Gauntlet Crew Ranks Science Fiction Films I

Every night as a young child, my father would tuck me into bed while regaling me with the tales of Isaac Asimov and Larry Niven. He retold these stories of grand empires and spaceships, aliens and supernovas, cultures facing major tipping points in their lifespans. For me, science fiction was bred into me at a young age, and I marveled at the worlds that could be. As an adult, I look for science fiction to ask questions that could bog down modern society. Science fiction at its best explores the issues of the next decade and the next century. It shapes our understanding of what may be to come, and it reframes the problems of now in a petri dish where asking the question isn't met with hostility.

For nearly 100 years, filmmakers have taken to the genre of science fiction and consequently it has evolved yearly, shaping both filmgoers and filmmakers alike. Whether the outlook is bright and bleak, science fiction serves as the prognosticator for our hopes and our fears in a way that no other genre can really embody.

#40 - When Worlds Collide (1951) ''JONA - 24 Inviso - 27 Wickle - 34 Johnbobb- 35 Karo - 37 Stifled - 37 Charon - 38 Snake - 38 Genny - 39 KBM - 39 Scarlet - 39''

Total: 387

"The movie has a neat premise and it’s intriguing to see how humanity can react to this hypothetical situation, with both good and bad intentions and both of those intentions being understandable because of the desperate situation. It’s cool to see the different ideas and plans for reacting to the rogue star. The love triangle in the movie somehow felt both out of place and like it fit right in. The special effects were also pretty neat. While it’s not the most exciting movie, it has a good amount of intrigue due to the focus on humanity rather than the sci-fi event itself." ~JONA

"I’d never heard of this film before this project, so when it came time to watch it, I didn’t really have any expectation whatsoever. And yet, it continues the streak of strong films on this list. It’s still weaker than the other two I’ve watched (or else it would probably be more famous), but this one was fun to watch. As someone who has grown up with tons of modern sci-fi movies, the trope of world-ending disaster is a common one, but usually the solution involves firing a ragtag group of heroes into space to blow up the asteroid/meteorite/sun. In this case, there’s no saving the Earth. It’s just saving a small handful of people from destruction. Which makes the stakes that much more interesting. The human element means dealing with how different people react to the situation, from the scummy, wheelchair-bound millionaire, to the selfless pilot, right up until the hundreds of laborers realize they’d rather escape than escape the fickle finger of fate, and try to attack the escaping rocket. It’s interesting, and feels relatively unique, so I enjoyed it." ~Inviso

"So… they are basically starting creationism on a new planet, with more knowledge of technology. This would have been what it looked like if we had no time to prepare for the end of the world and just had to guess, we do not really have to guess anymore, but it would be nice if we do find a new planet to colonize. It would be nice to see that happen in our lifetime. Anyway, as with some old movies, eventually it is tough to see what matters in the characters and it is such a short movie with a fairly big cast you basically see a name and a face and then they disappear, only maybe to be recognized again." ~Wickle

"I'll give credit where it's due for having impressive world-destruction effects for a 50s movie, but there's not a ton more I can give it. It certainly wasn't bad, but it wasn't particularly fun or even intriguing to watch. The dialogue was solid but the underlying plot was predictable and left me without strong feelings for any of the characters. " ~Johnbobb

"Astronomers suddenly discover that another star is on a collision course with our solar system, and even more surprising, it is not immediately blamed on the Soviet Union. The people of the world decide to save the human race (well, the caucasian race at least) by launching a rocket to a planet orbiting the invading star, which conveniently is exactly the same as earth. Note that they didn't know this to be the case beforehand, and made no preparations for a non-optimal environment whatsoever. The science used in this movie is so far beyond questionable that it is absolutely laughable. For example, we have these two celestial bodies that are moving at such an astounding speed that earth only has a few months of warning, yet it is weeks between the passing of the planet until the collision with its star. When they launch the rocket everyone just sits upright as they nonchalantly pass out from G forces in the most gentle liftoff ever. Everyone bemoans the lack of fuel when they launch at the last minute for dramatic effect, rather than launching when the planet passed so close to the fucking Earth a week ago that it caused worldwide earthquakes. All of this nonsense frames a generic love triangle between boring 1950's people. Zzzzzzzzzzzz." ~Karo

"I had a really big problem with this movie. So the end of the world is coming right? Where is the urgency? There was a ton of boring, borderline emotionless jibber jabber. Science this and science that. But where was the urgency? It felt like a bunch of people making a rocket to space just as a fun project. The only real conflict came from the rioting towards the end, but even that was tame. The two main characters were really fun and had great chemistry, but they were hardly featured! Most of the screen time went to the scientists explaining everything instead of showing it to me. I could have very easily taken a nap during this one and missed nothing important.

Travis’s Opinion: Travis gave me hugs and asked me to play Pokémon. He also ran around the living room Naruto style and asked me how fast he is. He has never watched Naruto." ~Stifled

"Ah, that bygone age of white male dominance. It's good to know what race of humans survived the end of the world there writers and/or directors. There's some stuff in here that makes little to no sense, you know, not counting the entire infeasibility of the plot to begin with. A star coming into this close of contact with the Earth wouldn't NEED to make a direct hit on it to destroy it, or you know, any weird roller coaster plane to a planet that just so happens to pop into an orbit. I felt bad for the ultimate cuckold guy here, very pathetic really... noble but random and sad. Movies from this era are ripe with women falling for these archetypes like Randall. The special effects here are lackluster, and even for the time period I felt other films on the list did better from the same general time period. Really, it was pretty trite and predictable and filled with characters I didn't like." ~charon

"A surprisingly exciting race against time, When Worlds Collide is an exercise in mood and ideas rather than strong story or characters. Like a lot of sci-fi, When Worlds Collide puts humanity under a microscope and shows our true colors under extreme duress. Some dated visuals don’t distract from the strong central messages of the film. " ~Snake

"I took several issues with When Worlds Collide. Namely that dude totally cucked himself for no discernable reason. Also that old benefactor was a [Editor's Note: At this point Genny used a banned word that began with C] and never should've even been humored. Also also how does a sun pass by a planet without scorching it to cosmic dust and why is the star even moving? Also also also the worlds never collided! It was earth and Ed Bellus, Zyra's star which orbits it for... reasons. Sigh..." ~Genny

"A runaway star collides with the Earth, but it's okay because about 40 boring white people manage to escape to safety. The best parts of this movie are the scenes of carnage in the second half, which feature some really impressive miniature work that won the effects team an Oscar. Unfortunately, like a lot of '50s sci-fi movies, the first half is old men in lab coats standing around and hand-wringing about a poorly-defined doomsday. The only character in this I cared about was Richard Derr as the everyman pilot character, who did have some genuinely likable moments and actually made me laugh out loud a few times with his delivery. But that wasn't enough to get me to really care about what happened to these people, and I spent most of the movie bored, just waiting for the effects sequences and major setpieces to start happening." ~KBM

"What It Is: Based on the famous 1930s science fiction novel, humanity attempts to save a portion of its populous as a rogue star races towards its inevitable collision with the Earth.

Why It Matters: One of many precursors to the burgeoning industry of science fiction filmmaking nowadays, When Worlds Collide is recognized as an influence among many science fiction filmmakers of the 1960s. It was extremely well-received in the cold war paranoia of the 1950s, and it even went on to win an Academy Award. Other movies such as Deep Impact and Armageddon credit their origins in When Worlds Collide.

What I Think: While it certainly is dated, I think When Worlds Collide is an extremely effective parable for the era in which it was released. While science fiction is deep in the heart of B-movie territory at this point, the story reminds me of the early salvos of science fiction writing. When you look at the written genre of science fiction, it always appears to be two decades ahead of its film medium counterpart. In the 50s, science fiction was just beginning to find its genesis in film, and while still years before The Twilight Zone, When Worlds Collide certainly is a crude forerunner of what is eventually to come. The writing is clunky and reminiscent of a dime pulp fiction comic, the acting wooden and lacking real chemistry. But it certainly stands as a pioneer in a genre that will eventually produce some truly thought-provoking pieces. So I give a respectful nod to a forerunner." ~scarlet

#39 - Barbarella (1967) ''Stifled - 22 JONA - 25 Wickle - 27 Karo - 33 Snake - 37 Johnbobb - 39 Charon - 40 Genny - 40 Inviso - 40 KBM - 40 Scarlet - 40'' Total: 383

"I was expecting absolutely nothing from this movie and I was pleasantly surprised. It’s the kind of campy fun I really wanted from some of these movies, particularly the older ones. I can see the creators of Austin Powers REALLY loved this movie and took a lot of inspiration from it. Jane Fonda is naked for the first like 10-15 minutes and I was perfectly fine with it. Not just for the obvious reason of her being super super hot, but it was done for comedy as well. Sexuality was used as a common joke throughout the film and it was done effectively. She ended up becoming a female James Bond after discovering recreational sex for the first time. And I know I bring up Sausage Party being awful a lot, but Barbarella is another example of how raunchy humor can be done very well and another example of how Sausage Party failed to deliver. I hope you enjoyed this movie as much as I did, pretty pretty.

