severed, yet there’s one place with electricity. And aliens.
Edge of Tomorrow
Edge of Tomorrow, starring Emily Blunt and Tom Cruise, takes place five years after a race of nearly invincible aliens called Mimics invaded Earth, turning 2020 into a futuristic hellscape where soldiers of the newly minted United Defence Force have to don bulky mech-suits just to stand a chance against them. It shows how quickly society can adapt when faced with an unprecedented threat, though in this case, it was by creating a massive military-industrial complex. A little different from the 2020 hell that actually was.
RoboCop
Another totally subversive science fiction movie from the 1980s, this film picks up Tron’s obsessions with corporate fascism and runs in a different direction, with the evil OCP trying to take over Detroit’s police force and remake the struggling city as Delta City. RoboCop himself is one of the best examples of sci-fi’s struggle with the ways technology changes or negates our humanity, and 20 years before The Dark Knight, this film managed to delve into similar questions about how far we’ll go to keep society safe from crime. A surreal blend of cyberpunk, Frankenstein and action movie, this film remains Verhoeven’s greatest statement.
There you go, 13 of the best sci-fi movies to binge on Amazon Prime Video. Head over to Prime Video to sign up.
This article has been updated since it was first published.
Comments