32 sci-fi movies that deserve a sequel
Apr. 26, 2024From space travel to time travel, these are the sci-fi movies begging to tell more stories
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Whether they’re based on comics or cartoons, or completely original ideas from writers and directors, sci-fi tentpoles tend to be the riskiest investments in the modern movie business. While hits like Star Wars, Avatar, and Avengers: Endgame are seismic hits that make billions of dollars around the world, some sci-fi movies have a harder time making any noise before it’s too late.
To mark the genre’s continued relevance and to bring attention to some overlooked gems, here are 32 sci-fi cult classic movies that actually deserve a sequel.
32. Titan A.E. (2000)
In what is currently the last theatrical feature from legendary animator Don Bluth, the remnants of mankind live among hostile alien species all throughout the galaxy. A young man, voiced by Matt Damon, discovers he holds the key to humanity’s new home. Released during a transitional period when Hollywood animated movies were still mostly drawn by hand, Titan A.E. memorably combined Bluth’s beloved style with sophisticated CGI. Decades later, Titan A.E. remains attractive not only for its unusual artistic style, but because of its original story that felt so much bigger than one movie ought to contain.
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Leigh Whannell’s sci-fi thriller Upgrade is basically, “What if Venom was a thousand percent darker and more violent?” Logan Marshall-Green stars as a paralyzed widower who is implanted with a cutting-edge computer chip. The chip not only allows him to walk again, but infects him with a super intelligent A.I. alter ego with its own motivations. Viciously violent and tonally bleak, Upgrade isn’t necessarily franchise friendly. But it’s just too good to not want more of Leigh Whannell and Logan Marshall-Green together raising more hell.
Emerging duringDisney’s flop era, The Black Hole is an original science fiction movie about space explorers who find a lost spaceship floating dangerously close to a black hole. At the time the most expensive live-action movie from Disney and the first to be rated PG, The Black Hole did not win favorable reviews - the late Roger Ebert panned it as “[taking] us all the way to the rim of space only to bog us down in a talky melodrama” - but remains infamous for showing Disney’s willingness to experiment during a prolonged drought. The Black Hole may not be begging for a spot in the Disney parks, but that doesn’t mean it shouldn’t try again.
After the dust settled on the Star Wars prequels, Hayden Christensen appeared in Jumper, based on the 1992 novel and directed by Doug Liman. An original superhero movie concept that hit before the critical mass popularity of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Jumper leaps free from restrictive IP parameters and burdensome expectations for shared universe worldbuilding. Still, a sequel could do wonders to make Jumper into something more than a forgotten, one-off production. Even after all these years, Jumper feels like it’s still got places to go.
At first glance, it’s a little hard to believe that a movie about robotic boxers would have a soul. But through some genuinely impressive VFX craftsmanship, the star power of Hugh Jackman, and strong direction from Shawn Levy - since having gone on to direct Free Guy, The Adam Project, and Deadpool & Wolverine - Real Steel packs a wallop as an authentic sports drama about fighting against one’s own limits. Talks of a sequel and even a Disney+ series version have been discussed, but for now, Real Steel remains down for the count.
In a time before Marvel amassed powerful influence over the movie industry, there occasionally came more off-beat superheroes who strayed away from paved roads. In 2008, Will Smith used his own proven star power for Hancock, in which Smith plays a crude, alcoholic superhero whose discovery of another like him complicates everything. While the movie ends up too overcooked plot-wise, nothing is better than Smith drunkenly flying around L.A. and making a mess of rush hour traffic. If the superhero genre is all about sequels, there’s no superhero more deserving of another chance at redemption than Hancock.
Based on Joseph Kosinski’s own unpublished graphic novel, Oblivion takes place in a futuristic Earth devastated by intergalactic war. A maintenance technician, played by Tom Cruise, is on the verge of finishing a job when he encounters a mysterious woman (Olga Kurylenko) seemingly from his own dreams that leads him to discover the truth about what happened on Earth. While Oblivion is appealing as a stylish standalone movie that admirably told a complete story, it still left enough threads loose for a continuation. And whodoesn’twant to see more of Tom Cruise in space?
