The 10 best sci-fi and fantasy TV shows you’re not watching
It’s a great time to be a sci-fi and/ or fantasy fan.
The once overlooked genre is booming on TV, from Game of Thrones to adaptations of acclaimed novels including Altered Carbon and Outlander’s timetraveling love story.
Besides those big-name series, plenty of superb under-the-radar sci-fi and fantasy shows are out there for every kind of fan. Looking for a strong woman protagonist spouting witty oneliners? We’re here for you. Want postapocalyptic epics? We’ve got at least three. Like robots or mermaids? Both are represented.
We rounded up 10 of our favourite sci-fi and fantasy shows that you might not have discovered, but are definitely worth your time. (We’ve left out zombie and superhero shows, because they’re genres all their own.)
If you miss Lost: Colony
Your (probably) favourite Lost star Josh Holloway and Walking Dead alum Sarah Wayne Callies star in this alien-invasion USA drama that just started its third season. The series is set in a dystopian future where the aliens have already won, and humans are living under military rule by human collaborators who serve the alien “hosts.”
Stream Seasons 1 and 2 on Netflix. Season 3 airs Wednesdays at 10 p.m. on USA.
If you love J.K. Simmons: Counterpart
This drama never rushes or drags. It’s more of a spy thriller that is lightly sci-fi, in part because Simmons sells its paralleluniverse storyline so well, doing double duty as men from two different worlds.
In this one, he plays Howard Silk, a low-level spy at a United Nations agency in Berlin who discovers a doorway to another dimension, where the only person he can trust is his look-alike counterpart.
Stream it on CraveTV.
If you like something, well, dark: Dark (Netflix)
Often garnering comparisons to “Stranger Things,” this drama starts off as a straightforward mystery about two young children who disappear from a small German town. As the 10-episode season unfolds, the mystery gets tangled up with the supernatural and the secrets of four families. Stream it on Netflix.
If you love martial arts fight sequences: Into the Badlands
A companion to AMC’s “The Walking Dead” and “Fear the Walking Dead” on Sunday nights, this mystic, postapocalyptic tale is an incredibly underrated pulpy good time. Set in a dystopian U.S. ruled by warring barons, it’s just as violent as the Dead series, with more stunning action scenes and beautiful sets and costumes.
Stream Seasons 1 and 2 on Netflix. Season 3 airs Sundays 10 p.m. on AMC.
If you miss Firefly: Killjoys Love an irreverent team of attractive space heroes thrown together on a ship with romantic drama, and also gunfights? Then “Killjoys” might be for you. The series follows a trio of bounty hunters (known as “killjoys”) in a system of four planets called “The Quad.” And while it delivers on the melodrama, action and (eventually) magic space goo, it’s also a keen commentary on class, race and climate change. Stream it on Space.
If you want something genuinely wild: The Magicians
Syfy’s fantasy drama, based on the series of novels by Lev Grossman, is probably the weirdest show on TV right now. It’s the love child of Harry Potter, “The Chronicles of Narnia” and Tumblr, with the zippy dialogue and pop-culture references of “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” and “Veronica Mars.” It follows a group of magical grad students who discover that the Narnia-like fairy land they read about in a popular children’s book is real, and it’s causing havoc on Earth. Things get even zanier from there, and “The Magicians” has batty creatures, beautiful new worlds, love triangles and steamy love scenes galore.
Stream Seasons 1 and 2 on Netflix, Season 3 on Showcase.
If you like Black Mirror and Blade Runner: Phillip K. Dick’s Electric Dreams
This anthology series based on short stories by Blade Runner author Phillip K. Dick is Amazon’s answer to the Black Mirror craze. But while Mirror is unified by themes of technology’s dangers, “Electric Dreams” is about totalitarianism and artificial intelligence. And while Mirror is mostly the work of writer Charlie Brooker, each Dreams episode is helmed by different writers and directors, giving them a unique look. The fantastic cast includes Janelle Monae, Terrence Howard and Steve Buscemi.
Stream it on Amazon.
If you love mythology and big feelings: Sense8 (Netflix)
The Wachowski siblings (directors of the Matrix trilogy) have crafted something vast, complex and intimate with this twisty sci-fi series about a group of eight strangers across the globe who share a psychic connection. The result is diverse, heartbreaking and moving, in addition to having a mythology so complex it can leave your head spinning. But even if you don’t get all the details, the surface emotions are so well played by the cast that everything works.
Stream it on Netflix. A finale movie will première June 8.
If you’re into the mermaid trend: Siren
This isn’t your average mermaid tale. Yes, Siren has many of the hallmarks of a Freeform series — melodrama, attractive young stars, a trendy hook — but it’s darker, bloodier and altogether more surprising. The series trades typical teen romance for real horror as it follows a murderous, ravenous mermaid who makes it onto land, to the dismay of humans.
Stream on Hulu. Season 1 airs Thursdays at 8 p.m. on ABC Spark.
If you want a female hero: Wynonna Earp (Syfy)
Syfy has a Firefly descendant in Killjoys, and the network captures the DNA of another great Joss Whedon series with Wynonna, which has strong Buffy echoes in its focus on a chosen one destined to save the world who quips at her enemies. Wynonna, played with acidic verve by Melanie Scrofano, is more of an antihero than Buffy, balancing her calling with bad decision-making.
The series also boasts a cheery cast of supernatural sidekicks, and the relationship between Waverly Earp (Dominique Provost-Chalkley) and Nicole Haught (Katherine Barrell) has a boisterous fandom all its own. (Google “WayHaught” if you dare).
Stream Season 1 on Netflix, Season 2 on Space.