Travis’s Opinion: lmao no. No no no. The PG rating was tossed around in the 60s and 70s like herpes and it’s a huge problem. I am so glad Scarlet told me about the content of this movie because I was gonna let Travis watch it. Lmaoooooooooo" ~Stifled

"Is this movie good? No. Is this movie entertaining? Yes. This movie definitely stands out from the rest of the list so that did help its ranking here. It’s a visually striking movie with some colorful environments and characters. Jane Fonda does great here, really helping the campiness of the film. It has its dull moments, but it made the more ridiculous moments of the movie stand out. It’s a stupid movie but one I would be willing to watch again." ~JONA

"A movie directed by a penis. Might as well say it that way as the dialogue was weird and plenty of the movie was naked chicks so… I guess I gave up whining about nudity and shrugged at the end saying I at least enjoyed it… Kind of." ~Wickle

"A young woman is sent to an alien world in a giant flying sex toy to find a missing scientist. Whether she is supposed to be a diplomat or a galactic stripper is unclear, but she is quickly shown to be incompetent at everything except for having intercourse, which thankfully for her is able to solve most of her problems. She is quickly captured by a group of small children, who in this planet's society are apparently abandoned in the arctic wilderness until they are of a 'serviceable age'. Uh... lets not talk about this anymore. Anyway she is rescued by a friendly child trafficker who takes gives her a ride in his vehicle which is a sailsled literally propelled by a rear-mounted fan blowing into the sails oh my god why arrrrrrrrrrg! She then meets a half-naked angel who she inspires to fly by going to his bird nest and fucking him, and he takes her to a city ruled by the Great Tyrant. This is actually not an epithet, but rather her real title. She is literally labeled 'Tyrant' in an official sense. After some misadventures with Captain Dildo of the rebel alliance and the villains unsuccessfully trying to kill her via orgasm, Barbarella and friends fly off into the sunset to upbeat music while the city burns behind them as a lovecraftian monster consumes all its inhabitants. There is a bright spot in this incredibly stupid film and she is called Jane Fonda. Her over-the-top and self-aware portrayal of the title character is what drives the movie and what makes one want to continue watching. The story is nonsensical and the budget looks only slightly higher than your average Lost in Space episode. But at least it is never boring." ~Karo

"An unabashedly pulpy exercise in late 60s excess, Barberella lacks in plot but makes up for it with absurd set-pieces and a progressive attitude towards sex that make it such a weird time you don’t even care that you have no idea what’s going on. Jane Fonda’s charming naivety is adorable at times, and only she could make scenes like the sexual-pleasure machine somehow look passable and kitsch rather than simply super creepy. " ~Snake

"I can't tell if the space stripping is supposed to be exploitation or sexual freedom. The doll thing was really fuckin weird. Pygar is a fucking idiot. Babarella keeps screwing everyone. The sound effects are making me want to claw my ears out. It's like Flash Gordon but with way more LSD and sex with strangers. I don't know what to make of it." ~Johnbobb

"One has to wonder why scarlet thought to include this brainless, booby-doop of a film on a list representing 39 other culturally important science fiction films but those thoughts leave your brain when this film begins to destroy its cells faster than every male character in the film destroys Jane Fonda. There is nothing good that can be said for this abomination masquerading as a film; it offers up nothing of any value whatsoever and was named Worst Film Ever by critics across every galaxy in the year of 4453." ~charon

"What is this intro? What is this movie? WHAT IS LIFE? Barbarella is without a doubt the worst female protagonist I've ever seen in a movie, and I refuse to believe this sci-fi excuse for a soft core porn was popular enough at one point for a band to name itself after one of its characters (which got super distracting by the way)." ~Genny

"Holy SHIT this movie is sixties as hell. Yeah, this stands out as being particularly terrible compared to the caliber of movies I’ve watched thus far on the list. First off, I CANNOT unthink of Leona Lansing every time Barbarella speaks, which is REALLY inconvenient given the amount of nudity and sex that takes place in the movie. But yeah, the acting is terrible, the plot is incoherent, and this movie seems like a vehicle for allowing the director to capture a bunch of his weird fetishes on film. The fact that I couldn’t enjoy a movie with this much blatant sexuality in it says something about just how nonsensical it all was. This was like a pornographic version of Alice in Wonderland, edited down to a PG rating for some reason." ~Inviso

"There are a couple of really good things in this movie – namely, the music, the production design, and Jane Fonda's body. Unfortunately, anything beyond that and this movie lost me. It played like a PG-rated porno, only with even worse acting. There are a few moments of unintentional hilarity, whether it's Barbarella's ridiculous costumes, Milo O'Shea hamming it the fuck up as Durand Durand, that guy at the beginning displaying his chest hair, or just the name Dildano. But this story would have felt paper-thin in a Star Trek episode, much less a full-length film. John Philip Law is particularly awful as the blind angel, Pygar, and quite frankly, I didn't think Fonda's acting was great, either. I probably would have had more fun just watching clips of this one." ~KBM

"What It Is: In the far future, the President of Earth assigns Jane Fonda the unenviable task of fucking her way to an evil super-weapon.

Why It Matters: Adapting one of Europe's most popular characters of the time, Barbarella was a hugely successful film in Europe, serving as the highest grossing film of the year in France and second-highest in the UK. It's visuals have been noted to influence a host of science fiction films afterwards, including The Fifth Element. Hell, Duran Duran took its name from the film.

What I Think: Absolutely schlocky and awful in every sense except one, Barbarella is definitely a great representation of the kooky European cult film scene of the 1960s. Pulling from source material that is every bit as head-scratchingly silly as the film itself, Barbarella's only real saving grace is the unique, enjoyable performance of Jane Fonda. Her character strikes me as acutely sheltered and innocent. It's an interesting subversion of being sexually liberated; she's not. There's no sense of promiscuity or judgment in this society. She's just... different. She comes from a different world. And I definitely appreciate that point of view. Aside from that, though, this movie is an unmitigated drug-addled bizarre pot stirred with colors, lights and the occasional line of dialogue." ~scarlet

#38 - Fantastic Voyage (1966) ''Inviso - 20 Scarlet - 28 KBM - 32 Charon - 33 Johnbobb - 33 Snake - 33 Stifled - 33 Wickle - 33 Karo - 36 Genny - 38 JONA - 40'' Total: 359

"This film feels unique in the fact that it manages to find a way to transport a cast of human characters to a fantastical realm without forcing them to take flight into outer space. I’m willing to ignore the gaping plot hole of the ending, because the rest of the film felt so tense and fascinating. The idea of shrinking a team of scientists down to perform microscopic surgery is interesting, but all the hazards of the human body keep the tension high throughout the film. From minor intravenous lacerations sending the crew tumbling into the wrong channel, to having to navigate a stopped heart, to sneaking through a silent inner ear, the writers managed to put the cast in danger in new, innovative ways without feeling cheap about it. Was the saboteur subplot necessary? Probably not. But it added some interpersonal tension, which I can appreciate. All-in-all, this was a solid film." ~Inviso

"What It Is: Thanks to Obamacare, a team of scientists enters the human body in miniature form, looking to destroy a deadly blood clot in the name of anti-Communism.

Why It Matters: The original short story, written by Jerome Bixby (a hugely influential writer who provided many famous stories that serve as episodes of The Twilight Zone, Star Trek and even played a major role in Isaac Asimov's work), really encapsulates the idea of science fiction in the 60s. It pioneered the sort of imaginative visual effects that would become a staple of science fiction for years to come. Fantastic Voyage has also served as the inspiration for everything from Doctor Who episodes to movies like Innerspace.

What I Think: When you look at the array of Inside Out movies, you find everything from the utterly terrible (Osmosis Jones) to the great (Inside Out). But I think it's important to give a nod to a story that really, truly defined the genre in the 60s, for good or for ill. There's a lot of original thought here. While the execution is certainly somewhat mundane and rife with pacing issues, this is one of those movies where, if you can set aside some of the clunkiness, you can just bask in the unbridled optimism the film presents. It's the sort of 60s story that shines a light on science and optimistically predicts technological marvels by which you can't help but be a little enchanted. Hell, the inside of the human body wouldn't get a special effects upgrade until Look Who's Talking. In the meantime, I like to sit back and go on a voyage with Donald Pleasance that lets me dream of tomorrow." ~scarlet

"I have to admit I have a fair amount of nostalgia for this movie, but that doesn't mean it's particularly great. Donald Pleasance is here, and that's neat, and I'm sure in 1966 this movie was just as visually fascinating as I found it when I was like 6 years old. But like a lot of Richard Fleischer's work, it's a workmanlike studio product that is firmly entrenched in its time. A lot of the acting is quite stilted, and at 100 minutes the Magic School Bus premise is stretched out to a very slow pace." ~KBM

"Interesting concept, made me think of an episode of Rick and Morty's first season which apparently it influenced the creation of. While this film has all the usual bad delivery of an older film when it comes to its female character, it's at least not as overblown as many of the other films on this list are with it. The mystery of the saboteur is generally well done and I wasn't sure which it was until near the end. Biologically speaking, I'm not sure how accurate this actually was but apparently a lot of thought did go into formulating the workings of the inner human body. That said, there was only so much to do in a time period like this with special effects that were beyond the stations of the technicians. Still, I don't think it's necessarily bad or anything." ~charon

"Excellent and creative visuals make this high-concept film a simple delight to watch. It’s hard not to love the idea of little men and a submarine exploring your body to make it better." ~Snake

"This movie was beautiful. I was very impressed with the effects and flashy pretty colors. But the movie itself was nowhere near as interesting. The cast was mostly bland except for a few standout moments here and there. I really didn’t care if they lived or died or even succeeded. I was just fascinated by the scenery.

