Sci-fi shows this year have run the gamut from big-budget video game adaptations like Fallout to quirky animated gems like Iwájú. Be they from existing franchises, adaptations of books, or totally original stories, they all explore the wide world that the science fiction genre has to offer — because in truth, it’s quite a range. We’ve got Legos, we’ve got zombies, we’ve got robots, and more. The sci-fi umbrella is big enough for everyone.
So what are the best ones to check out, the cream of the crop from 2024? Here’s Polygon’s picks for the best sci-fi television of the year.
Where to watch: Prime Video
Image: Prime Video
Fallout felt like a small miracle of the year: a show set in the world of a video game franchise that built on the lore, rules, and tone of the games effectively and smartly. We follow Lucy (Ella Purnell), who’s venturing beyond her vault for the first time ever. What she finds in the wasteland is, of course, corruption and madness — this is Fallout, after all.
What makes Fallout great feels like how easily it moves beyond that. Sure, there’s the one-off NPC homages, and the major expansions (or even just possible departures) of game mythology. But as precise as Fallout feels, it also just feels like a freewheelin’ sci-fi world that’s just fun to live in. There’s cyber feet and decapitator devices and irradiated creatures and a whole religious order built around “klutzy” steel suits of armor. It delivers on its bona fides and its sci-fi potential, but it also just comes assured, giving a big story told through distinct characters. —Zosha Millman
Image: Netflix
Yeon Sang-ho’s work often exists at the intersection of sci-fi and horror. Zombie movies (Train to Busan), supernatural horror (Hellbound) — even his more straightforward sci-fi projects usually involve some horror elements.
Parasyte: The Grey, his Netflix follow-up to Hellbound’s first season, takes this to the extreme. A live-action spinoff of the popular manga series, the show follows the aftermath of an invasion of Earth by parasitic creatures that kill humans and take over their bodies. But when one woman (Jeon So-nee) ends up in a more symbiotic relationship with her parasite, it throws everything into question. Like most of Yeon’s projects, it’s a very fun time filled with genre thrills, with some of the best VFX you’ll see this year. —Pete Volk
Where to watch: Apple TV Plus
Image: Apple TV Plus
A cat-and-mouse thriller sprawled across the multiverse— Wait! Don’t leave! The multiverse fad isn’t dead yet! This is one of the good ones!
Based on Blake Crouch’s novel of the same name, Dark Matter finds Jason (Joel Edgerton) abducted and dumped in an underground lab… located in a parallel universe. The masked assailant behind the crime: his double, “Jason 2,” who intends to live out the rest of his days with Jason 1’s wife, Daniela (Jennifer Connelly), the one that got away in his world. Even after discovering Jason 2’s process for crossing over, returning to his place in spacetime turns out to be no easy feat for Jason 1, as the psychedelic drugs that allow his mind to navigate the multiverse don’t come with a map, leaving him on a roulette journey into other versions of Earth, both perilous (Ice Age world! Zombie world!) and utopian.
Like Cast Away or The Martian, Dark Matter is a man-versus-impossible-odds survival story. But thanks to the split perspectives of Jason 1 and Jason 2, and perhaps Crouch’s choice to adapt his own novel, the show puts its emphasis on the ramifications of how relationships would warp and spark under the larger-than-life predicament. Accompanying Jason 1 on his race through the multiverse is Jason 2’s girlfriend, Amanda (Alice Braga), who challenges his love-conquers-all mission while questioning her own relationship to the man she’s now met the more compassionate version of. At the same time, Jason 2, a hot-shot scientist who gave up on meaningful relationships in his own world, struggles to keep up appearances with Jason 1’s family — he has the looks, but not the heart.
