The 13 best sci-fi movies since Avatar

The Way of Water Avatar, the long-awaited sequel to James Cameron’s chart-topping sci-fi blockbuster AvatarFinally, it is here. It’s been over 13 years since the original film premiered in theaters; needless to say, a lot has transpired in the world of cinema, let alone the world at large. It was released in 1993. AvatarIn 2009, when we launched the website, there were only a handful of people. TwoMarvel Cinematic Universe movies. There are now 30 movies in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. In that span of time, the entire Star Wars sequel trilogy has been completed.

In the midst of our journey to Pandora’s extrasolar moon, we feel it is appropriate to take a look back at all the outstanding sci-fi film that has been made over the past decade. From operatic post-apocalyptic action dramas and ecological horror tales to hyperreal parables warning about the commodification of humanity, here are the 13 best sci-fi movies to have come out in the 13 years since James Cameron’s sci-fi epic. With Way of Water out in the universe, here’s to the next 13 years.

Annihilation

Image from Paramount Pictures

Year: 2018
Run time: 1h 55m
Director: Alex Garland
Cast: Natalie Portman, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Gina Rodriguez

AnnihilationIt is a film as full of metaphors and meanings as the forests and swamps that make up its surreal environment: the Shimmer. Each expedition trying to learn more about this mysterious phenomenon, has failed. Oscar Isaac, who portrayed one of the expedition members, never returned home. HeHe was unconscious. The Shimmer is quickly discovered by Natalie Portman, his pitch-perfect wife.

During the journey, you begin to learn more not just about the Shimmer’s effects, but about the people who would partake in these almost certainly suicidal expeditions. This movie is a moving look at self-destruction, loss, and the stories of (still alive) expedition members give hints from previous ones. Through both its astonishing visuals and minimalist dialogue, the movie effectively captures the psychedelic feel of Jeff VanderMeer’s original novel, but it is so much more than a carbon copy of the book. For example, not only does the movie’s ending go in a completely different direction, but the use of sound effects and music is so iconic it vaults the sequence into the pantheon of great science fiction cinema. —Clayton Ashley

AnnihilationParamount Plus allows you to watch it live.

Congress

Drafthouse Films

Year: 2013
Run time: 2h 2m
Director: Ari Folman
Cast: Robin Wright, Paul Giamatti, Jon Hamm

Ari Folman’s live-action/animation hybrid CongressThe story is messy and confusing narratively. It reminds me of many complicated stories with many ideas. But it’s also fascinating, heady stuff that feels more prophetic than ever in an era where AI bots can reproduce artists’ styles in any form users can imagine and James Earl Jones has sold off his vocal rights to an AI company so Darth Vader can continue showing up in new work forever.

Congress centers on a fading actress, Robin (Robin Wright), who sells all rights to her likeness to an AI firm — she’ll have to quit acting so she doesn’t compete with the corporate, digital version of herself. This seems to be enough for a movie of high stakes. But the story moves forward by decades. We follow digital-Robin through various states in a virtual world that is rapidly changing.

It’s a bittersweet (and often just bitter) movie about the changing forms of identity in the future, adapting Stanisław Lem’s phantasmagorical 1971 novel Futurological Congress. It isn’t always grounded enough in comprehensible motives or well-realized characters, but it’s visually rich and phenomenally narratively ambitious — one of those movies that just towers above others in the field. —Tasha Robinson

CongressIt is streaming on Hulu, and available with advertisements on Tubi.

Dawn of the Planet of the Apes

Image by 20th Century Studios

Year: 2014
Run time: 2h 10m
Director: Matt Reeves
Cast: Andy Serkis and Jason Clarke. Gary Oldman

If I had been told before, watching Dawn of the Planet of the Apes that I would be moved by the sight of a leering scar-faced bonobo riding astride a galloping horse, cackling wildly while firing two M249 light machine guns at a fortified human encampment, I’d have thought they were insane. That I remember that moment, and what I felt while watching it nearly a decade ago in theaters, is a testament to director Matt Reeves’ ability to draw new blood from the otherwise desiccated corpse of a flagging franchise.

