6 Best Movies Set in Space Released Since 2020, Ranked

Published Oct 4, 2026, 2:11 PM EDT

Diego Pineda has been a devout storyteller his whole life. He has self-published a fantasy novel and a book of short stories, and is actively working on publishing his second novel.

A lifelong fan of watching movies and talking about them endlessly, he writes reviews and analyses on his Instagram page dedicated to cinema, and occasionally on his blog. His favorite filmmakers are Andrei Tarkovsky and Charlie Chaplin. He loves modern Mexican cinema and thinks it's tragically underappreciated.

Other interests of Diego's include reading, gaming, roller coasters, writing reviews on his Letterboxd account (username: DPP_reviews), and going down rabbit holes of whatever topic he's interested in at any given point.

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Ever since the start of the 2020s, the world has been treated to some exceptional movies belonging to one of the most exquisitely entertaining categories of science fiction out there: Space sci-fi. Whether we're talking about space operas like Project Hail Mary or space-faring superhero blockbusters like Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, several of the greatest science fiction movies of the last six years have happened to find their settings in outer space.

It's rather unsurprising, of course, considering that space has been the setting of many of history's greatest sci-fi movies. Different people may have different standards for what counts as a movie set in space, but as long as the film spends a substantial portion of its runtime between the stars, or as long as space travel plays a crucial role in its narrative, it counts for the purposes of this list. The best part of it all is that there are many ways for a film to take advantage of its space setting, whether that's emphasizing its vast and terrifying nature, exploring the wonders of its infinite size, or simply using it as a springboard to tell a particularly engaging story on a planet other than Earth.

6 'Space Sweepers' (2021)

Image via Netflix

Space Westerns are often some of the most irresistibly entertaining sci-fi movies that can possibly be set in space, and as far as this subgenre goes, the 2020s hasn't had much better to offer than Jo Sung-hee's South Korean gem Space Sweepers. It's one of those forgotten Netflix action movies that are perfect from start to finish, regarded as the first true major South Korean space sci-fi blockbuster. It's a space opera set in the year 2092, where Earth has become an uninhabitable wasteland. The dysfunctional, debt-ridden crew of a junk-collecting ship finds Dorothy, a young girl rumored to be a humanoid weapon of mass destruction. What ensues is a hich-octane space adventure unlike any other that the last six years have offered.

Space Sweepers isn't perfect. There are many a familiar sci-fi cliché, and the story is somewhat bogged down by some exposition dumps and logical leaps. For the most part, however, this is about as charming, fresh, action-packed, and entertaining as space sci-fi movies get. The world-building is delectably vibrant, the emotional core provided by the characters and their dynamics is awfully effective from start to finish, and Jo's direction sharply tackles timely issues like corporate greed, class divides, and environmental decay. There may not be very many narrative surprises here, but it's all so wonderfully produced that it's hard not to have a fantastic time with it all.

5 'Last and First Men' (2020)

Image via Shudder

Last and First Men is an odd example of a sci-fi film that's technically set in space, even if some may find its inclusion to be a bit of cheating. Based on the 1930 novel of the same name by English author Olaf Stapledon, it's the only feature film that legendary composer Jóhann Jóhannsson ever directed, released two years after his untimely death from a drug overdose. Accompanied by one of the most rousing scores Jóhannsson ever composed, Last and First Men's visuals consist entirely of shots of World War II monuments and memorials in former Yugoslavia, while the real story is a tale narrated by Tilda Swinton about the final generation of humanity facing total extinction in the far future.

A movie that consists of 70 minutes of a disembodied narrator telling an epic multi-million-year history is, needless to say, not for everyone; but those interested in such a concept will quickly find that Last and First Men is not only great, but one of the most perfect sci-fi movies of the 21st century. It's a beautifully surreal and experimental meditation on the passage of time and the fragility of human civilization, one where space is not necessarily seen as an exciting frontier of exploration, but rather as an eerily indifferent and ultimately fatal cosmos.

4 'Alien: Romulus' (2024)

Image via 20th Century Studios

Back in 1979, Ridley Scott completely revolutionized sci-fi horror with Alien, kicking off a franchise that, while undeniably uneven, has nevertheless produced some truly exceptional movies throughout the years. The most recent Alien outing is Alien: Romulus, where a group of young blue-collar space colonists scavenging an abandoned space station suddenly find themselves attacked by unwanted visitors. Impeccably directed by Fede Álvarez, it may not be the best Alien installment of the bunch, but it probably is the best of the 21st century so far.

All superlatives aside, one thing is certain: the Alien franchise has always excelled at making space seem like the coldest, most isolated, most terrifying place to be, and Alien: Romulus continues that tradition with the utmost glee. Returning the franchise to its tensely claustrophobic roots while still offering plenty of narrative and thematic sauce all of its own, it has some of the most stunning practical effects and one of the most gripping atmospheres that the survival horror genre has seen in many years. There's no shortage of sci-fi movies which understand that space can be an inherently scary place, and as far as the 2020s go, no film has conveyed that better than Romulus.

