The Signal follows the story of Sven and his daughter Charlie as they try to uncover a conspiracy behind her mother’s death in a plane crash. They also attempt to decipher the cryptic message she left before boarding the plane. Along the way, they face threats from people who want to silence them and prevent the truth from coming out.
If you think “Dark” is the best German Netflix show, The Signal might make you reconsider. However, in the event you’re looking for similar shows to satisfy your craving, here are our top ten suggestions.
Dark (2017)
Dark is a mind-bending German sci-fi thriller that starts with kids disappearing from a small town called Winden. At the center of the story are four families as they stumble upon a time-travel conspiracy that has something to do with a wormhole that is sitting under a nuclear plant.
This wormhole links different times, from 1953 all the way to 2053, revealing the families’ twisted pasts and how they’re all connected. Things get even worse as the two groups start to fight over how to use time travel.
Constellation (2024)
In terms of themes and all, Constellation is a little bit too similar to the latest German four-episode series, The Signal. The POV character of the show is Joanna Ericsson, an astronaut who starts having hallucinations after a bizarre incident on the International Space Station (ISS).
We see Joanna struggling to survive in a snowy fjord in Sweden, where she’s dealing with terrifying visions. There are also many scenes that show her time aboard the ISS, where a collision with an unknown object leads to the death of a crew member and forces an evacuation.
The Event (2010)
The Event follows Sean Walker as he tries to find out why his girlfriend disappeared, and while Sean is at it, he stumbles upon a huge conspiracy. The conspiracy is that the U.S. government has been holding a group of extra-terrestrials captive since their ship crashed in Alaska decades ago.
Some of these aliens, known as ‘Sleepers,’ have been living among humans, blending in. When U.S. President Martinez learns about the aliens, he plans to tell the entire world about it, but his plans take a backseat thanks to by an assassination.
Another Life (2019)
Another Life is about astronaut Niko Breckinridge, who’s in charge of a mission on the spaceship Salvare, and their mission is to figure out where the mysterious alien artifact that landed on Earth came from.
Meanwhile, Niko’s husband, Erik Wallace, a big-shot scientist with the US Interstellar Command, is trying to talk to the aliens. As the crew zips through space faster than the speed of light, they run into all sorts of dangers while trying to make contact with these mysterious extra-terrestrials.
Dark Matter (2015)
In Dark Matter, we meet the crew of the spaceship Raza, who wake up from their stasis pods with no memories of who they are or where they came from. This is exactly what you will call a rough awakening!
They quickly realize they’re in the 27th century and now have to navigate the vastness of space while dealing with who knows what’s out there. The best thing about the show is the way they try to start piecing their past to make sense of the matter at hand.
Nightflyers (2018)
For those who have no idea, Nightflyers is a sci-fi horror drawing from George R. R. Martin’s novella and takes us to the year 2093, where The Nightflyer is a super high-tech ship on a mission to the edge of our solar system.
The ship carries a team of scientists eager to make first contact with alien life, but as they voyage through the cosmos, creepy and violent things start happening on the ship.
The leader of the ship is astrophysicist Karl d’Branin, who, along with his crew, faces a series of mysterious and deadly incidents that make them realize that the true danger is not outside space but inside.
Altered Carbon (2018)
Altered Carbon is a cyberpunk series that takes us 360 years into the future, where technology allows human consciousness to be transferred to different bodies, which we call “sleeves.”
In this successful series, death is just a temporary setback because humans have invented what they call cortical stacks that store your mind. Our main man, Takeshi Kovacs, is a former elite soldier turned investigator who’s brought back to life in a new sleeve to crack a rich guy’s murder case. The story takes place in Bay City, which used to be San Francisco some centuries ago.
Black Mirror (2011)
Black Mirror is one of the best series that you’ll ever watch. To explain it in the way of Forest Gump, the show is a box of chocolates, where each episode is a standalone story with its own characters and world.
The show shows us different near-future scenarios where our love affair with fancy technology ends up biting us in the rear. This includes everything from a Prime Minister dealing with a crisis to a society that lives and dies by its social media ratings. Not to mention, there is a place where you can replay your memories like a movie.
The OA (2016)
The OA follows Prairie Johnson, a woman who returns after being missing for seven years. What’s odd is that she was blind before going missing, but after she returns, she can now see and also has a new name called “the OA.”
Also, Prairie has these mysterious scars and is not telling the FBI or her friends and families about where she’s been all this time. The show has two seasons, but be warned, it leaves you hanging on a cliff as it got cancelled before it could finish its intended five-season plan.
Travelers (2016)
At the core of the story is a group of operatives who come from a future that’s seen better days. They send their consciousness back in time to people who are about to die in our present day. But why go through all the trouble? Simply put, they want to prevent society from going down the drain.
These travelers team up to complete missions that could save humanity, all while keeping their hosts’ lives intact as a cover. They also have strict rules to follow to make sure they don’t derail the future, but we all know that no matter how good your plan is, things don’t always go according to plan.
So there we have it, our 10 TV show alternatives to watch when you’re finished watching Netflix’s The Signal.
What do you think of our picks? Do you agree? Are there any notable omissions? Let us know in the comments below!