Travis’s Opinion: He seemed to be on my wavelength. He loved the bright colors, but went off to play when there weren’t any." ~Stifled

"Something referenced in many cartoons, without recognition to this film. It was an attempt, not the most fabulous one, but definitely an attempt. I found it boring, and little things grated on me, such as just the swimming and the girl kicking the inner ear while doing it. The statement at the very beginning of the movie made me think it was some space thing like Forbidden Planet, but nope." ~Wickle

"The tale of a group of doctors in a miniaturized submarine sent on a fascinating journey into the inner workings of a lava lamp. So basically they need to save the life of a Russian defector who has valuable information, and because of a bunch of arbitrary circumstances the only way to do this is to get the help of Hank Pym and shrink everyone to the size of microbes. After a boring hour and a half of drifting around learning some partly incorrect biology lessons, they heal the Russian by changing the drapery in his brain with a space laser. They then exit the body and are welcomed as heroes, up until the point where the submarine they left behind returns to full size and makes his head explode. Just stick with the Magic School Bus, you'll learn more, the characters will actually have personality, and you won't fall asleep halfway through." ~Karo

"I didn't derive much enjoyment out of The Fantastic Voyage, but I appreciate it for inspiring many concepts that came after. I think if the pacing had been much better- I swear it took about 45 minutes which was essentially half the movie just to get voyaging already- I'd have ranked it much higher. Yes the effects didn't hold up well but look at when this was created. They did the best they could with wind machines and colored paper and it's admirable." ~Genny

"I can see the influence that this movie has made but all it really has going for it is its premise and some neat yet outdated effects. It’s a rather dull movie with a dull cast with a twist that was expected. It’s not outright terrible but it’s also quite boring but not the kind of boring that made me upset that I even watched it. Pretty good for a #40 on the list!" ~JONA

"First takeaway: I loved the opening credits. Didn't think that'd be one of the things to really grab me, especially in a 60s sci-fi film, but damn they're clean. Really, most of the visual effects here are, while kind of outdated, really pleasant to watch, with striking use of color and cinematograpgy. Plotwise, it's something we've now seen hundreds of times, but I suppose it was original for its time so I can't exactly knock it. I can hold it back just a little for the amount of slog it takes to really get the plot going, which is a shame, because otherwise there's a good bit to enjoy here." ~Johnbobb

#37 - Forbidden Planet (1956) ''Snake - 12 KBM - 21 Stifled - 26 Wickle - 29 JONA - 30 Genny - 34 Karo - 35 Johnbobb - 36 Inviso - 37 Scarlet - 38 Charon - 39'' Total: 337

"Forbidden Planet is one of my favorites for several reasons. First, I absolutely love Robby the Robot, who is probably the best robot in sci-fi history. Second, I love the concept of the “monsters from the Id”. Fears manifested from our subconcious. It’s a great central concept and an awesome way to portray the human psyche. The comparions to Shakespeare’s The Tempest are interesting way to show a sci-fi story too, and the translantions work surprisingly well. Overall, gripping characters and a gripping story makes this sci-fi film one I can watch over and over again." ~Snake

"It's The Tempest... but in space!!! Really, though, I was pleasantly surprised by this movie – beautifully filmed and designed with great effects, cinematography, use of color, and some awe-inspiring sets. It also features Leslie Nielsen in his dramatic prime, which is something I haven't seen enough of; the guy gives a great performance here even when his character comes up a little lacking (often thanks to the embarrasingly dated gender politics). The script does have some genuinely interesting things to say at times, even when it does end up devolving into that peculiar brand of pseudo-Freudian psychobabble that seems almost omnipresent in '50s cinema. Anne Francis doesn't get much to do, contrary to what the opening number of Rocky Horror might claim, but regardless, it's still a very fun movie with a lot of elements that do, in fact, hold up surprisingly well today." ~KBM

"I really liked around 80% of this movie. I was prepared to put it much higher, but there was far too much talking and lecturing in spots. In particular, the history lesson of the creatures took way too long to get through. Without that, I might have placed this in the top 20. The robot was really cool. The mystery of what really happened to the previous crew of astronauts was fun because it placed major suspicion on the guy they came to visit. The action was pretty fun. The romance was…kind of silly and sudden, but at the same time I enjoyed the girl shutting down the advances of most of the crew. I got a huge laugh at her being a Disney princess with those animals. And perhaps most importantly, it was the kind of classic campy sci-fi fun that I really wanted. If not for the pacing issues, this would be a real winner instead of just pretty good.

Travis’s Opinion: Travis kept trying to cuddle with me and watch, but he got bored. He liked the space ship a lot and paid attention every time it was on the screen." ~Stifled

"Well, this was a weird film. Good for its time though. Monsters from the Id." ~Wickle

"There are some cool ideas and technology shown here but the movie has some pacing issues. The movie can feel like a very stretched out Twilight Zone episode. The romance is poorly done but there’s some odd humor in there which kinda makes up for it. The mystery of what ended up happening to the scientists is intriguing and helped made me stick with the movie and not zone out and the payoff made me glad I stuck with it." ~JONA

"Forbidden Planet was not very good! I saw the twist coming from a mile away (ask char it was literally the second theory I hypothesized) and the sexual tension between the dude's daughter and well EVERYONE else but the friggin' robot made me uncomfortable with the ending where she's stuck with the survivors and nothing but a robot incapable of killing humans to protect her from the inevitable train they're about to run on her. Don't you dare tell me the captain was different and wouldn't let that happen because he came across as a pig just like all the rest." ~Genny

"A flying saucer is sent to a distant planet in to find out the fate of a colony on the surface. It is soon discovered that the only two survivors are a man and his daughter, and that a mysterious evil force has killed everyone else. The ship crew is composed of the best and brightest of earth's young astronauts, all of which spend most of their time getting drunk or trying to fuck the daughter the man they were sent to rescue. In one particularly atrocious scene, the commander literally tells the girl to dress more modestly so his men don’t rape her. You are a credit to your species, Captain Taliban. The interesting tale of the alien civilization destroyed by its own hubris is the heart of this movie, but the delivery of the story is just so excruciating, and the characters so terrible." ~Karo

"This is tough to rate. I can acknowledge how important it was toward both sci-fi filmmaking and filmmaking in general. 70 years ago it was incredibly ahead of its time, but now it really hasn't held up, not in terms of effects (which, aside from lasers, are surprisingly solid), but storytelling. The film spends an uncomfortable amount of time focusing on the crew of scientists all trying to hook up with Alteria, a child-like woman who exists solely as a possession of Morbius to be won by Adams. Characters are killed off more rapidly and with less care than a typical teen slasher movie. There are good things here too; the idea of the metaphysical monster is a great one, but it's unfortunately hidden for most of the film behind fluff." ~Johnbobb

"This is the first movie on the list that felt underwhelming, to say the least. I figure it probably made the list in the first place because Robbie is such an iconic sci-fi robot, but overall, there just isn’t a lot that stands out here. I get that the overarching plot involves a spaceship crew touching down to investigate a previously-explored planet…and the human guy there is CLEARLY sketchy from minute one. But then you’ve got a weird love subplot, and the star of the film is the cook just trying to get his hands on a fuckton of bourbon (or was it whiskey?) It’s just weird. The pacing is slow, to the point where nothing really HAPPENS until well after the halfway point in the film, and then everything just rushes to a resolution. It wasn’t BAD, but it wasn’t something amazing, either." ~Inviso

"What It Is: It's Shakespeare's The Tempest but in space, with a robot and monsters of the mind.

Why It Matters: Forbidden Planet revolutionized a lot of concepts in sci fi filmmaking - it contains one of first usage of faster-than-light travel, something now a staple for the genre. Robby the Robot became an iconic character and also was the first major example of a robot depicted on film. The film was nominated for an Academy Award and is one of the elite handful of movies in the Library of Congress' National Film Registry. It was also one of the inspirations for Star Trek.

