The five best sci-fi movies to watch on Netflix this weekend
Science is the foundation of all things real. But science fiction? It’s the core of all things surreal. If you’re troubled with what could be your weekend pick of movie marathon, Best of Netflix suggests a trip down the sci-fi lanes of what might be.
Typically governed by what-if logics, these sci-fi movies on Netflix teeter on the edge of fact and fiction. Sometimes, they leak into cerebral realities, offering hypothetical explanations and far-fetched plausibilities of a scientific logic, invention, or phenomenon.
Although they are born out of fictional undertones, they carry the weight of tangibility, or at least the possibility of it. And that alone could either be fulfilling or threatening. They explore the world of alternate realities, advanced technology, and time travel, leveraging the speculative and often debated nature of these concepts to comment on existing anxieties surrounding the ethics and unchecked ambitions of scientific progress.
So, if you thought this was going to be just another ordinary weekend, here are the five best sci-fi movies on Netflix that will make you think again.
The five best sci-fi movies to watch on Netflix this weekend
Okja (Bong Joon Ho, 2017)
Sci-fi movies have a soft corner for preying on your worst fears. With Okja, Bong Joon Ho thought, why not haunt viewers with a tale of friendship, camped in the moral collapse of scientific advancements and the instinctive response of inhumane separation? The 2017 sci-fi action-adventure film revolves around the story of an unconditional camaraderie between a gentle giant, a scientifically bred “super pig,” Okja, and a young girl, Mija, who goes to great lengths to fight against its mistreatment by murderous and corrupt multinational corporations.
One of the most powerful stories of contemporary times, Okja is a tale of tragedy that’s equally heartwarming, thought-provoking, and beautiful. The film has two POVs: both human, but only one humane.
The Kitchen (Kibwe Tavares and Daniel Kaluuya, 2023)
World-building is crucial for sci-fi titles. Without it, neither can you expect a seamless reception, nor can you crack into the imaginative space. Fortunately, The Kitchen excels at that. Set in a dystopian, futuristic London where all the housing facilities have been eliminated, the sci-fi thriller focuses on “The Kitchen,” a community on the brink of social cleansing by the upper class.
The Kitchen doesn’t feature alien invasion, dazing time travel, or extraterrestrial explorations. It takes a more humane approach, where science fiction serves as the vehicle to portray the dangers of generational inheritance of functioning anxieties, such as the lack of community feeling, propagation of marginalisation, and class disparity, against the backdrop of a natural bond growing between Izi and Benji.
Advantageous (Jennifer Phang, 2015)
Although Advantageous is set in a dystopian future, it’s difficult to overlook the contemporary agency in this sci-fi movie. Conceived in a society that is plagued by economic imbalance, the film is told from the feminist perspective of a single mother in a world where the infertility rate is at an abnormal high. The film is born out of opposition, that of cerebral and physical consciousness.
Meditative in tone, Advantageous provides a critical outlook on sexism and ageism, offering scientific possibilities of systemic gendered commodification.
See You Yesterday (Stefon Bristol, 2019)
See You Yesterday invokes the curious concept of time travel with a sharp critique of an injustice somewhat more tangible and persistent: racism. The sci-fi drama film is based on Stefon Bristol’s 2017 short film. It revolves around the tale of a science wunderkind who races against time to create a time machine to save her brother, who has been a victim of authoritative racial profiling by a police officer.
While she tries to change the past, she unknowingly unravels the laws of causality, falling prey to the clauses of temporal principles. The film explores the futuristic attempts to bring a historic change to a concept that’s contemporary and very much present. And with it, See You Yesterday represents the short-sightedness of erasing the past instead of attempting to change the system that influences the present and future.
They Cloned Tyrone (Juel Taylor, 2023)
In a world where individuality is a gift, They Cloned Tyrone makes you wonder whether it’s, after all, a curse. The Netflix film teases the age-old propagation of forced assimilation, plucked to imagine a future doomed by clones. They Cloned Tyrone is a stark critique of cultural appropriation, the cycle of racism, and the idea of surveillance and systemic control.
It confronts viewers with the uneasy truth of predetermination, the lack of agency, and the whitewashing of communities, calling for immediate and urgent resistance to avoid a future of man-made disaster.