To follow up in 2014 Rise of the Planet of the Apes Caesar, a fearful simian who has become almost Shakespearean among his people is transformed into a king. He tries to save the home that he created and broker some peace between the human colony and the apes. However, both sides are undermined in their conciliatory efforts by the dissidents Koba (Toby Kebbell), who wants to take Caesar’s place as leader of apes, kill the humans, or Dreyfus (“Gary Oldman”), who is an ex-cop, leader of the human colonies, who believe that there can be no coexistence of the apes with humans. Dawn of the Planet of the ApesThis is undoubtedly the greatest Planet of the Apes series reboot, powered by powerful performances and breathtaking action and one of the most cinematic sci-fi dramas of the last decade. —Toussaint Egan

Dawn of the Planet of the ApesIt is also available for rent through Amazon, Apple and Vudu.

Edge of Tomorrow

Warner Bros. Pictures

Year: 2014
Run time: 1h 53m
Director:Doug Liman
Cast: Tom Cruise, Emily Blunt and Bill Paxton

With the box-office smash hit, Tom Cruise revived blockbuster Tom Cruise Maverick: Top GunNearly a decade ago, he was in the blockbuster of the century.

Cruise portrays a public relations officer forced into joining a military operation to stop invading aliens. He then finds himself in an inexorable time loop. Cruise meets Rita Vrataski (Emily Blunt) in the loop. She trains Cruise in loops after loops, without remembering any of their past meetings.

The movie makes clever use of its time loop gimmick both visually and in the narrative – only in this kind of movie can you have your protagonist die as a punchline. It’s fun, it’s exciting, and it’s anchored by two movie stars overcharged on charisma, operating at the height of their powers in a dynamic similar to screwball comedies of days yore (but this time, with mech suits).

My only complaint is they chose the worst of their three possible titles; the original light novel’s title Kill is All You Have is excellent, as is the movie’s tagline, Live Die Repeat. —Pete Volk

Edge of TomorrowIt is also available for rent through Amazon, Apple and Vudu.

Gravity

Warner Bros. Pictures

Year: 2013
Run time: 1h 31m
Director: Alfonso Cuarón
Cast: Sandra Bullock, George Clooney, Ed Harris

Ridley Scott’s The MartianIt is most likely the first movie to come to mind for sci-fi movies about one person trying to survive alone in the harsh environment of space. But for my money, Alfonso Cuarón told a similar kind of story more effectively two years earlier in Gravity. Sandra Bullock gives one of her finest performances as the film’s hero, Dr. Ryan Stone, a first-timer paired with veteran astronaut Matt Kowalski (George Clooney), who has to find the will within her to persevere and use all of her ingenuity to make it back to Earth.

Cuarón and frequent collaborator Emmanuel Lubezki use every moment of Gravity’s 91-minute run time for maximum impact. They take the time for long, languid shots to establish the drudgery of life as an astronaut; the endless expanse of space; and the vast distance between Earth and our heroes — and then punctuate them with violent interruptions of peril, quickening the pace of the story and the pulse of the viewer. These grueling sequences are made more dramatic by the (appropriately) absence of sound. —Samit Sarkar

GravityIt is streaming on HBO Max.

Her

Warner Bros. Pictures

Year: 2013
Run time: 2h 6m
Director: Spike Jonze
Cast: Joaquin Phoenix, Scarlett Johansson, Rooney Mara

The only thing Spike Jonze got wrong in his solemn, pastel vision of the future is that a human might be gainfully employed at a business like “BeautifulHandwrittenLettters.com” when AI has reached near-sentience. The story’s emotional content is impeccable, despite the fact that ChatGPT has been removed. The love story between Theodore Twombly (“Joaquin Phoenix”) and Samantha (Scarlett Johansson), which involves a tryst with Siri-like Samantha (Scarlett Johansson), remains fascinating due to Jonze’s unique ability to link human needs to technological elements. There are satirical jabs — a cute bubble kid character in Theodore’s hologram video game devolving into caustic vulgarity is just too good, even if it’s too easy — but no easy answers. Jonze allows Phoenix and Johansson to have fun, to allow romance to blossom, to consider failed relationships, and to make Theodore’s world feel too large and too small. It’s a movie rich with ideas without anything that goes boom — a different kind of science fiction we almost never seen on screen. —Matt Patches

HerIt is also available for rent through Amazon, Apple and Vudu.