What I Think: While it revolutionized concepts for its time, the movie is uncomfortably primitive in a lot of respects, and it doesn't seem to realize it. After the shock of seeing Leslie Nielsen younger than 60 wears off, dissecting the characters just yields head-scratching results. That puts all of the film on poor old Robby, and while it's fun to see all of the Fallout: New Vegas progenitors (Morbius, protectrons, Forbidden Dome), it's ultimately a movie with no one to back. The shallow nature of the characters end up sealing its fate." ~scarlet

"A nauseating sendoff from 1950's sexism. This movie starts by introducing a ton of generic white dudes that I can't tell apart from one another and before too long all of them begin behaving like wild animals at the sight of a female. There's even a small innuendo about Robby the Robot being a female from the cook. It's unbelievable to me how anyone could relate to these characters in modern times. In one instance Nielsen's character goes from deriding a lesser ranking crew member for trying to seduce Alta, but then HE immediately does it himself. He's the worst. I was certain this movie would be at the bottom for me but then I watched my last place movie, which has a lot in common with this steaming relic from a shameful time in history." ~charon

#36 - Logan's Run (1976) ''Genny - 10 Wickle - 18 Karo - 23 Stifled - 24 Charon - 25 KBM - 30 JONA - 31 Inviso - 34 Scarlet - 34 Snake - 36 Johnbobb - 40'' Total: 305

"Jason didn't like Logan's Run as much as my mom and I did, and I can imagine why. Some of the interaction between Logan 5 and Jessica 6 are a little uh... rapey in vibe. A product of the 80s I imagine. The movie certainly shows its age, but in my humble opinion the concept is still strong enough that the film holds its own." ~Genny

"Kind of weird seeing this movie as PG with some nudity here and there and then a little bit of blood. Like the way the one guy died at the beginning was odd, and you had a psychedelic-ish cat house (maybe?) that they went through. Overall, it was a kind of nice movie. Weird, simple plot with just a nice overlook in a new life as they discover a long dead society they would soon be a part of. Wonder if they will be able to read books and completely integrate with the land. Hopefully they’ll be capable of getting food, I’m sure JONA was salivating at his potential meal." ~Wickle

"In the far future, everyone dresses like Tinker Bell and gets sacrificed to Cirque du Soleil when they get too old. Logan is a sort of a future cop who keeps people from 'running' from their day in the sun, and of course when it comes his own time he has second thoughts and tries to flee. Once they escape, the movie goes completely off the deep end as they find out the path to paradise actually just leads to Mr. Aluminum Foil Robot and whatever believability the movie had left by this point implodes spectacularly. Logan returns to his home and overloads the Master Computer by getting high and speaking like a mentally disabled person and then everything explodes and everyone lives together in harmony and sings kumbaya. It is typical of your dumb low-budget sci-fi movie from the pre Star Wars era, and while the base concept was a great idea the execution of said idea was cataclysmically bad." ~Karo

"It was fairly obvious Logan was going to become a runner at some point in the movie. I mean…the title gave it away. But I had a big issue with not actually caring about Logan one bit, at least initially. He and his partner enjoyed killing runners way too much. Like…doing your job is one thing, moral ambiguity and all that, but they were fucking laughing and enjoying themselves while killing runners. It was sadistic and weird. And on top of that, Logan was super creepy trying to get in that girl’s pants and saying she isn’t worth his time unless she bangs him. What the hell, man? Luckily the concept and the movie were good enough to overcome that issue, and by the end I was hoping for Logan to succeed for the sake of ending the genocide. But if Logan also happened to die to make that happen, I wouldn’t have cared one bit.

Travis’s Opinion: Here we go again with the PG movie boobs. Yeesh. He asked me about the different colors that people were wearing during the ceremony at the beginning of the movie, but Travis didn’t care much beyond that. I was kind of relieved he missed out on all the frozen boobs." ~Stifled

"Logan falls into a long list of characters that I initially disliked, mostly all for the same reason. Your lead protagonist should never be one that you find it hard to root for. However, unlike many of the others on that list Logan comes around and changes his ways, becoming someone you want to see succeed. The machines here are kinda stupid, and their defeat basically comes at their own hands for being short-sighted. It's interesting that these machines, which control the lives of the entire city so effortless and perpetuate a lie were unable to rectify information they were receiving. A lot of the finer concepts introduced in this world are not really explored, because there just wasn't time for it I guess." ~charon

"This feels like it laid the ground work for a whole ton of YA tropes. I definitely enjoyed this movie, but I do think it got by in large part on the charisma of its actors. There's a lot of things about this story that fall apart under scrutiny. The costumes are goofy, and there are movies from the '50s whose effects have aged better than these – but beyond that, I found there to be a lot of mixed messaging and confused character motivations. Maybe the book it's based on is better about this, but by the end I still got no real sense of what Logan's true motivations were, and while I liked that sense of ambiguity for awhile, he never really got that moment to choose whether or not to be a hero – the computer just kind of can't process the information he's giving it and explodes, seemingly short-circuiting the entire city and making his choice for him. There does also seem to be a weird puritanical undercurrent to this story, as if the reason everything went to hell was just “those damn hippies ruined the world.” Still, the set-up was intriguing, and the chemistry between Michael York and Jenny Agutter (as well as eventually a delightful, mumbling old Peter Ustinov in the third act) is strong enough that I was engaged despite the shortcomings." ~KBM

"Definitely a ridiculous premise, but I liked the setting and atmosphere. It was intriguing to see a simultaneous utopia and dystopia. I did find the movie to go downhill once the main characters met the robot though. The robot’s scene was quite weird and felt out of place. There was too much time spent in the outside world but with that being said, it’s a fun, silly and thoughtful journey." ~JONA

"Logan’s Run is an interesting concept for a post-apocalyptic utopian dystopia film. The world is built up strong, establishing that people aren’t allowed to exist in society past the age of thirty, and there’s a class of hunters that track down anyone that tries to avoid their intended fate. One of those hunters is tasked with infiltrating the society’s underbelly in order to find out where all the runners are hiding, to end their shenanigans once and for all. And all that is fine, because that hunter becomes the hero seeking to upend the society, which has become very stagnant and accepting of their shitty lot in life. The main flaws I have are twofold: one, the acting is kinda cheesy and terrible, and two, the movie never does a good job of explaining WHY no one over thirty is allowed to live. I get it from the perspective of “we don’t want overpopulation”, but then why do you care if they run away instead of reporting for death? Overall, it’s an interesting concept that I definitely liked watching, but it pales in comparison to the high caliber of this list as a whole." ~Inviso

"What It Is: Basil Exposition clashes with a society's mores he helped to enforce - everyone who reaches the age of 30 is killed in order to maintain a level of resource consumption.

Why It Matters: Based on a much more often forgotten novel of the same name, Logan's Run ended up influencing many if not most of the dystopian stories that would come after it. The concept served as the root of everything from the Defiant films to Fallout 3. It also won a handful of Saturn Awards in the year it was released.

What I Think: Michael York is a fantastic actor, and I really enjoyed his performance, going from someone who is part of the problem to someone fighting directly against his role in the society he was once a part of. While the movie itself plays like your average Star Trek episode, that's actually not a strike against it, but rather a great example of the sort of conceptual morality plays that I think science fiction represents at its best. It's certainly rough around the edges in terms of effects and set pieces, and there's some cheesy acting, but this is definitely one of those moments where science fiction is reaching out to its literary roots and trying to convey a message. You can see where things like The Giver will eventually crib, well, everything about their plot." ~scarlet

"It doesn’t take itself too seriously, with a fun concept and some interesting set design. The film takes a nice step up when Logan and Jessica start to actually go on the run, and things get so ridiculous it’s impossible not to laugh. Just a bit of harmless fun." ~Snake

"I was really hopeful for this one given the way it started. Bright colors and an interesting set composition giving life to a pretty interesting yet easy-to-grasp dystopia. It unfortunately didn't take long to take a steep dive, though. The performances were largely godawful (in part due to terrible writing). It jumps around from boring to cheesy and very rarely grasps the drama it's going for. Logan himself starts awful, which makes it weird that we're supposed to buy a sudden complete character change without actual character development to get us there. That's all bad enough, but then there's THE ROBOT." ~Johnbobb

#35 - Outland (1981) ''Stifled - 7 Karo - 20 KBM - 20 Scarlet - 22 Wickle - 26 Charon - 31 Inviso - 31 Johnbobb - 34 JONA - 34 Genny - 36 Snake - 40'' Total: 301

"Three things are always assured. Death, taxes, and Sean Connery being Sean Connery. If you tuned into this movie expecting to see Sean Connery be Sean Connery to a high level of Sean Connerydom, you are in luck. He is maximum Sean Connery and it is wonderful. I had never even heard of this movie before watching it, but I’m really glad I did. It gave me a big Red Faction vibe, which I was happy about. The doctor was quite a character that could hang with Sean Connery. The villain was a total asshole (as pointed out by Sean Connery, so it’s true) and while he wasn’t menacing in any way, he was appropriately antagonistic. The showdown with the hired guns was fun, but the betrayal from that other cop that got hardly any screen time was kinda dumb. Not a deal breaker by any stretch and their fight was cool, but it left me a tad underwhelmed. Regardless, really good movie I actually wanna watch again soon.

Travis’s Opinion: Based on what I read on the IMDB parent’s guide beforehand, I decided to have Travis skip this one. Although besides the naked chick getting beaten up and a few heads exploding, it really wasn’t a hard R. I might let him watch it next time. " ~Stifled

"So James Bond is a marshal on a mining colony on one of Jupiter's moons and has to solve the mystery of why the miners keep going nuts. He soon uncovers a drug ring in the colony that has connections on the highest levels so of course he feels the need to be a one man army and take on the whole fucking universe. The main character is essentially a stick-up-the-arse tool, he's a family man who doesn’t seem to give a shit about his family, or at least puts their happiness (and safety) in a lower tier than 'being a badass space sheriff'. It is honestly only Connery’s acting skills that keep the movie from imploding into an unmemorable slog, and when the story focused on the mystery at hand things remained interesting. By the time we get to the Gunfight at the Io Corral the movie has begun to wear out its welcome, and even the betrayal of Deputy Black Guy feels more arbitrary than surprising." ~Karo

"Underrated movie alert: all sources indicated that my feelings on this movie would be lukewarm, at best, but it turned out to be a campy delight. Sean Connery, just prior his second “un-retirement” from the role of James Bond, plays the mouthy new marshal just transferred to a backwater station on Io (which, as the movie helpfully informs us in the opening text, is pronounced “Eye-oh”). He immediately sets to rooting out corruption stemming from a sneering Peter Boyle, with the help of a hilariously crotchety old doctor lady who could give Dr. McCoy a run for his money in the snark department. Lots of heads explode, and yes, we've all heard this story before, but goddammit it's in space and it's Sean Connery and it's awesome. Visually speaking, it's possible it borrows a bit too much from Alien, and if the filmmakers didn't want me immediately comparing this movie to Alien, well, then, they shouldn't have used that obvious font for the title card. But yeah, I enjoyed this one a lot, lot more than I expected. " ~KBM

"What It Is: On a titanium mining planetoid ruled by the iron fist of Peter Boyle, a new sheriff rides into town. Turns out, this town ain't big enough for the two of them.

