Sci-fi fans know 2022 was a fantastic year for the genre. While sci-fi is usually the bastion of massive blockbusters, there are plenty of smaller projects that also find a way to use the genre in creative ways in order to create fantastical movie worlds and characters -- some from another planet, some are from amazing versions of the one we know.
While science fiction and fantasy have a tendency to blur lines we're doing our best to limit this list to those movies that are clearly science fiction rather than fantasy. They could be building their worlds in outer space, in the future, or using otherwise advanced technology. Here are the ten best sci-fi movies of 2022.
10. The Adam Project
Any science fiction fan is going to make time for a good time travel story and one notable one of those was Netflix’s The Adam Project with Ryan Reynolds. One of the first big sci-fi releases of the year sees The Deadpool star playing a man who travels back in time to try and rescue his wife and inadvertently ends up enlisting his younger self. The Adam Project doesn’t really break any new ground in time travel stories but it’s got a solid cast and a lot of heart and that adds up to a fun movie.
Where To Stream: Netflix
9. Lightyear
From the moment Lightyear was announced nobody had much of an idea what to expect. A movie that was not tied into the Toy Story franchise but was instead supposed to be the movie that inspired the Buzz Lightyear toy, was difficult for some to wrap their head around. Taken on its own, however, Lightyear was a fantastic little sci-fi adventure. The most action-heavy movie produced by Pixar to date, it was legitimately thrilling in parts, funny in others, and had a reasonably surprising twist. Lightyear struggled to find an audience in theaters, but hopefully over time more people will discover it on Disney+ because it’s worth a look.
Where To Stream: Disney+
8. Strange World
The last time Walt Disney Animation Studios produced a science fiction adventure story that was released during the Thanksgiving weekend it was Treasure Planet and the box office was not kind. Strange World is seeing a somewhat similar response, which is too bad, because it’s actually another pretty good little movie. Disney’s riff on Journey to the Center of the Earth tackles the concept in a fresh way with interesting characters and all the emotion we’ve come to expect from Disney.
Where To Stream: Disney+
7. Dual
Karen Gillan stars as a woman dying of a fatal illness, and in order to ease the strain on friends and family she has herself cloned. Unfortunately, when she miraculously recovers, there’s only one way to deal with the fact there are two of the same person walking around: A duel to the death. Gillan is perfect twice over in her roles in this dark comedy from Riley Stearns, the writer and director of The Art of Self Defense.
Where To Stream: Hulu
6. Crimes Of The Future
Crimes of the Future may not be the best Cronenberg film, but it is almost certainly the most Cronenberg film. Viggo Mortensen leads as a man who has elevated human mutation to the level of performance art in a brutal future hellscape where human evolution has advanced us to amazing and terrible places. This will be a difficult film for many to get through, those who are not fans of body horror need not apply, but for the right audience it will do what the best science fiction does, use it as a look at humanity’s future to ask questions about what it means to be human at all.
Where To Stream: Hulu
5. Prey
While the original Predator is an all-time action movie classic, filmmakers have tried and failed to live up to it for more than three decades. Other Predator movie has been varying degrees of bad. Enter Prey. It strips the franchise down to the core elements that make it work, an unstoppable alien force, and its prey, who will not go down without a fight. Maybe it’s not the best movie in the Predator franchise, but it’s the first truly great Predator movie in a very long time.
Where To Stream: Hulu
4. Avatar: The Way Of Water
It’s been more than a decade since James Cameron began the story of Avatar, and yet, somehow, he may have actually made Avatar: The Way of Water worth the wait. The film is an absolute masterpiece of technical filmmaking, creating some of the most mind-blowing visuals we’ve seen on a movie screen, and the absolute best use of HFR ever. Whether or not the sequel is the phenomenon the first film was is irrelevant to the fact that the sequel is something worth experiencing.
Where To Stream: Disney+ (ETA Mid 2023)
3. Beyond The Infinite Two Minutes
Technically released in 2020, but not available here until this year, Beyond The Infinite Two Minutes is both hilarious and technically impressive. A cafe owner in Japan discovers his computer monitor and his cafe TV are linked, but on a two-minute delay, allowing him to communicate with himself two minutes in the future. Shot on an iPhone, and, via the use of hidden cuts, filmed as if the entire movie is done in a single take, it’s an incredibly entertaining and creative piece of filmmaking.
Where To Stream: Tubi
2. Nope
Jordan Peele has provided two of the greatest horror movies of the past few years with Get Out and Us, and he does it again with his third feature Nope. However, Nope is also a science fiction movie, which means I get to gush about it on a list of great science fiction movies, as well. Nope is an incredibly engaging and complex film that, like all great science fiction, uses the genre as a way to look at our less fictional real world. This is what all of Peele’s movies have done, but this one is perhaps the best yet.
Where To Stream: Peacock
1. Everything Everywhere All At Once
Sometimes it can be difficult to find the line that divides science fiction from other forms of genre fiction, but while one major movie release about the multiverse this year uses fantasy magic to cross from one world to another, Everything Everywhere All At Once does it with fanciful science and technology and therefore it belongs on this list. It’s an incredible film full of wild set pieces, incredible action, laugh out loud humor, and an incredible lead performance by Michelle Yeoh. If there was one “not to miss” movie this year of any genre, this was it.
Where To Stream: Showtime
2023 promises to be a strong year for science fiction. Both Denis Villeneuve’s Dune and James Gunn’s Guardians of the Galaxy will come to their conclusions. We’ll also see Zack Snyder’s Rebel Moon. How they will compare to this year’s best sci-fi, and what they will add to the genre? Well, that’s in the future.