The grounded approach coupled with bursts of the fantastical leaves Dark Matter feeling more like an episodic take on The Fountain than anything in the MCU, all anchored by Edgerton’s, Connelly’s, and Braga’s delicate performances. —Matt Patches
Where to watch: Disney Plus
Image: Disney
Disney’s collaboration with pan-African studio Kugali is just six half-hour episodes, but it packs a punch. It’s a very tight story, taking place in a futuristic Lagos, Nigeria. The wealthy enjoy the boons of technology, like flying cars and high-tech computers; the poor, meanwhile, work their butts off for a fraction of that in separate areas of the city controlled by crime lords. The show follows two children, a wealthy but lonely girl and the clever but poor boy who works for her father. Iwájú doesn’t waste a moment in its captivating world. —Petrana Radulovic
Where to watch: Disney Plus
Image: Disney Plus
This year, Doctor Who danced back onto screens with aplomb. Sure, it wasn’t the most even of seasons, week to week. But the downs were more than outweighed by standout sci-fi parable episodes like “Boom” and “73 Yards.” Even charming interludes like “Dot and Bubble” and “Rogue” succeeded as showcases for the sheer charisma of Who’s new stars, Millie Gibson as the orphaned companion Ruby Sunday and the electrifying Ncuti Gatwa as the Fourteenth Doctor.
Returning showrunner Russell T. Davies showed that he could still make the old tunes sing, and that Doctor Who could break new ground for the veteran sci-fi staple — a Doctor of color, unshakable trans-positive themes — while remaining effortlessly, effervescently itself. —Susana Polo
Image: Netflix
When Netflix announced Game of Thrones creators David Benioff and D.B. Weiss would be helming an adaptation of Cixin Liu’s The Three-Body Problem alongside Alexander Woo, the question from those who had read the book was simple: How? The book is one of those considered unadaptable, filled with dense scientific descriptions and not much in terms of character interiority or motivation.
The answer: By making some serious changes (but keeping some of the book’s most intense moments). Netflix’s 3 Body Problem dramatically accelerated the timeline of the books, borrowed characters from later books in the series, and tried to give more focus on the people involved in this very science-driven story. For the most part, it worked, telling a complicated but compelling story about humanity in crisis (and with sick VR headsets). The show will be getting two more seasons to wrap up the saga. —PV
Where to watch: Prime Video
Image: Prime Video
Sadly canceled after two intriguing, bizarre seasons, this existential sci-fi Western has great writing, an excellent cast (led by Josh Brolin, Lili Taylor, and Imogen Poots), and just the right amount of Twin Peaks influence.
A family drama that also takes some notes from Yellowstone, Outer Range follows the Abbotts, a ranching family in Wyoming who are juggling two significant problems: (1) conniving rich neighbors eyeing their property and (2) a giant hole that recently popped up on their property that no one seems to fully understand. Both are great focal points for the family drama that ensues, as the Abbotts’ strong bonds are strained by the difficulty of their situation. —PV
Where to watch: Apple TV Plus
Image: Apple TV Plus
Suzie Sakamoto (Rashida Jones) doesn’t want any of this. She doesn’t want to have lost her husband and son in a plane crash; she doesn’t want her mother-in-law telling her how to grieve. And she definitely doesn’t want the giant helper robot, Sunny (Joanna Sotomura), up in her business. But, given that Sunny was left behind by her roboticist husband, Suzie endeavors to try (or at least can’t figure out how to shut Sunny all the way off).
And it’s a good thing, too, because very quickly Suzie discovers that there’s something special about Sunny, something people are willing to kill for. The more Suzie digs into what Sunny’s deal is and why she’s been left in Suzie’s care, the greater the conspiracy goes. Sunny is indulgent as it unravels this, moving methodically through the mysteries of this softer, slightly wacky version of an alt-Japan. Ultimately it’s in how the show balances its many flavors — the intrigue, the sorrow, the madcap — that makes Sunny worthy of being one of the best sci-fi of the year. It’s feels like the future without losing its sense of how it feels to be now. In that way, it’s very easy to want. —ZM
Lego Star Wars: Rebuild the Galaxy
What to watch: Disney Plus
Lucasfilm Ltd.
Lego Star Wars: Rebuild the Galaxy purposefully breaks all of the Star Wars “rules” to have some fun. After all, isn’t the core of playing with Legos creativity?
Now, technically, in order to break the rules, this special introduces some new rules. But while the minutiae of how this multiverse thing works might lead to some Very Devastating implications, the actual multiverse mixup leads to some kooky fun times. Ewok bounty hunters? Emperor Palpatine being a kindly old Jedi Master? Leia and Greedo being a romantic item? It’s just like playing Legos as a kid and going “yes, and” to all the crazy ideas about your favorite characters. —PR