Why It Matters: This movie is probably one of the least influential movies on this list, but it does have the distinction of serving as a major inspiration for Joss Whedon's cult classic TV show Firefly.

What I Think: I'm a sucker for anything western-related. I love the romantic notion of a lone lawman facing the daunting task of protecting the sanctity of the law in a world where everything seems to stand at odds with that notion, and this movie certainly plays into that archetype. It's not spectacular, but it certainly is an enjoyable romp of action sequences. That said, I imagine that it won't rank too highly on the final list, but given that it is the first real genre hybrid of westerns and science fiction on the big screen, I think it definitely deserves a little respect." ~scarlet

" After the movie I had to check if the actress who played Lazarus was related to Jane Lynch as she sounded very similar to her. Anyway, bloody head explosion things again. Not as gross as they were in Total Recall, but similar. Sean Connery’s character was not bad though. Good planning for the elite soldiers coming. The movie just lacked something to push it higher." ~Wickle

"Connery plays a good part here, and it definitely has that western feel to it. It's able to create an interesting world on a foreign world to Earth but still make it feel like an old mining town full of corruption and sin back on the planet. I'm conflicted about this one because while I like the atmosphere, the world and find Connery's character a good lead, there's something a little slow and plodding about this movie too. There are action scenes, and they generally aren't super flashy, but still end up feeling effective. Yet there are times between them when it feels like the movie is just creating extra time by showing you elaborately set plans and painstakingly created scenarios. The way our hero defeats the hitmen is clever and unique, but somehow I didn't feel that excited by it either. It's weird. " ~charon

"This is a really weird film for this list, partially because I’d never heard of it before, and partially because aside from the setting, nothing about this film or its plot requires it to be a sci-fi film. By all accounts, this could be a standard police movie, or hell, it could even be a Western with a few extra tweaks. It definitely feels interesting to have that ending sequence where Sean Connery has to Home Alone his way through killing three would-be assassins. I will admit though, the setting allows for some more interesting deaths, what with the rapid decompression, or getting dudes sucked out into space. Overall, it felt like an enjoyable police movie, and I found the acting fine (especially the future bug spray flamethrower lady from The Mist.) So this felts like an acceptable place for the ranking." ~Inviso

"One of the things that really makes a sci-fi movie good is how it uses the science fiction as a tool to tell it's story. It's why the idea of a space western is actually pretty intriguing. Contrast the seemingly endless environment of a traditional western with the actually endless environment of space, but limit the ability to explore it, and you've got a solid concept to work with. Outland never really capitalizes on its setting. It feels like space is used primarily as a way to get flashy on-screen kills than as a way to tell the story. Then compare the synthetic drug made to force people to work longer to the way citizens are treated in a future like Soylent Green's. Is it a dark view of the future, where proper working conditions have systematically dissolved? No, it's actually just one corrupt villain that needs to be taken down. There's a lot of potential here that isn't ultimately followed through on." ~Johnbobb

"Sean Connery gives a good performance and the film has a good atmosphere, but the story is rather dull, and the action doesn’t stand out. " ~JONA

"My brain was asleep through most of Outland. I don't think I could tell you five details about that movie to be honest. It stars Sean Connery. It takes place in like a factory. The workers are self-terminating seemingly at random. The are assassins hired to obfuscate a conspiracy... That's it. Yawn." ~Genny

"The film generally has a dull and clinical sense of style throughout, and none of the performances are really that exciting, I even felt Sean Connery phoning it in greatly. The score is cool though, and I would expect nothing less from Jerry Goldsmith. " ~Snake

#34 - Equilibrium (2002) ''Wickle - 7 Charon - 16 Scarlet - 16 Genny - 17 Stifled - 23 Karo - 31 Inviso - 35 JONA - 37 KBM - 37 Johnbobb - 38 Snake - 39'' Total: 296

"Well, the gun fights were kind of cool, but a few aspects of the story were a little dull and the sword fight was not great. One comment I have though, it did not effect my write-up at all… but why were they forced to kill someone under the doctrine, under his medication… just because he was calmly reading a book. It’s not like he was going completely out of sorts, stealing from everyone, holding up operations… so on and so forth. There were some dumb aspects of that society, but that is why it was wrong and why it was defeated." ~Wickle

"Ah, a classic Sean Bean moment for sure. It's interesting that Preston immediately has this big revelation right after he essentially murders his best friend. He begins down the same path almost instantly, which is a little sad and just a reminder that Sean Bean has to die no matter what logic there is to prevent it. I felt a lot of vibes from The Matrix in this movie, in terms of the high-octane action sequences which were a lot of fun and a big part of why I put this one in the spot I did. Bale plays the stoic, conflicted hero here long before he does it again years later. The twists and turns the character experiences are not easy to see coming. In one moment, you believe one character has the upper hand when in reality it was just a ploy all along, only to realize that the other character expected that anyway. It's fun, flashy and leaves me feeling good. All big pluses." ~charon

"What It Is: Sean Bean inspires Christian Bale to take down a societal system devoid of emotion. And Bill Fitchner is there.

Why It Matters: This was the first movie to come after The Matrix and attempt to ape the style and concept. In a sense, it's almost as important as the Matrix because, until this point, The Matrix was an abberation. Suddenly, the Matrix became a marketing strategy, and attempting to copy became the absolute norm.

What I Think: I can see the problems others will have with this movie, but there is some subtlety in the acting that I really think makes the film worth the watch. If you can't portray emotions, how do you convey if you're the bad guy? Taye Diggs really performs admirably on that tough tightrope he has to walk. I've also always enjoyed the gun fu style of fighting; you really never see it this way anywhere else, and it does feel like the most fleshed out aspect of the film. There are certainly some issues with the script, but overall, I bought the world and the three main characters." ~scarlet

"So this is like "The Matrix" but if Keanu Reeves was a good actor. Right? That's pretty much all I got from this. The physics are (slightly) more realistic but it's easy to see one took heavy inspiration from the other. My only major gripe with Equilibrium is that Taye Diggs' character had all this buildup leading to an epic showdown and went out like a total bitch." ~Genny

"Let’s get something out of the way first. The marketing described this as a Matrix killer. Let me be the first to say absolutely not and deliver a strong cackle to the contrary. Quite the fact, this is not similar to the Matrix at all except for the slow down fighting. This movie is badly reviewed and I feel like the Matrix killer nonsense plays a huge role, because it was quite good. There were some cheesy elements for sure, and a few of the action scenes were kinda lame at the beginning, but I had a good time with this. The idea of everyone suppressing their emotions with medication is one of the more interesting utopia ideas I have seen. The only issue is the black dude didn’t get the memo about that. He was very expressive the whole time and no one interrogated him about it. While I hated the animal killings, they at least added some audience investment to Christian Bale wiping those damn dog killers off the face of the earth. And outside of the wonky opening sequence, the gun-fu or whatever they called it was really cool, especially for the ending battle. They also added swordplay for…some reason…but it was cool too at least. And not really a plot point, but more of a side not, Sean Bean might have set the all time Sean Bean record with this one. Damn.

Travis’s Opinion: Travis did not like this at all. He played with his back to it. He also kept trying to bug me and prevent me from watching it." ~Stifled

"In the far future, war has been eliminated by the systematic eradication of the greatest inciter of conflict in human history. No not religion or racism you silly goose, I'm talking about art and poetry! Fuck you Mona Lisa, you caused World War II! All the people of the world also now take a drug to help suppress their emotions for the good of society because the world would totally be safer with everyone a dispassionate uncaring sociopath. This dystopia is policed by the Gramophone Clerics, enforcers who study the statistical analysis of common gunfire trajectories. They can thus dodge every bullet fired at them because their data is really REALLY good. The story is of course that one of these guys sees the light and sets out to take down his own people, who of course lose because they do some bizarre setup to troll the protagonist rather than just like, killing him when he was captured and helpless. Every aspect of the world requires a great deal of suspension of disbelief to simply not break out laughing, and given that the film was supposed to deal with some pretty serious issues and wasn't meant to be a comedy this is absolutely not a good thing. It honestly just feels like something that is riding on the coattails of that OTHER movie about the gunslinging guy in a black coat with uncanny reflexes who sticks it to The Man, and while it is not unwatchable, it is extremely derivative and unoriginal." ~Karo

