Ridley Scott's Prometheus-Like Miniseries Takes Less Than 3 Hours To Binge

Published Nov 14, 2026, 11:15 PM EST

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Ridley Scott's career as a director is defined by many iconic sci-fi movies. Among them, 1979's Alien remains a timeless classic, while even Blade Runner stands the test of time. Serving as a prequel to Alien, Prometheus debuted to positive reviews and even performed fairly well at the box office. However, unlike the first few movies of the Alien franchise, it struggled to have a wider appeal.

Drifting away from the traditional approach taken by most of its predecessors, it was packed with philosophical questions about humanity's origins and the existence of a higher power. These aspects of the film only gained more appreciation in hindsight, eventually prompting many to tout it as the best movie in the Alien franchise.

Prometheus seems to be aging incredibly well with time. While no other movie or show comes even remotely close to being its ideal replacement, one sci-fi series, The Andromeda Strain, dabbles with similar ideas. The show in question is based on Michael Crichton's book of the same name, and is not the first adaptation of the acclaimed sci-fi book.

The Andromeda Strain Is Just Under 3-Hours Of Cinematic Sci-Fi

Created by Robert Schenkkan, The Andromeda Strain is driven by a Prometheus-like mystery in its opening arc. Just like humans attempt to decode a mystery left by the Engineers, the central Wildfire team in The Andromeda Strain discover a Pathogen that contains a secret message. With what follows, the show unfolds a gripping story about the cost of preserving one's race.

Unlike many sci-fi shows, The Andromeda Strain avoids having any sub-plots and keeps its narrative taut and straightforward. In its brief 4-episode runtime, it almost feels like a breeze as it draws parallels to the Prometheus myth. Like the Ridley Scott movie, it shows how humanity attempts to weaponize the unknowable instead of using it as a tool to save themselves from imminent doom.

In just three hours, The Andromeda Strain features everything from a terrifyingly intelligent virus to a looping narrative that adopts time travel as a device. While the show is not as philosophically dense and existential as Prometheus, it proves to be a compelling watch. It wastes no time and promises to deliver a satisfying and quick conclusion.

How The Andromeda Strain's Miniseries Compares To Other Versions

There are two major adaptations of Michael Crichton's The Andromeda Strain. Before the 2008 TV series, the book was adapted for the big screen by director Robert Wise in 1971. Similar to the original novel, the feature film adaptation was more clinical and procedural with its approach. It did not expand the original story's vision to cosmic scales, making it less like Ridley Scott's Prometheus.

The series even confines its setting to a lab and closes with a fairly positive conclusion. Despite seemingly taking a safer adaptation approach, however, the movie remains more critically acclaimed than the show. It boasts a decent Rotten Tomatoes score of 67% while the series stands at 30%. The show was clearly overshadowed by the movie.

Still, after all these years, it is hard not to appreciate the series' ambition. Like Ridley Scott's Prometheus, it attempted to bring something new to the table by spinning a new existential yarn into a familiar sci-fi story.

The Andromeda Strain

After a military satellite crashes in a Utah town, nearly every resident dies from a mysterious extraterrestrial microorganism. A team of elite scientists enters a secret underground laboratory to identify the pathogen and stop its rapid mutation, while a journalist uncovers a government conspiracy surrounding the outbreak.