It’s appropriate to say that a large majority of the best Apple TV Plus shows are sci-fi heavy, therefore, it comes as no surprise why it’s one of the best streaming services for you sci-fi and thriller buffs out there. With the highly-anticipated Silo season two coming out this week, I’ve put together a list of five shows with over 83% of Rotten Tomatoes for you to watch after you’ve binged the new season.
Blending some older favorites and some newer additions, there’s a sci-fi show out there for everyone, and trust me when I say Apple TV Plus has it all, including classic dystopian-based dramas, alternate universe thrillers and black comedies with domestic robots. You don’t get more versatile than that.
Silo
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- RT score: 94%
- Age rating: TV-MA
- Episode length: ~49 minutes
- Creator: Graham Yost
Starring and executive produced by Rebecca Ferguson and co-starring Rashida Jones and David Oyelowo, Silo first arrived on Apple TV Plus in 2023 and is set to return for its highly-anticipated second season this week.
Yost’s sci-fi dystopia series is based on the Silo trilogy of novels by Hugh Howey and set in a toxic future world. In an underground silo consisting of 144 levels, a community of people exist under regulations put in place that people believe have been enforced to protect them from the dangers on the surface above the silo. Engineer Juliette (Ferguson) gets caught up in the silo’s secrets, uncovering truths of its past and present.
Dark Matter
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- RT score: 83%
- Age rating: TV-MA
- Episode length: ~46 minutes
- Creator: Blake Crouch
Based on Blake Crouch’s 2016 novel of the same name, Dark Matter blends sci-fi and thriller with the classic alternate universe premise. Chicago-based physicist Jason Dessen (Joel Edgerton) is thrust into an alternate version of his life and finds himself on a journey through the lives he could’ve lived. In an attempt to get back to his family and return to his real life, he must save his loved ones from their biggest threat: himself.
Dark Matter is one of Apple TV Plus’ latest additions, premiering in May this year. After a successful first season run, the show was picked up for a second season in August.
Sunny
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- RT score: 90%
- Age rating: TV-MA
- Episode length: ~29 minutes
- Creator: Katie Robbins
Rashida Jones stars in Robbins’ sci-fi series on Apple TV Plus, which fuses black comedy, mystery, and thriller. American woman Suzie (Jones) lives in the city of Kyoto, Japan, whose life is flipped on its head when she learns her husband and son have mysteriously vanished amid a plane crash.
Following the events of the crash, she’ sent a domestic robot named Sunny (Joanna Sotomura) by her husband’s tech company. What was initially meant for consolidation turns into something bigger when Sunny starts to help Suzie uncover the truth of what happened to her husband and son.
For All Mankind
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- RT score: 92%
- Age rating: TV-MA
- Length: ~42 minutes
- Creators: Ronald D. Moore, Matt Wolpert, & Ben Nedivi
Premiering on Apple TV Plus in 2019, For All Mankind has had more than a successful run on the platform reaching its fourth season in 2023 and securing a renewal for a fifth season in April this year.
Spinning the events of the moon landings, For All Mankind is set in an alternate version of 1969 where the Soviet Union has been the US in the race to the moon. In this ‘what could’ve happened’ storyline, the show dramatizes the possible outcomes if the space race had never finished, resulting in a decades-long race into space.
Foundation
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- RT score: 86%
- Age rating: TV-14
- Episode length: ~45 minutes
- Creator: David S. Goyer & Josh Friedman
Another sci-fi series on Apple TV Plus that takes inspiration from novels, Foundation’s story is loosely based on Isaac Asimov’s series of books. It follows an ensemble cast featuring Jared Harris, Lou Lobell, Leah Harvey, Terrence Mann, and Lee Pace set in a far-off galaxy under the rule of the Galactic Empire. When civilisation crumbles as the Empire starts to collapse, the people of various planets must band together to rebuild society and mend humanity.