"There’s something inherently hard to enjoy about a movie in which a dystopian government has eliminated all emotion. Because the very concept relies on actors in a movie being able to portray an emotionless state. And it was just very jarring for me at numerous instances to see characters clearly expressing anger or fear, without those emotions being called out as contradictory to the whims of society. Furthermore…this just felt very…standard. It had good moments, but the best thing about the film were the three or four fight scenes, and they were all so quick that I couldn’t sit down and truly enjoy them like I might’ve wanted to. Even the ending of the film resolves itself so quickly, when it should’ve been a far more drawn-out affair. I dunno…it just didn’t hit the mark as far as I’m concerned is all." ~Inviso

"The only movie on the list where I think the entire premise of the movie is fucking stupid. Usually, I’m not one to completely shoot down a movie based on the premise if the movie does a good job of justifying it and Equilibrium doesn’t. I get the point of it but it’s just so incredibly ridiculous to even think it could happen. The action can be a little bit cool, although you have to overlook that many of Christian Bale’s opponents just stand still or are really bad shots. The movie can be kinda fun in a bad way." ~JONA

"Quite possibly the single most derivative movie on this list. Mash up a whole bunch of better movies that were popular in the '90s, and you get Equilibrium. It's not like this is a terrible sit (mostly thanks to a strong cast) but it is one of those that goes straight out of your brain a couple days after watching it. Thematically, it's pretty obvious, as it borrows Important Themes from stuff like The Giver, Demolition Man, and Harrison Bergeron, which has the unfortunate side-effect of making the proceedings painfully obvious. (The “gun fu” doesn't lend the movie any subtlety either.) Visually speaking, we're also borrowing heavily from John Woo and the Wachowski Sisters. The main problem here, of course, is that Kurt Wimmer is not as smart a writer or filmmaker as the likes of his obvious inspirations.

All that said, Equilibrium still would have made it higher on a different list. Behind the familiarity, there's some great cinematography from Academy Award winner Dion Beebe, and as I said, some of the casting is really great (especially Christian Bale) – even though, it must be admitted, it's sometimes difficult to watch people trying to act like they have no emotions: a concept that, outside of the Vulcans in Star Trek, usually works better in a novel than in a film." ~KBM

"This is a dumb movie. Worse than that, it's a dumb movie that THINKS it's smart. It's one of the least subtle dystopian futures I've seen in any type of media, on top of just not making any fucking sense. To avoid war, they make all emotion illegal and kill anyone that expresses it. Is that, like, international policy, or just a thing in the US? How would that be agreed upon and enforced worldwide? Ignore the fact that emotion isn't what causes war to begin with. It even says "emotion is what causes mankind's violence against mankind" and yet the emotionless dystopia seems to exist almost solely to murder hundreds of random civilians and animals so how the fuck does that solve the violence problem? And on top of that, SOME emotions seem to be just fine. Pride, anger and fear all seem to be reinforced by the government, with only happiness and sadness ever being a problem. ALSO if all the weird ninja police are trained extensively at gun-kata why is Christian Bale literally the only one who ever manages to use it effectively, while the rest of the police force basically has the gun skills of stormtroopers? The only thing that stops this movie from tanking completely is the admittedly badass gun fights. It feels like they just made some cool fight scenes and then tried to shamble together a story around them." ~Johnbobb

"Borrows the best parts of other sci-fi films to create a high octane action flick without much other substance to it. " ~Snake

#33 - Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1978) ''Snake - 4 Inviso - 14 JONA - 17 KBM - 22 Johnbobb - 24 Genny - 28 Karo - 34 charon - 35 scarlet - 36 Stifled - 39 Wickle - 39'' Total: 292

"In the most superior version of this story, 78’s Invasion perfectly captures the cutultural zeitgeist of the time. A thick sense of paranoia permeates the entire film, and Donald Sutherland is fantastic in it, perfectly showing his fear, shock, and sense of mystery over the strange occurrances happening around him. The camera work in this film is simply top notch, crafting scenes of disarry and dizziness as we attempt the solve the mystery along with the main characters. Elements of body horror cap of the sheer scariness of this picture, remaining one of my favorite horror experiences to date." ~Snake

"Now prior to this ranking, I’d seen the original film and I thought it was pretty good. But after watching this remake, I think it managed to make the horror elements of the story feel all the more important, and really amped up the tension. Some of the body horror involved in the creation of the duplicates was really intense and frightening in a way that the effects of the 50s really couldn’t capture properly. But I’m comparing the remake to the original, when the story throughout both films is pretty amazing. Having an entire population overcome by mysterious space plants is extremely unsettling, but the fact that the invaders don’t seem to be acting out of malice makes it all the eerier. The slow whittling away of people that the main characters can trust only serves to further amp up the tension until a twist ending VERY different from the original movie. This was just another very solid movie overall." ~Inviso

"This movie has a great cast and the movie takes its time to help get attached to the characters. It starts off slow but it’s also deliberate to help build the intrigue of what exactly is going on. There’s a great sense of fear and paranoia throughout the movie and it results in one of the most impactful endings on this list. " ~JONA

"President Snow does speed in order to stay awake and not get turned into an alien. Another nostalgic one for me on this list, this is right up there with Ben-Hur (1959), The Fly (1986), and True Grit (2010) in the “best remakes ever” conversation. Donald Sutherland has always had a great screen presence, but his '70s work is particularly dear to my heart for the singularly awkward charisma he had. The horror elements here are probably more effective than the sci-fi elements – certainly the more memorable aspect of the film. That shrieking thing the body snatchers do is pulled off to chilling perfection and still sends chills down my spine, especially when Sutherland does it at the end." ~KBM

"So it kind of sucks that the one clip I had ever seen from this movie is the last shot. Completely spoiled the ending way in advance. Still, it was a fun ride getting there. Up until the last 1/3rd of the film, it's basically a passive aggressive alien invasion, which makes the whole thing unsettling. I think I enjoyed that aspect more than the pod people chasing every human they see, though the screams were a nice touch. It's creepy and thrilling and definitely not something I'd mind seeing again." ~Johnbobb

"Invasion of the Body Snatchers is unique in that it's one of few films in which the antagonists win. I have no issue with this in itself, and honestly I wish more media had the balls to pull this off. No, my main issue with it is telegraphing it so damned early. It becomes a hopeless uphill battle when you realize that you literally cannot sleep or you risk possession. Our party was fucked from the jump by trusting the wrong "people". Once the seed pods made it onto the boat it was all over and there was nothing the brave protagonist could do. I do like the twist ending though." ~Genny

"Extraterrestrial space spores come to earth and replace the world's people one by one with evil duplicates for reasons that aren’t explained and honestly don't make a lot of sense any way you think about it. This process takes place overnight, and nobody in the entire city ever notices the giant alien flower in the room replacing their loved ones with pod people because they are all reaaaalllllly sound sleepers. The characters are not particularly memorable, and it's hard to reach any level of caring about them or anything else going on. The premise is stupid and difficult to believe, its just a typical dumb evil clone story that’s been done a million times elsewhere, and done much better." ~Karo

"I guess this is a horror movie disguised as a Sci-Fi movie, based on the ending and all. I enjoyed some of the performances here but at times I felt the writing was strange and some of the plots were a bit ill-conceived. I disliked the forced romance between Matthew and Elizabeth, and I also felt the "get you while you sleep" thing didn't make total sense. How exactly does that work? I mean, why do you enter such a deep state of sleep and how do these giant pod things magically turn up? They explained some of it with the plant delivery to the bathhouse and Elizabeth bringing the flower inside, but what about when they all fall asleep? Only Matthew is outside, how do the plants start cloning all the others then too? The end is a bit jarring; you see it coming obviously but the way the lead hero goes down is ambiguous and underwhelming. If you are going to do a "bad end", at least have some sort of ultimate resolution that we can see as an audience." ~charon

"What It Is: Donald Sutherland and Mister Spock attempt to make heads and tails of a metaphor for communism that is turning everyone into the worst singers ever imagined.

Why it Matters: At a time when the Cold War was alive and well, this movie proved both a huge critical and commercial success. In terms of remakes, this is often listed as one of the greats, and it ended up proving more successful in all fronts than the original by any measurable metric. It also had an impact on many filmmakers to come after, and supposedly was the movie that got Donald Sutherland his part years later in Hunger Games.

What I Think: I certainly love the final scene and all of the conspiratorial paranoia it creates inside of me, but it takes a long time to get to that point. The unease the movie makes is its strong suit. The relationships the movie fails to make cause major chunks of it to fall flat for me. I think there will be a large array of placements on this one simply because everyone in Gauntlet Crew processes relationships in film differently, and therefore they prioritize them differently. For me, the absolutely iconic moments (which are way better in this than the original), just don't outweigh what I feel is a slog to get through. Objectively though, the entire metaphor is so perfect for its moment that I have to admit this is one of the great remakes of all time." ~scarlet

"I was initially really excited to watch this because I love this movie. But wait…Donald Sutherland? This isn’t the one I saw. Oh god the remade it. Well that sort of remake with Nicole Kidman wasn’t that bad so maybe this one will be…fuck. It’s bad. It’s really fucking bad. The priest on the swing with the kids at the beginning of the movie was honestly the creepiest thing about it because the rest was just awful. The woman knows her husband isn’t really there and something is very wrong, but let’s waste a ton of screen time on her and Donald Sutherland slowly hooking up. What a dirty cheating whore. And Donald is a damn homewrecker. I didn’t want them to get together. I wanted them to focus on the invading aliens and forego bad romance subplots. But here we are. And even when the focus was on the aliens, it wasn’t interesting or fun. The characters were all so boring and up their own asses that I couldn’t bring myself to like them. I was rooting for the aliens. And wouldn’t you know it? The aliens won! Donald screeching at the very end made me crack up laughing, so that was a nice way to end my suffering.