One of the most inventive and playful sci-fi movies of the 1980s, Innerspace from Joe Dante is basically Fantastic Voyage reimagined as a contemporary romantic comedy. Dennis Quaid plays a handsome but down-on-his-luck Navy aviator who submits to a top secret experiment that shrinks subjects to microscopic size. Somehow, the experiment places the pilot in neurotic grocery clerk Jack (Martin Short), kicking off a kooky buddy comedy where Quaid basically tells Martin Short how to man up. While too much time has passed to really follow any of its characters, it’s hard not to vibe with a modern retelling of the same premise.
By Grabthar’s Hammer… there shall be a sequel! In this laugh riot comedy, former sci-fi TV stars are recruited by aliens to save their species. Predictive of the rise of fandom culture but never belittling it, Galaxy Quest could easily make for a great franchise of its own in the modern era. (Although it would be devastating to reunite with these characters without the late, great Alan Rickman.) There has been some traction regarding a sequel, including rumors of a series for the Paramount+ streaming service. But that a sequel didn’t happen immediately after the original movie’s release speaks to how hard it is for anything in Hollywood to blast off.
What if Superman were evil?That’s hardly a new idea, but the original superhero horror Brightburn dared to explore that idea, and it did so with flying crimson colors. Produced byJames Gunnand helmed by David Yarovesky, Brightburn basically tells an off-brand version of Superman’s origin story - alien child adopted by a kind Kansas couple - but instead of the child growing up into a Man of Tomorrow, he grows into a nightmare incarnate. Elizabeth Banks and David Denman co-star in his overlooked horror movie that shows just how much we as humans are at the mercy of a cruel, indescribable universe.
A passion project of writer/director Luc Besson, who funded a large portion of its extravagant $223 million production budget himself, Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets adapts the French comicsValérian and Laureline(a childhood favorite of Besson’s). Both the movie and its original source comics tell of two futuristic space explorers who encounter various galactic challenges with equal parts humor and heroism. The film starred Dane DeHaan and Cara Delevigne, and while they lacked chemistry as actors, the rest of the movie made up for it with impeccable and eye-popping sci-fi magnificence. While Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets was just too expensive for any reasonable box office gross to even out, there has still been enough fans of the movie to generate interest in a sequel.
A throwback to sci-fi pulp with innovative VFX filmmaking, Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow is a cult classic still loved for its arresting art deco visual design and unfulfilled potential as a franchise starter. Set in an alternate 1930s, a reporter (Gwyneth Paltrow) hires an old flame, the dashing “Sky Captain” (Jude Law) to investigate the whereabouts of kidnapped scientists. Clearly primed for more stories to tell, it’s bewildering that Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow failed to fly at the box office. The movie remains director Kerry Conran’s one and only theatrical film to date.
After The Matrix blew up in 1999, sci-fi enthusiasts were quick to point out the thematically similar and little-seen movie Dark City, released a year prior in 1998. Directed by The Crow’s Alex Proyas, Dark City follows an amnesiac (Rufus Sewell) who is suspected of murder and works to clear his name and find out his real identity. Characterized by startling and striking visuals and an abundantly bleak atmosphere, Dark City earned positive reviews but fared poorly commercially. Years after its release, Dark City enjoys cult status, though a sequel, great as it might be, still feels way out of reach.
Eric Francisco is a freelance entertainment journalist and graduate of Rutgers University. If a movie or TV show has superheroes, spaceships, kung fu, or John Cena, he’s your guy to make sense of it. A former senior writer at Inverse, his byline has also appeared at Vulture, The Daily Beast, Observer, and The Mary Sue. You can find him screaming at Devils hockey games or dodging enemy fire in Call of Duty: Warzone.
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