With the Marvel Cinematic Universe and the whole Star Wars saga among its roster, Disney+’s sci-fi offering is truly aiming for the stars.
With a host of out-of-this-world movies to choose from, here are 10 of the best titles to watch on the streaming platform.
Armageddon (1998)
Sure, it’s nonsense – who needs trained astronauts when you have a bunch of guys who can dig a big hole really well? – but Michael Bay’s asteroid-bound blockbuster sure is fun.
Bruce Willis and Ben Affleck are among the all-star cast attempting to land on a space rock the size of Texas and knock it off its Earth-bound course. Deliriously silly stuff ensues.
The Black Hole (1979)
Gary Nelson’s 1979 space-set disaster movie is one of Disney’s less celebrated sci-fi capers. But that’s a shame. Battered bots called BOB, attempted lobotomies, and interstellar ship-gobbling singularities are all to be enjoyed in this peculiar – and very, very seventies – 98 minutes of entertainment.
Avatar: The Way of Water (2022)
The long-awaited sequel to James Cameron’s record-breaking original has just dropped on the platform. Sam Worthington and Sigourney Weaver are among the cast returning to the neon-coloured moon of Pandora, where they once again face off against the invading Earthlings.
Star Wars: Rogue One (2016)
With the entire Skywalker saga and its various spin-off movies – including the 1980s Ewok adventures – on the platform, Star Wars fans are spoiled for choice.
But let’s pick out the 2016 standalone resistance flick Rogue One for special praise. The desperate exploits of Felicity Jones’s Jyn Erso rag-tag rebels upped the grittiness of the Star Wars universe and led the way to the excellent Andor series.
The Martian (2015)
Matt Damon living in a big tent and farming potatoes might not be an appealing prospect for anybody looking for some movie magic, but stick him alone on Mars and the prospect becomes far more tantalising.
The stranded star plays Mark Watney who faces a battle for survival on the red planet after the rest of his crew leaves him for dead following a huge dust storm.
Starship Troopers (1997)
Paul Verhoeven’s magnificent war satire – playing out as a despotic interstellar superstate’s piece of propaganda – is much more than the dumb creature feature critics saw it as on its first release. Neil Patrick Harris and Denise Richards join the bug-killing cast.
Prey (2022)
The Predator prequel takes everyone’s favourite trophy-hunting alien back to the Native American 18th-century plains. There, the Comanche tribe are battling with the colonial French, before captive Naru (Amber Midthunder) escapes and faces off against the alien aggressor with just limited weaponry and her wits to keep her alive.
The lore-building, back-to-basics battles and intriguing setting make this the best follow-up to Arnold Schwarzenegger’s 1987 blockbuster.
Melancholia (2011)
It’s a bold move to start your movie with the end of the world, particularly if it spirals down into darkness from there. However, while spectacularly depressing, Lars Von Trier’s apocalyptic movie is also beautiful.
Kirsten Dunst’s Justine breaks down on her wedding day after spotting a new star in the sky and self-destructs as the people in her life look on. From there, she stays with sister Claire (Charlotte Gainsbourg), and we watch as the feuding siblings face the inevitable in wildly contrasting manners.
The Fly (1986)
As usual for Cronenberg, body horror takes centre stage in his remake of the fifties B-movie terror flick, which focuses on scientist Seth Brundle’s (Jeff Goldblum) transmogrification from human to bug after a botched experiment. This is both a testament to 1980s movie makeup and special effects, and vomit-inducing horror.
Be afraid. Be very afraid.
Aliens (1986)
Ridley Scott’s ground-breaking original might also be on Disney+, but James Cameron brings in the gung-ho adventure with this entry in the series.
There’s no safety in numbers for ultimate xenomorph survivor Ripley (Sigourney Weaver) and her interstellar marines, as they investigate a colonised moon after a mysterious loss of signal. As usual with Cameron’s movies, subtlety is not much of a feature, as the guns blaze.
There we have it, our list of 10 best sci-fi movies on Disney+. Do you agree with our picks? Or have we missed a crucial choice off the list? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below.