Just because a movie made a lot of money doesn't mean it's automatically good — and vice versa. Whether they involve alien slug monsters or a mission to blow up the sun, these solid sci-fi flicks didn't deserve to flop.
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00:00 Just because a movie made a lot of money doesn't mean it's automatically good, and vice versa.
00:06 Whether they involve alien slug monsters or a mission to blow up the sun, these solid
00:10 sci-fi flicks didn't deserve to flop.
00:13 We should be on the fourth or fifth Dread film by now.
00:16 In fact, we should have a whole Dread universe complete with spin-offs, video games, and
00:20 theme park rides, but we don't.
00:22 Instead, we have to make do with two standalone adaptations, 2012's Dread and 1995's Judge
00:28 Dread.
00:29 Even though the newer version starring Carl Urban brought in less money, it's more intense,
00:33 more stylized, and more memorable than its predecessor with Sylvester Stallone.
00:38 In the massive urban sprawl known as Mega City 1, it's the job of the judges to maintain
00:42 law and order.
00:44 The streets have been flooded with an addictive drug called "slo-mo," and cartel kingpin
00:48 Mama won't rest until she's taken over the entire community of peach trees for good.
00:53 It's up to Dread and new recruit Cassandra to stop Mama once and for all by acting as
00:57 judge, jury, and executioner.
01:05 Pete Travis' film grossed just $41 million on its $45 million budget, but it has a cult
01:10 following to this day.
01:12 If you can't get enough of Carl Urban as Billy Butcher in The Boys, you'll love seeing him
01:16 go to town in Dread.
01:18 There was no shortage of praise for Children of Men upon its release in 2006, and yet it
01:22 grossed just $70 million against its $76 million budget.
01:27 It may not have had the best marketing campaign, but Alfonso Cuaron's masterpiece is just as
01:31 impressive all these years later.
01:34 Children of Men introduces us to the London of 2027, which has become a grungy police
01:38 state after an 18-year global fertility crisis.
01:42 Pollution hangs in the air, and armored police patrol the streets as an air of hopelessness
01:45 envelops the entirely adult population.
01:48 After nearly being caught in the blast of a terrorist attack, Theo Farron finds himself
01:52 swept up in an organized effort to protect a refugee woman who may just be the savior
01:56 of the human race.
01:58 Clive Owen, Julianne Moore, Chiwetel Ejiofor, and Michael Caine are all at the top of their
02:02 game in this bleak but thoughtful thriller.
02:05 With impeccable cinematography and brutal action, Children of Men is quite simply a
02:09 must-see movie.
02:11 If you could genetically engineer your child to have entirely perfect traits, would you
02:15 do it?
02:16 In the world of Gattaca, the answer is yes, that is, if you want them to be able to have
02:20 a professional career.
02:22 Andrew Nichols' 1997 dystopian film asks some difficult questions about technology
02:26 and fate.
02:27 Ethan Hawke plays Vincent, a man born outside of the eugenics program who has dreams of
02:32 a life among the stars.
02:34 Unfortunately, his "invalid" genes make him ineligible for space travel, so he enlists
02:38 the help of a paralyzed former athlete as he lies his way into the ideal job.
02:43 It can't be that easy, though, as the murder of an administrator at the Gattaca Aerospace
02:47 Corporation leads investigators on a search for the imposter.
02:50 By the end of its theatrical run, Nichols' $36 million film had grossed just $12 million
02:56 at the U.S. box office.
02:57 Still, it's become warmly regarded as a highlight of 90s sci-fi and a favorite of high school
03:02 biology teachers everywhere.
03:05 In 1997, long before he became part of the Marvel machine, director James Gunn worked
03:09 for another American media empire, Troma Entertainment, the company known for low-budget B-movie hits.
03:15 Gunn got his first writing credit on Tromeo and Juliet, and it was clearly the work of
03:19 a young man who had grown up on Night of the Living Dead and Friday the 13th.
03:23 Nine years later, Gunn channeled all of his genre education into Slither, his first movie
03:27 in the director's chair.
03:29 When a meteorite lands in rural Wheelsy, South Carolina, it unleashes a parasite that infects
03:34 local resident Grant Grant.
03:36 After the bug-like entity assumes control of his mind, it kicks off a chain of events
03:40 that results in thousands of alien slugs descending on the town.
03:44 It's up to police chief Bill Pardee and the citizens of Wheelsy to stop them, along with
03:48 the hideous monster that Grant has become.
03:54 Slither is a gory good time, but it only grossed $12 million against its $15 million budget.
04:00 If you prefer the toxic Avenger to the actual Avengers, this is the movie for you.
04:06 David Cronenberg is the undisputed king of unsettling body horror, and his son Brandon
04:10 has eagerly followed in his footsteps.
04:12 The younger Cronenberg made his skill behind the camera abundantly clear with his second
04:16 feature film, The Mind-Bending Possessor.
04:19 Tasia Voss is a skilled assassin who has her consciousness uploaded into the bodies of
04:23 strangers when she carries out her hits.
04:25 After her mission to take out a rich CEO goes sideways, she finds herself in a difficult
04:29 position as her host begins to fight back.