Collider Exclusive · Sci-Fi Survival Quiz Which Sci-Fi World Would You Survive? The Matrix · Mad Max · Blade Runner · Dune · Star Wars

Five universes. Five completely different ways the future went wrong — or sideways, or up in flames. Only one of them is the world your instincts were built for. Eight questions will figure out which dystopia, galaxy, or desert wasteland you'd actually make it out of alive.

💊The Matrix

🔥Mad Max

🌧️Blade Runner

🏜️Dune

🚀Star Wars

TEST YOUR SURVIVAL →

01

You sense something is deeply wrong with the world around you. What do you do? The first instinct is often the truest one.

APull on every thread until I understand the system — then figure out how to break it. BStop asking questions and start stockpiling — food, fuel, weapons. Questions don't keep you alive. CKeep my head down, observe carefully, and trust no one until I know who's pulling the strings. DStudy the patterns. Every system has a rhythm — learn it, and you learn how to survive it. EFind the people fighting back and join them. You can't fix a broken galaxy alone.

NEXT QUESTION →

02

In a world of scarcity, what resource do you guard most fiercely? What we protect reveals what we believe survival actually requires.

AKnowledge. If you understand the system, you don't need resources — you can generate them. BFuel. Everything else — movement, power, escape — runs on it. CTrust. In a world of fakes and informants, a truly reliable ally is rarer than any commodity. DWater. And after water, information — the two things empires are truly built on. EShips and credits. The galaxy is big — you survive it by being able to move through it freely.

NEXT QUESTION →

03

What kind of threat keeps you up at night? Fear is useful data — if you're honest about what you're actually afraid of.

AThat reality itself is a lie — that everything I experience has been constructed to keep me compliant. BA raid. No warning, no mercy — just the roar of engines and then nothing left. CBeing identified. Once someone with power decides you're a problem, you're already out of time. DBeing outmanoeuvred — losing a political game I didn't even know I was playing. EThe Empire tightening its grip until there's nowhere left to run.

NEXT QUESTION →

04

How do you deal with authority you don't trust? Every dystopia has a power structure. Your approach to it determines everything.

ASubvert it from the inside — learn its rules well enough to weaponise them against it. BIgnore it and stay out of its reach. The further from any power structure, the better. CAppear to comply while doing exactly what I need to do. Visibility is the enemy. DManoeuvre within it carefully. You can't beat a system you refuse to understand. EResist openly when I have to. Some things are worth the risk of being seen.

NEXT QUESTION →

05

Which environment could you actually endure long-term? Survival isn't just tactical — it's physical, psychological, and very much about where you are.

AUnderground bunkers and server rooms — cramped, artificial, but with access to everything that matters. BOpen wasteland — brutal sun, no shelter, constant movement. At least the threat is honest. CA dense, rain-soaked city where you can disappear into the crowd and nobody asks questions. DMerciless desert — extreme heat, no water, and something enormous living beneath the sand. EThe fringe — backwater planets and busy spaceports where the Empire's attention rarely reaches.

NEXT QUESTION →

06

Who do you want in your corner when things fall apart? The company you keep is the clearest signal of who you actually are.

AA tight crew of believers who've seen behind the curtain and have nothing left to lose. BOne or two people I'd trust with my life. Any more than that and someone talks. CNobody, ideally. Alliances are liabilities. I work alone unless I have no choice. DA community bound by shared hardship and mutual survival — people who need each other to last. EA ragtag team with wildly different skills and total commitment when it counts.

NEXT QUESTION →

07

Where do you draw the line — if you draw one at all? Every survivor eventually faces a moment that tests what they're actually made of.

AI won't harm the innocent — even the ones who'd report me without hesitation. BI do what I have to to protect the people I've chosen. Everything else is negotiable. CThe line shifts depending on who's asking and what's at stake. DI draw a long-term line — nothing that compromises my people's future, even if it'd help now. ESome lines, once crossed, can't be uncrossed. I know which ones they are.

NEXT QUESTION →

08

What would actually make survival worth it? Staying alive is one thing. Having a reason to is another.

AWaking others up — dismantling the illusion so no one else has to live inside it. BFinding somewhere — or someone — worth protecting. A reason to keep moving. CAnswers. Understanding what I am, what any of this means, before time runs out. DLegacy — shaping the future in a way that outlasts me by generations. EFreedom — for myself, for others, for every world still living under someone else's boot.

REVEAL MY WORLD →

Your Fate Has Been Calculated You'd Survive In…

Your answers point to the world your instincts were built for. This is the universe your temperament, your survival instincts, and your particular brand of stubbornness were made for.

The Matrix

You took the red pill a long time ago — probably before anyone offered it to you. You're a systems thinker who can't help but notice the seams in things.

• You're drawn to understanding how the system works before figuring out how to break it.
• You'd find the Resistance, or it would find you — your instinct for spotting constructed realities is the machines' worst nightmare.
• You function best when you have access to information and the freedom to act on it.
• The Matrix built an airtight prison. You'd be the one probing the walls for the door.