Travis’s Opinion: Again with the PG rated nudity! No wonder we got a rating system. Anyways, Travis wanted me to sing a song about sheep instead of watching this movie. I think he had the right idea. " ~Stifled

"Man thinks he can stop an invasion of people that take over bodies after they have already taken over the entire city he lives in. News at 11 on why he fails. Like, it’d make sense for them to try it if it they figured out what was going on and saw the plants while they were still taking over maybe a couple people a day. Where you could find everyone that was figuring out something was wrong, gather them together and bring them to fight. Not when there’s four of you left, and even less so when there were two of you left." ~Wickle

#32 - Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (2005) ''Scarlet - 17 Johnbobb - 18 Karo - 21 Wickle - 21 Genny - 25 Snake - 25 Charon - 29 KBM - 31 Inviso - 33 JONA - 36 Stifled - 36'' Total: 292

"What It Is: The Earth is destroyed. Then the movie continues for 90 minutes.

Why It Matters: An adaptation of the singularly most famous and well-read comedic science fiction novel of all time, Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy was an abberation, following the Matrix craze and just before the real superhero craze took flight. In the meantime, Hitchhiker's shows us Hollywood's desire to adapt the uber-successful, and it also gives us glimpses into three careers that are about to really take flight.

What I Think: My parents hosted a birthday party for my 8th grade? Somethingth birthday, and they took about 20 of my friends out for pizza and a movie based on my favorite book at the time. It still is one of my favorite books, but the film isn't quite on point with the novel itself. Still, there are some great hidden nuggets of wisdom in the film, that I absolutely love. Stephen Fry is perhaps the greatest possible narrator, Alan Rickman nails the character of Marvin... and the main three. Martin Freeman was just absolutely perfect as Arthur, Mos Def is a really interesting Ford, and the chemistry Zooey Deschanel has with every character is just on point. Freeman and Deschanel just nail the emotions of people who almost were into each other but just aren't quite there. It's awkward and charming and so real that it hurts. The end credits play out one of my all-time favorite scenes from the book extremely well. There is a lot to fix with this movie, as it does suffer from Adaptatitis (wherein the movie assumes the viewer knows more from the books than they should), but all-in-all, this is goofy sci fi fun with a few great subtle levels of depth worth analyzing." ~scarlet

"I loved this movie as a teenager. I went in now years later with full bias, expecting to like it a lot. I'll be the first to admit, I was able to see some of its flaws more than I had originally. The tone can be inconsistent, the plot's a little rushed, and the film as a whole feels oddly nihilistic. And yet, this is easy to forgive because the film is brimming with creativity. It's unique. It's memorable. It's the type of "with sci-fi, anything can happen as long as you're creative enough" attitude that ultimately made Rick & Morty so popular the last few years. I honestly think this would've made for a better TV show than a film, allowing us to spend a little more time exploring the vast improbabilities of the universe.: ~Johnbobb

"In this adaptation of the acclaimed book series, the world's most ordinary british man gets abducted by aliens just in time to save him from the destruction of earth and he goes on an interplanetary adventure with a Wikipedia contributor and his friends. Unfortunately it doesn’t take very long to see that things are horrendously wrong, what should have been a charming and campy romp is instead an irritating exercise filled with loud and/or obnoxious characters and an insidious poison of creeping 'hipness' that belongs nowhere near the series. Sometimes it seemed like they almost managed to capture the weird british humor of the original novel, except everyone was on crack and as a result the pacing is too hyper and frantic and there is barely time for the jokes to set in before we jump to another scene targeted at an ADD-addled teenager. If this had been made back in the 80's it most certainly would have been something special, but sadly this was done quite a bit later and we all know that a cute or whimsical franchise being adapted to the 2000's generally goes about as well as Adolf Hitler being put in charge of an ethnic diversity committee. Regardless of what the Guide says on the cover, you should definitely panic whenever hollywood gets its fetid claws in a franchise such as this one." ~Karo

"A comedy movie that spends most of its time not being funny, yet also enjoyable. The characters aren’t great, but their drive ends up gaining some value by the end. I really got nothing else to say, so… So long, and feed dolphins lots of fish, I don’t like seafood so they can have my share." ~Wickle

"Hitchhiker's Guide was a fun movie. I don't have much to say about it, but I enjoyed Deep Thought's wit. " ~Genny

"An amusing affair front to back but sometimes it thinks its being more clever than it actually is. Sam Rockwell is especially good however. " ~Snake

"Very disappointing honestly, because I had high hopes coming into this and with the general premise. There are some good characters here that they just never do anything with for some reason. At times the film feels like it's trying to tell too big of a story for its own good, which apparently it is I suppose. The problem with introducing characters you don't do much with just for the sake of having them pop up for people who are familiar with the source material is that people who really aren't are left wondering, why bother doing that? I feel like this universe would work better as a television show than a movie. Not to say it's bad, but I feel it can't capitalize on the universe in the form of a film." ~charon

"Between this and The Hobbit, Martin Freeman is building himself quite a reputation for giving performances that are way too good for the mediocre adaptations of beloved novels in which they appear. In both cases, the movies are pretty good when they follow the plot of their source material, and occasionally manage to really bring something about it to life, but tend to go off on pointless tangents that bring the product down as a whole. At times, this actually manages to bring to life the wild, madcap energy of Douglas Adams' novel to the screen (definitely more so than the lethargic '80s BBC version), and I love Alan Rickman as Marvin. My favorite scene is (predictably) the opening number, an infectious number that sets the bar too high for the rest of the picture. The biggest problem, of course, is that, unlike The Hobbit, it's practically impossible to adapt the Hitchhiker's Guide series well to a visual medium. So, of course, t's uneven, but still good enough to be rewatchable." ~KBM

"I’ve never read the Douglas Adams book that this movie was based on, and perhaps it deals with the bizarre non-sequiturs better than the filmed version does, but this movie just didn’t connect with me. It just didn’t feel like there was a coherent storyline to follow from beginning to end of the film. Don’t get me wrong: the eclectic cast of characters kept things interesting, and Martin Freeman always serves well as a shy everyman type of character. But…I just wanted to watch an actual plot arise from this film. The only events that ACTUALLY mattered were the destruction of Earth, followed by the rebuilding of Earth, and everything in the middle of those two plot points felt random and unnecessary, unfortunately. I don’t know what else to say. It was weird and felt very space alien in its sci-fi nature…but it ultimately didn’t impress me a ton." ~Inviso

"I really wish this movie was better because there are some bits of comedy gold stuck in here. Stephen Fry’s narration is particularly great. However, the plot is just rushed, and the romance feels forced. Zooey Deschanel’s performance is not great here. Sam Rockwell’s character comes off as more annoying than funny. It’s a shame that this is the final product because there’s a lot of potential here." ~JONA

"This movie is very silly and very British. The humor and references completely went over my head. It reminded me of a British equivalent of the show All That. Very silly, slapsticky brand of humor and it wasn’t my thing. A few jokes got a small chuckle from me, but it just came off as being weird for the sake of being weird overall. Alan Rickman as a robot and Helen Mirren as a gigantic thinking statue were pretty much the only positives I can muster.

Travis’s Opinion: He seemed to enjoy the opening dolphin song, but he wasn’t into the movie either really. " ~Stifled

#31 - Westworld (1973) ''Genny - 7 JONA - 16 Charon - 19 Johnbobb - 20 Wickle - 24 Snake - 25 Scarlet - 29 Karo - 32 KBM - 34 Inviso - 36 Stifled - 38'' Total: 282

"I really like the concept of Westworld, and I wish they could've expanded on it because I would've been happy to see a movie on MedievalWorld. Nah I'm probably not gonna binge any Netflix shows sorry. Way too much on my plate at the moment. At a grand a day the price is way too unrealistic but unlike say Total Recall I could totally buy people wanting to vacation at these places." ~Genny

"The premise and ideas are what make me rank this movie this high. The characters are likable, and the environment is cool. I liked seeing the different perspectives of the people who are going there to vacation, with one being a newbie and one who’s already experienced, as well as the perspectives of the people behind the scenes. The Gunslinger has a great presence and sense of menace, which is helped by the effect they do with his eyes. One has to wonder why he’s given all those fancy abilities if he’s meant to lose though. Maybe to make visitors feel awesome when they won? The movie does a great job conveying the fear of this premise going wrong. " ~JONA

"Watching this I realized that maybe it was Yul Brynner that was the original unstoppable killing machine and not Arnold. Despite his short stature and modest appearance, he gives a terrifying performance as the unnamed Gunslinger who keeps coming back for more. The idea behind this movie is an interesting one, and we had a debate where we'd most like to take our vacation to. While it can, at times, be a little cheesy (which is perfectly portrayed by the goofy western ending theme song followed by a much more powerful, epic number) I have to say I was thoroughly entertained by it." ~Charon

"There's something weird about going back and watching a 45-year-old movie after already watching its moden TV adaptation. One of the biggest appeals of Westworld is its great concept, but it was impossible to go into this movie with that concept still feeling surprising. That being said, it's a REALLY cool concept, and just as importantly, it's executed well. I'm not gonna remember the names of any of these characters in a week, but Westworld isn't a movie about characters. It's just a quick look into an exciting but also terrifying "future" (sort of in the way that Back to the Future takes place in the "future")." ~Johnbobb

"And then the owners were arrested and put in jail for life for causing mass murder because they would not agree to shut down the system, and the amusement park is permanently shut down. The end. It had some interesting things, but it was kind of slow with pretty ‘eh’ characters." ~Wickle

"This melding of two distinct genres, western and sci-fi, should not work as well it does, but it’s an incredibly tense thriller that even manages to raise some interesting questions on the nature of technology along with what’s alive and what isn’t. Yul Brynner is menacing as the Robot Gunslinger, and the film crosses over into horror territory much like future films like The Terminator would." ~Snake

"What It Is: Seasons 1 and 2 of an HBO TV show condensed into a feature film.