04:32 Sadly, Possessor hit theaters in the fall of 2020 as COVID lockdowns continued to restrict
04:37 the film industry around the world.
04:39 As a result, it brought in just $911,180 at the box office, a paltry sum for such an ambitious
04:46 project.
04:47 The Cronenbergs are no strangers to financial failures.
04:51 David's classic "videodrome" didn't even make half its budget back after all, but it's still
04:55 a shame that so many people missed out on seeing this trippy thriller on the big screen.
04:59 Possessor shouldn't be missed, and be sure to check out the uncut version if you want
05:03 a particularly intense experience.
05:06 Michael Shannon and Jeff Nichols may not be the most famous actor-director duo, but their
05:10 collaborations have made for some truly captivating cinema.
05:13 Sadly, none of them have made much of a splash at the box office.
05:17 After Shotgun Stories and Take Shelter, the pair teamed up a third time for the supernatural
05:21 drama Midnight Special.
05:23 Alton is a young boy with extraordinary powers who grew up belonging to a religious cult
05:28 known as the Ranch.
05:30 When he and his father Roy escape along with a trusted friend, they find themselves targeted
05:34 by both the Ranch and the U.S. government, leading them on a wild goose chase from Texas
05:38 to Florida.
05:39 Their journey will put them in mortal danger, and it will also bring them closer together
05:43 than ever before.
05:44 Midnight Special was praised by the majority of critics, but that didn't stop it from earning
05:48 just $7.6 million against an $18 million budget.
05:52 Regardless, it's a memorable watch for fans of Michael Shannon, Jeff Nichols, and sci-fi
05:57 in general.
05:59 Just like The Last Voyage of the Demeter could be easily described as "Dracula on a boat,"
06:03 Peter Nassar Hardiman's sea fever is essentially "the thing on a boat."
06:07 If you're expecting torrents of gore, though, temper your expectations.
06:11 This is an understated horror piece that favors measured suspense, for better or worse.
06:15 Siobhan is a PhD student studying with a trawler crew off the Irish coast.
06:20 When their boat collides with an unidentified mass, it covers part of the hull in a strange
06:24 slime that proves to be hazardous to humans.
06:27 It's not long until the crew loses control of the situation, succumbing to both the slime's
06:31 mysterious danger and the ocean's maddening isolation.
06:38 Since Sea Fever was released in April of 2020, it never had much of a chance to break out
06:42 at the box office, and it earned just $254,911 in theaters.
06:48 Most people who watched Sea Fever did so in the safety of their own homes, and if you
06:52 haven't yet, you should do exactly that.
06:55 Despite being primarily known for grounded dramas like Beau Travail and White Material,
07:00 French director Claire Denis took her arthouse sensibilities to outer space with her 2018
07:05 film High Life.
07:06 Robert Pattinson plays Monty, a death row inmate who's been sent to a black hole to
07:10 extract energy and serve his sentence.
07:13 He and his fellow inmate crew members are also the lab rats for the experiments of Dr.
07:17 Dibbs, a researcher with a dark past and some bizarre sexual fixations.
07:22 After a child is born on the ship, it changes the path of Monty's life forever.
07:27 Pattinson is joined by all-star actors Mia Goth, Andre Benjamin, and Juliette Binoche,
07:31 but that wasn't enough to keep High Life from grossing just $2.8 million.
07:36 Despite playing fast and loose with the actual physics of living on the edge of a black hole,
07:40 Denis' first attempt at science fiction is truly captivating, and hopefully it won't
07:44 be her last.
07:46 One year before The Matrix hit theaters and changed sci-fi forever, director Alex Proyas
07:50 released his own film about a lifelike world that is not exactly as it seems.
07:55 While Dark City leans more into the realm of neo-noir than pure action, that doesn't
07:59 make it any less exciting.
08:01 John Murdoch wakes up in a hotel bathtub with amnesia, but he doesn't have time to gain
08:05 his bearings.
08:06 He's told by a mysterious doctor that a group of men is coming after him, and they're
08:10 going to accuse him of murder.
08:12 As John evades the strange forces that govern life in the Dark City, he tries to learn exactly
08:16 who he is, what's going on, and how to save the world.
08:20 Dark City was soon overshadowed by Neo and his friends, but it still managed to make
08:24 back its $27 million dollar budget, with just $200,000 to spare.
08:30 If there's one thing we can count on every day, it's the sun rising in the morning…
08:34 right?
08:35 Well, not in Danny Boyle's Sunshine, a sci-fi thriller in which the stakes could not possibly
08:39 be higher.
08:40 It's the year 2057 and the sun is going dark.
08:43 A group of astronauts aboard the Icarus II are on a mission to detonate a special bomb
08:48 designed to reignite our star and bring light back to the solar system.
08:51 Naturally, it's a perilous mission with billions of lives hanging in the balance,
08:56 and even if they succeed, not everyone is going to make it back alive.
09:00 Despite the existentially terrifying subject matter, the imagery and score of Sunshine
09:05 often feel vast and serene, eerily so.
09:08 Many sci-fi fans consider it one of the most underappreciated films of its time, considering
09:12 that it only made back $26 million of its $60 million dollar budget.
09:16 [music]