Mad Max

The wasteland doesn't reward the clever or the well-connected — it rewards those who are hard to kill and harder to break. That's you.

• You don't need comfort, community, or a cause larger than the next horizon.
• You need a vehicle, a clear threat, and enough fuel to outrun it — and you're good at all three.
• You are unsentimental enough to survive that world, and decent enough — just barely — to be something more than another raider.
• In the wasteland, that distinction is everything.

Blade Runner

You'd survive here because you know how to exist in moral grey areas without losing yourself completely.

• You read people accurately, keep your circle small, and ask the questions others prefer not to answer.
• In a city where humanity is a legal designation rather than a feeling, you hold onto something that keeps you functional.
• You're not a hero. But you're not lost, either.
• In Blade Runner's world, that distinction is everything.

Dune

Arrakis is the most hostile environment in the known universe — and you are precisely the kind of person it rewards.

• Patience, discipline, and political awareness are your core strengths — and on Arrakis, they're survival tools.
• You understand that the long game matters more than any single victory.
• Others come to Dune and are consumed by it. You'd learn its logic and earn its respect.
• In time, you wouldn't just survive Arrakis — you'd begin to reshape it.

Star Wars

The galaxy far, far away is vast, loud, and in a constant state of violent political upheaval — and you wouldn't have it any other way.

• You find meaning in being part of something larger than yourself — a cause, a crew, a rebellion.
• You'd gravitate toward the Rebellion, or the fringes, or whatever pocket of the galaxy still believes the Empire's grip can be broken.
• You fight — not because you have to, but because standing aside isn't something you're capable of.
• In Star Wars, that willingness is what makes all the difference.

↻ RETAKE THE QUIZ

3 'Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3' (2023)

Before the release of James Gunn's Guardians of the Galaxy in 2014, the eponymous team was hardly a D-lister superhero lineup in the Marvel universe. With the unprecedented success of Gunn's film, not only was it proven that the MCU was capable of taking virtually any character and making bona fide movie stars out of them; on top of that, one of the most iconic sets of characters in the entire MCU was also established. All of it culminated with Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, one of the most expensive MCU movies to date, where every single cent was entirely worth it.

It's many a fan's favorite MCU film from the last six years, and for good reason. Anchored by a deeply emotional and genuinely tragic story, it's a true character-driven finale that gives both the characters and the audience a wonderful sense of cathartic closure. Blending high stakes with profound character arcs, thrilling action, and top-tier craftsmanship, the film at times even feels more like a delectably unique space opera than a typical cookie-cutter franchise entry. Regardless of where the Guardians go next, one thing is certain, and that's that Guardians Vol. 3 was a perfect conclusion to what may very well be the franchise's best trilogy.

2 'Project Hail Mary' (2026)

Image via Amazon MGM

Andy Weir has thus far only published three full-length novels, yet he has already cemented himself as one of the contemporary kings of hard science fiction literature. His latest is Project Hail Mary, about an amnesiac man who wakes up aboard a spaceship on a desperate mission to save the universe, as his memory gradually returns to him. Directed by Phil Lord and Christopher Miller, the film adaptation of the same name is not only easily the greatest hard sci-fi film of the 2020s so far, but also easily one of the most unique space operas that the big screen has seen in decades.

Project Hail Mary was a sleeper hit at the box office and a critical darling through and through, and for good reason. It's one of those sci-fi movies featuring aliens that are total masterpieces, this one particularly standing out for having one of the most endearing character dynamics that any first-contact movie has had to offer since E.T. Add to that a phenomenal performance by Ryan Gosling at the top of his game, some of the most eye-popping visual effects of any major Hollywood blockbuster in recent memory, and Lord and Miller's crowd-pleasing yet undeniably bold direction, and it should be no surprise why Project Hail Mary is among the highest-rated films in history on both Letterboxd and IMDb.

1 'Dune: Part Two' (2024)

Image via Warner Bros. Pictures

Considering that Frank Herbert's Dune is not only one of the most universally beloved science fiction novels of all time, but perhaps even the single most important sci-fi book of the 20th century, it isn't hard to understand why many people used to think it was impossible to make a movie adaptation worthy of the source material's legacy. That was until Denis Villeneuve came along. As great as 2021's Dune was, it's Dune: Part Two that continues to be remembered as one of the best genre films of the 2020s so far, and will likely go down in history as one of the greatest sci-fi films of this era.

Of course, most of Dune: Part Two's narrative is actually set squarely within the planet of Arrakis, but space travel plays such a pivotal role in the story that it's quite reasonable to consider this a piece of space sci-fi. As it happens, it's also one of the best blockbusters of the 2020s so far, a thematically layered, emotionally riveting, and absolutely epic masterpiece with some of the greatest production values, character arcs, and direction that the sci-fi genre has seen in years. It will take something very special to top it.

Dune: Part Two

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