Over the last several years, the diverse selection of sci-fi movies on streaming has become an avalanche of seemingly infinite options. It’s often overwhelming trying to find something decent to watch, let alone your next favorite. However, buried under the constant churn of content, there are a few science fiction gems that are good enough to catch a second wind. Somehow, despite their quality, these movies have slipped through the algorithm’s cracks, and it’s about time we unearth them again.
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Through the early 80s, all the way up to contemporary sci-fi, these movies are waiting for you on the platforms you’re already playing for, including Netflix, Hulu, HBO Max, and Prime Video. Even if they were originally overshadowed by blockbusters or swallowed by Netflix’s never-ending carousels, every one of these films is worth a watch. And thanks to streaming, rediscovery is easier than ever.
7) Chronicle | HBO Max
Three Seattle high schoolers stumble on a mysterious glowing object that gifts them telekinetic abilities. For a moment, it’s all laughs, but things turn dark when one of them, an outcast with bottled-up pain, starts using his powers for control instead of fun. Found-footage mingles with superhero tropes, but Chronicle plays it straight, resulting in a smart, fast-paced sci-fi adventure that explores adolescent psychology.
Released in 2012, the film was directed by Josh Trank and written by Max Landis, starring Dane DeHaan, Alex Russell, and Michael B. Jordan. It was made on a mere $15 million budget and grossed $127 million worldwide. However, as superhero movies have grown bigger and shinier, Chronicle has fallen out of the conversation despite how great it is. If you haven’t seen it, you can stream the low-fi sci-fi thriller now on HBO Max.
6) Ashfall | Prime Video
A massive volcano on the China–North Korea border is about to annihilate the Korean peninsula, and the only possible solution comes down to a South Korean special forces team who must break a North Korean defector out of prison, steal a nuclear weapon, and detonate it inside the volcano itself. Ashfall is half disaster movie, half military thriller, but the emotional edge comes with a surprisingly profound metaphor for parenthood.
Released in South Korea in 2019 and directed by Lee Hae-jun and Kim Byung-seo, Ashfall was a massive Korean blockbuster that barely made a dent in Western markets, largely because international distribution was a mess in the late 2010s. An Armageddon-esque setup for a movie that cares deeply about its characters, Ashfall is more than deserving of a second life on streaming. The science is delirious, and the plot is unhinged, but the movie sells every beat with impressive VFX and unexpected nuance. It’s available to watch now on Prime Video.
5) Color Out of Space | Hulu
Nicolas Cage stars as a New England farmer whose family slowly unravels after a meteorite lands in their yard and unleashes a color that shouldn’t exist in our spectrum. The longer it sits on the farm, the more reality bends around it. As plants, animals, and time itself mutate, the family begins losing their grip on reality. It’s a cosmic horror flick styled in psychedelic neon, surrounding a harrowing family tragedy.
Richard Stanley’s first feature since being fired from The Island of Dr. Moreau in 1996, the film also stars Joely Richardson and Tommy Chong. Despite an 86% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes, it received only a limited release before disappearing into the streaming abyss. If you’re a fan of Lovecraft, Color Out of Space is worth a stream, as critics have hailed it as one of the most faithful adaptations ever made. For unknowable dread, body horror, and Cage delivering madness, you’ll want to stream Color Out of Space on Hulu.
4) Scanners | HBO Max
Another sci-fi horror, David Cronenberg’s cult favorite paints a world where people called “scanners” can read minds, control bodies, and make heads explode. When a rogue scanner plans to build an army of psychic soldiers, a shady corporation recruits another scanner to stop him, resulting in espionage, body horror, and psychic warfare.
Released in 1981, the film was a box office success and even won the Saturn Award for Best International Film. While Scanners undoubtedly still has devoted followers, the film is relatively unknown among the younger generations. Even in Cronenberg’s filmography, it often gets overshadowed by later hits like The Fly and Videodrome. Made under chaotic conditions with an unfinished script, it’s primed for a second life in the era of AI and the overly processed sheen associated with made-for-streaming movies. Beyond the famous head explosion, the film’s commentary on pharmaceutical corporations is more relevant than ever. Catch it on HBO Max.
3) See You Yesterday | Netflix
Two Brooklyn teens build a pair of working time machines for a school project. However, when one of their brothers is killed by police in a case of mistaken identity, they use their invention to try to save him, discovering that each attempt to fix the past unleashes increasingly devastating alternate timelines. Back to the Future meets modern social urgency in a fun, high-stakes sci-fi adventure.
Directed by Stefon Bristol as an expansion of his 2017 short film, the movie was produced by Spike Lee through 40 Acres and a Mule and earned a 93% on Rotten Tomatoes. Bristol even won Best First Screenplay at the Independent Spirit Awards. Yet it was almost immediately lost in the shuffle, never really breaking through into the cultural conversation. See You Yesterday is a classic time travel tale that uses the conceit to explore grief, systemic injustice, and the impossibility of mending a broken timeline when the real problem is the world itself. To see the fantastic young cast in action and catch Michael J. Fox’s cameo, you can head over to Netflix.
2) A Scanner Darkly | Tubi
In a near-future America drowning in addiction to a drug called Substance D, an undercover cop is tasked with surveilling suspected dealers, including, unknowingly, himself. As the drug fractures his personality into two competing selves, he loses the ability to tell that he’s investigating his own life. Layered over all of this is rotoscoped animation, giving the film a surreal, dreamlike look that evoked the characters’ slipping sanity.
Released in 2006 and directed by Richard Linklater from Philip K. Dick’s 1977 novel, the film features a stacked cast of Keanu Reeves, Robert Downey Jr., Woody Harrelson, and Winona Ryder. Yet even with a small budget, it barely broke even, likely because the animation style and bleak tone made it a hard sell. Over time, it faded from the conversation, remembered mostly by PKD devotees and Linklater fans. It remains a brilliant, fascinating film, however, and it deserves rediscovery as one of the best adaptations of Dick’s work. It’s dark, funny, paranoid, and devastating. Thankfully, it’s now streaming for free on Tubi.
1) Coherence | Prime Video
Eight friends gather for what should’ve been a normal dinner party on the night a comet passes overhead. Then the power goes out. Then they spot another house on the street that looks exactly like theirs… with people inside who look exactly like them. As parallel timelines fracture and overlap, the night devolves into paranoia, and all sense of diplomacy dissolves. Perhaps most impressively, all of it was shot for $50,000 inside the director’s actual home.
Premiering at Fantastic Fest in 2013, Coherence was written and directed by James Ward Byrkit in his feature debut and stars Emily Foxler (now Baldoni). The entire movie was filmed over five nights in Byrkit’s Santa Monica house with no script. The actors were given daily notecards and asked to improvise everything. Despite winning Best Screenplay awards at multiple festivals and earning glowing reviews, it received only a tiny theatrical release. It’s easily one of the most innovative sci-fi films of the century so far. The loose, naturalistic performances juxtapose the tightly structured mechanics, and in the end, it sticks the landing. Stream it on Prime Video if you’re looking for a mind-bending science fiction thriller.
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