Interstellar

Warner Bros. Pictures

Year: 2014
Run time: 2h 49m
Director: Christopher Nolan
Cast: Matthew McConaughey and Anne Hathaway. Jessica Chastain

As with a lot science fiction, Interstellarit’s about the father. More specifically, it’s about a dad going to space and leaving behind his two kids, specifically his young daughter Murph (played by Mackenzie Foy of The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 2 Jessica Chastain was a star in her youth. Cooper (Matthew McConaughey), and other astronauts journey via wormhole to far-flung reaches in the galaxy looking for a suitable home for mankind. Earth has suffered from crop-destroying pestilences and is now running out of time. Interstellar was praised for its scientific accuracy and its special effects — which are all very impressive and cool (that planet with the enormous tides! It’s the black hole. But at its heart, it’s a story about a father and a daughter trying to connect across time and space — and the weight of that is what makes it resonate years later. —Petrana Radulovic

Interstellar Paramount Plus allows you to watch it live.

Mad Max Fury Road

Warner Bros. Pictures

Year: 2015
Run time: 2h 0m
Director: George Miller
Cast:Charlize Thon, Nicholas Hoult, Tom Hardy

Mad Max Fury RoadFeels like an assortment of contradictory messages, shoved eagerly in your face. In the wastes of the postapocalypse, you have to fight for your survival — water, gasoline, bullets — and Max (Tom Hardy) fights his way through it all. But you’re probably here for the spectacle and theater; Fury RoadIt feels to me so much like an era when films had to be seen in theatres.

Fury RoadPostapocalypse will be furious and chaotic, explosive and explosive. Loud and frenetic action-packed sequences — cars decked in terrifying spikes — contrast with the desolation of climate apocalypse, and the fleshy softness of the human body. On the dusty stretch, there’s so much happening, but not enough.

Charlize Theron and Tom Hardy give the performances of a lifetime — alongside other fantastic actors, like Nicholas Hoult and Zoë Kravitz. This series has been around since late 1970s. It was directed by George Miller (also known as the director for Happy FeetAnd Babe: Pig in City. That varied filmography may not sound like it makes sense, but when you think about the spectacle of these films, the underdog arc of their main characters, and the showmanship of it all — these past films make a lot of sense. —Nicole Clark

Mad Max Fury RoadIt is streaming on HBO Max.

Shin Godzilla

Image: Toho Co. Ltd

Year: 2016
Run time: 2h 0m
Director: Hideaki Anno, Shinji Higuchi
Cast: Hiroki Hasegawa, Yutaka Takenouchi, Satomi Ishihara

With one notable exception, most of the Godzilla films are American. The Toho original film is one the greatest movies of all time, and the sequels are just as good. But if you’re looking for a more modern adaptation, you can’t get better than Shin Godzilla.

Evangelion Hideaki Anno, the creator of the Kaiju Series, filtered it through an administrative lens. There is destruction and death, but that’s not the key tension. Shin Godzilla This happens in conference rooms as incompetent politicians and red tape get in the path of genuine solutions that will help those in crisis.

If a Godzilla movie about bureaucracy sounds boring to you — rest assured, it is not. Anno brings those scenes to life with humor and a careful eye, and it’s all juxtaposed with a terrifying new design for one of cinema’s oldest monsters. You will be haunted by the final shot.

Shin Godzilla is a landmark entry in one of cinema’s most important franchises, and one of my very favorite movies of the 21st century. Anno wrote and has produced many films since. Shin UltramanAnd is the director Shin Kamen RiderThe book will be available in the coming year. If they’re anything like Shin Godzilla, I can’t wait. —PV

Shin GodzillaIt is also available for rent through Amazon, Apple and Vudu.

Snowpiercer

Image: The Weinstein Company

Year: 2013
Run time: 2h 6m
Director:Bong Joon-ho
Cast:Chris Evans and Song Kang-ho by Tilda SWInton

Înaintea his emergence Parasite, Bong Joon-ho brought his satirical scalpel to this English-language adaptation of Jacques Lob and Jean-Marc Rochette’s graphic novel of the same name. And true to director Bong’s past and future work, SnowpiercerMulti-level operations are combined to create one of science fiction’s greatest works. In the wake of climate disaster, Earth’s last survivors circle the icy globe aboard the Snowpiercer — but all cars are not created equal. When Curtis (Chris Evans), a lowly caboose rider, decides it’s time for a change, his revolt breaks through car by car to uncover the truth of their steel prison, and unmask the upper crust who wines and dines while they suck down rations of mushed-up cockroaches. Bong combines brutal action with crushing social commentary and Tilda Swainton wearing bizarre makeup to support a dystopian circus. —MP

SnowpiercerIt is streaming on Showtime, available for rent on Amazon and Apple and Vudu.

Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse

Image: Sony Pictures Animation

Year: 2018
Run time: 1h 57m
Director: Bob Persichetti, Peter Ramsey, Rodney Rothman
Cast: Shameik Moor, Jake Johnson, Hailee Sternfeld

We don’t deserve Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse. The feature is a revolution in computer-generated animation and design, a prescient entry in the mainstreaming of the multiverse concept, a collection of fabulous vocal performances, and would have had the bangingest soundtrack the year it came out if it hadn’t shared 2018 with Black Panther.

However, the best thing about it is Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse might be that it’s… kinda the best version of Miles Morales’ story in any medium? Spider-VerseThis book oozes passion for its source material down to the smallest design decisions. It demonstrates not only a story that is possible with heroes, but also the iconography that renders those stories irreplaceable.

Live-action films are seen as the final arbiter for legitimacy in the slow rise of super heroes to mainstream cinema, even if it does mean losing the simplicity and expressivity that gave birth to this genre. Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse is all the proof anyone should need that the best comic book adaptations — maybe the Only good ones — consider the medium and not just the message. —Susana Polo

Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse It is also available for rent through Amazon, Apple and Vudu.

The Skin

Image: A24

Year: 2013
Run time: 1h 48m
Director: Jonathan Glazer
Cast: Scarlett Johansson, Jeremy McWilliams, Adam Pearson

Few films released in the last decade — or two, or more — have the unnerving power of Jonathan Glazer’s The Skin. Mixing naturalistic vérité footage with unforgettable sequences of stark surrealism and a sparse, frightening score by Mica Levi, the film follows an uncanny woman (Scarlett Johansson) who drives a van around Scotland, seducing and abducting men whom she brings back to a deserted house where a dark void awaits. The first hour will leave you chilled and awestruck; the second, as the woman breaks her pattern and tests the boundaries of her existence, trades some of that inscrutable power for a more conventional story structure, but it’s still quietly disquieting.

Glazer took the 2000 novel to its core and stripped it down to its essentials. The Skin supports all kinds of interpretations: It’s a film about alienation, foreignness, gender performance and identity, about using and being used, and about the utter strangeness of our world when viewed from the outside. The film reads differently today than when it was released in 2013. Its center is Johansson who uses her star-struck magnetism as a scalpel to dissect the human condition in an enlightening and terrifying way. —Oli Welsh

The SkinIt is streaming on HBO Max.

World of Tomorrow, 1-3

Image: Don Hertzfeldt

Year: 2015 (World of Tomorrow); 2017 (Episode Two: The Burden of Other People’s Thoughts); 2020 (Episode Three: David Prime’s Absent Destinations)
Run time: 17m (World of Tomorrow); 23m (Episode two); 34m (Episode 3)
Director: Don Hertzfeldt
Cast: Julia Pott, Winona Mae, Jack Parrett

On a list of films whose average combined run times amount to approximately two hours, Don Hertzfeldt’s 2015 short film is a stark argument by example that less is more. It’s hard to contest such an argument when you consider the results. World of TomorrowThis sci-fi story is moving, imaginative, bizarre, and visionary. It transports the audience to an enviable posthuman future, asking them to reflect on what it really means to be human.

While the first film is more visually, emotionally, and thematically rich than many of its animated contemporaries (animated or not), the second and third films expand the universe and dive deeper into the motives of the characters. All three shorts are exceptional, but if you only have time to watch one, you simply can’t go wrong with the first. —TE

World of TomorrowIt is free to stream on YouTube. World of Tomorrow, Episode 2And World of Tomorrow: Episode ThreeAre available for rent or stream on Vimeo.

Honorable mentions…

Image courtesy of 20th Century Studios

Covenant with Alien
Arrival
Big Hero 6
Blade Runner 2049
Europa Report
The Martian
Looper
The Platform