Animated sci-fi TV shows may be the staple of the era now with the popularity of Rick & Morty, Cyberpunk: Edgerunners, and Invincible, but this particular combination of genre and medium isn’t new. Even as far back as the 1950s when the likes of Peabody & Sherman first premiered, which gave way to shows like The Jetsons, Space Ghost, and countless others, animated sci-fi shows have been huge. Every decade has their examples but the 1990s is a key point in time not only for animated sci-fi shows, but TV as a whole, with some fan-favorites making the era into what it was.
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In the 1990s not only was television really finding its footing by expanding into esoteric niches on cable and new programming, but a key piece of that came in the form of making animation a cornerstone of that. Saturday morning cartoons continued to be a focal point of shows for children, but it got even bigger than that. Not only were entire channels created to continue catering to this specific interest by younger audiences, but the scope got even bigger, as projects were developed in the same arena of animation that weren’t marketed toward kids at all. These shows not only created genre fans that still continue to love science fiction, but animation as a whole.
1) X-Men: The Animated Series
There may very well be no other animated show of the 1990s that so perfectly captured the era that it was created, but also has endured in popularity, than X-Men: The Animated Series. Often noted as the breaking-in point for many fans, their introduction to the team of Marvel heroes, the series adapted major plots and storylines from the pages of the comics, making these epic science fiction stories filled with action and parables even more accessible to mainstream audiences. X-Men: The Animated Series made the Marvel brand bigger than it had ever been upon its launch, giving way to an entire universe of animated shows that included Iron Man, the Fantastic Four, and, of course, Spider-Man.
A key element of this series’ popularity that made it define the 1990s is that its look was inspired by another major hook of the decade, the Jim Lee-designed costumes of the key characters. The show’s place in history remains so big that Marvel Studios rebooted it with a brand new show that picked up immediately after the original’s cliffhanger ending. Even a step further, the series’ costumes are so tied to the specific characters that they’re what’s been used in live-action films like Deadpool & Wolverine, Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madness, and the upcoming Avengers: Doomsday.
2) Dexter’s Laboratory
On the flip side of a flagship series for Saturday morning cartoons, Dexter’s Laboratory became the science fiction animated show that was the cornerstone for an entire network of…well, cartoons. Created by Genndy Tartakovsky, the slapstick nature of Dexter’s Laboratory might not immediately make it seem like science fiction but this is, after all, a series where a small boy genius idolizes Einstein, builds countless robots, and conducts experiments like cloning dinosaurs.
The continued popularity of Dexter’s Laboratory is one of its traits that make it a defining show of the era, but it’s fully cemented in that place by its origins. Dexter’s Lab was born out of Cartoon Network’s What a Cartoon anthology series. The show debuted as a short on that program and was then voted on by kids (via phone calls, early websites, and other means) for it to fully become its own TV show. If mass voting by kids over the phone to pick a cartoon that they want to become a crown jewel of an entire channel about cartoons doesn’t sound like the ’90s, I’m not sure what does.
As of this writing the first two seasons can be found on Prime Video, but to watch the entire series requires an additional purchase from fans.
3) Captain Planet and the Planeteers
If X-Men: The Animated Series defines sci-fi animation for the ’90s by its place in making superhero comics mainstream, Captain Planet fits the bill in an entirely different arena of the decade, the political one. Featuring the title hero and the five super-powered kids, the series was not only a major show for the decade not only by having a cast of characters defined by a global view but explicitly tackling the ideas of environmentalism and conservation in a way that its young audience could understand. These specific themes tie directly into larger movements of the 1990s, one about promoting recycling, reducing pollution, and fighting back against corporations. One might even say these are pretty timeless ideas.
Though six seasons and over 100 episodes were produced of the series, only three of those seasons can be easily streamed online (the whole thing can be purchased if you decide to be environmentally friendly and not buy plastic via the DVDs)
4) Aeon Flux
If the shows that preceded this are defined by their major influence from the outside, Aeon Flux deserves the nod because it didn’t play by the rules. First premiering to the world on MTV’s Liquid Television, Peter Chung’s hit cyberpunk series worked deep within the spaces that science fiction was most comfortable, exploring ideas of political extremes in addition to delivering deadly futuristic technology. Influenced by the likes of Japanese anime and even surrealist artists like Möbius, though there are only 16 total episodes Aeon Flux made a huge mark in ’90s TV.
The most important aspect of Aeon Flux however is that fact that it was an American animated series that was created explicitly for an adult audience (though plenty of fans from the era will tell you they watched it while entirely too young). As a result the series proved their was an appetite for this kind of show to be on the air, making way for programming blocks like Adult Swim years before it would even premiere.
As of this writing, only the third season of the series is available for streaming on Paramount+ with the earlier seasons completely absent from any platform.
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image courtesy of 20th Century Studios