Why It Matters: Westworld clearly had a major effect on many movies, and several of the concepts in the movie would be used elsewhere. You can see it in Jurassic Park or in The Terminator, or you can see certain ideas ruminated upon much more in movies about artificial intelligence. For its time, it was very innovative.

What I Think: There are too many moments of downtime for this movie to reach the upper echelons of this list, but the concept is phenomenal, the performances of Governor Rob Richie and Ramesses II are pitch perfect, and I definitely walked away from that film wanting to learn more about what would happen in a world with this basic concept. I think said concept alone is enough to make this film worth watching. You either do it first or you do it best, I always say, and Westworld definitely does it first. And, additionally, it also does it pretty damn well. It has that great 1970s movie vibe which is only really dragged down by its penchant to sort of reach back and play really slowly like a 60s film from time to time, but that is also a little bit of a science fiction miscue you find in most of the genre films from the decade." ~scarlet

"In the future, there is this highly advanced theme park that mimics various past eras such as the wild west via the use of lifelike robots. Though the guns everyone has will not fire when pointed at another human being, it is not explained how they keep the guests safe with fucking bullets ricocheting all over the place. The plot is paper thin and mostly exists only to show off how the theme park works up until the point when the inevitable robot rebellion finally begins. Even then, the payout is somewhat disappointing as the remaining third of the movie is mostly spent on a yawn-inducing 'chase' scene through all three worlds featuring the protagonist and a second-rate terminator. It is Jurassic Park without any dinosaurs. It is a western without any stakes. Ultimately, it is a movie without any point." ~Karo

"The King of Siam pursues Thanos' dad (Barbra Streisand's husband) through a weird theme park, inspiring a much better TV show 45 years later. Michael Crichton's original film certainly does have its moments, and many of them do come courtesy of Yul Brynner and James Brolin's performances, which are very strong. But the tone of this movie is all over the place, and it manages to feel like it has filler scenes even at 88 minutes long. The Medievalworld scenes in particular just took me out of the movie with their unfunny slapstick and bad Disneyland walkthrough aesthetic. There's certainly a good core idea here, and that idea was pulled off to much greater effect in both Jurassic Park and HBO's Westworld adaptation. Crichton's not a terrible filmmaker, and he does manage some pretty good cinematography on his obviously shoestring budget. I just wished the film had had more focus, and maybe some more interesting side characters. Better as a historical curiosity than as an actual contiguous film. (Sidebar: the Gunslinger's pixelated POV shots in this are adorable. The fact that it's the first instance of computer animation in a major feature is super neat, though.)" ~KBM

"Westworld is a tough movie to rank, because in its own right, it’s not the most amazing film I’ve ever seen. It’s passable enough, with a decently crafted world that was at least good enough to eventually adapt into an Emmy-winning (I know for Thandie Newton, but possibly others, too?) television series. But it’s a very rough movie around the edges. The first hour is just two guys dicking around a Western town, only for this jarring tonal shift that leaves the main character running from a gunslinger for the rest of the movie. The characters themselves are…kinda flat, but it’s a movie about killer robots, so I can’t really blame it too much. Really, Westworld deserves praise not for what it is, but for what it inspires. You can definitely see hints of Westworld in The Terminator, Alien, Predator, and Jurassic Park, all of which are amazing classics in their own right. So for that, Westworld is owed a debt of gratitude for being the giant shoulders that brilliant directors later stood upon." ~Inviso

"The beginning was very misleading because it was good. The commercial with random people commenting on their experiences was a fun build up to what should have been a good movie. But it wasn’t. Let’s start with the boring sacks of meat that we got stuck with as main characters. Hearing them talking about Westworld to hype it up nearly put me to sleep. But hey, it’s just airplane chatter right? It’ll get better right? No. I can see why HBO wanted to remake this. Capitalizing on how bad this is was child’s play. The one episode I have seen of the show so far was ten times better than this movie. It has so many problems. First of all, do you remember how the movie is called Westworld? Well you would think that it would focus on Westworld right? No, let’s check out the Medieval World and focus time on a character that doesn’t matter to the plot at all. So since we are taking a look at Medieval World, you would think they would also show us the Roman World too since they mentioned they had three parks, right? No. What ends up happening is we watch the two useless chode main characters dick around the Westworld park and do dumb shit, then we watch the fat guy do dumb shit in the Medieval World. Now we all know the robots are gonna go crazy. And since it’s called Westworld, the first kill of the movie is gonna be there right? Nope! Let’s kill the fat guy who is worthless to the plot first in a lengthy scene and then completely destroy the emotional weight of the robots revolting and killing one of the two leads instead. Not that I cared if the leads died or not, but their problems are supposed to be the most important part of this story. WESTWORLD is supposed to be the main setting. But instead the most important twist of the movie happens in the Medieval World. That makes absolutely no sense and it makes me angry. Not to mention this movie also suffers from lengthy exposition segments from the scientists that don’t matter at all to the viewer! This is just bad storytelling and I would have gladly put this in last place. But my bottom two are somehow worse. This has honestly been a fantastic list of movies to watch overall, but the bottom three are just unforgivably bad.

Travis’s Opinion: Travis was very interested in the horses and cowboy costumes at first. He even hopped up on the couch to watch it with me. But he got bored quickly. He asked if we could watch Bleach instead. I wish we could. =(" ~Stifled

#30 - The Day The Earth Stood Still (1951) ''Wickle - 2 Inviso - 9 Charon - 22 KBM - 25 Karo - 28 Genny - 29 JONA - 29 Johnbobb - 31 Snake - 34 Stifled - 34 Scarlet - 35'' Total: 278

"Just a very excellent film, the acting was well for its time and story was pretty good. Still not really sure why Gort’s main directive was not to revive his alien master, but to destroy the world if his master dies, when reviving his master is actually a command." ~Wickle

"Once again, I’m extremely impressed by an older movie’s ability to wow me with its story. So many times in alien invasion movies (this isn’t an invasion, but I’m lumping it under that genre), the viewer is given a human stand-in through whom we can experience the emotions of the film’s events. But in this case, the main character is the ALIEN. And suddenly, the viewpoint shifts, because WE know that for all intents and purpose, Klaatu wants to HELP the Earth. Yet EVERY person he encounters is either overly fearful without even considering the idea that he might be operating in a positive fashion. Really, this makes the whole movie feel like a long Twilight Zone episode, where humanity is laid bare as easily-frightened idiots. But that just makes the whole watching experience all the more interesting." ~Inviso

"The Day the Earth Stood Still: Imagine this, an older movie that has an intelligent lead character and the messages all come across in a way that modern day society doesn't loathe. Done? Well, this movie already did that. I was impressed with the themes presented here and with Klaatu; he's very likable and just seems like a genuinely good person. It's hard to believe that a film was made like this in the 1950's, because it didn't really have anything that was a true comparison to it at the time. To me, it's a beacon amongst these older films because of the aspirations that the plot has; be peaceful and love one another, lest you might find something you don't want to find." ~charon

"This is one of the few '50s sci-fi movies that seems genuinely self-aware and actually seems to represent a desire to move the genre in a more progressive direction. This is a very interesting, entertaining, and still-relevant sci-fi parable about the inherently violent nature of humanity, and the dangers of xenophobia (featuring some anti-McCarthyist undertones that date the film, but not in a negative sense). Some of the acting is a bit hokey, and at times the script becomes a bit too preachy and the allegory laid on too thick. But by and large, The Day the Earth Stood Still deserves its enduring reputation. The material that comes across a bit too blunt nowadays would probably have ended up a lot more overbearing in the hands of a lesser director than Robert Wise. As far as this ending up in the bottom half of my list, well, we'll just chalk that up to personal taste, because a lot of the middle of this list is both very similar in its high quality and difficult to compare because certain decade gaps changed the genre so dramatically." ~KBM

"A well-mannered extraterrestrial comes to earth in his flying saucer, and the xenophobic inhabitants of 1950's America of course immediately freak out over the Evil Spaceman from Uranus. The movie is a brilliant riff on cold war era paranoia, and demonstrates the utter stupidity of prejudice with the contrast between the gentle and polite alien and the monster the ignorant masses see him as. It is very strange to see such a viewpoint in a movie this old, and considering recent events the values at hand could be applied to the present day as well. Unfortunately, the film is dreadfully boring whenever Klatu is not around, and only marginally interesting when he actually is present. It should be commended for its message, but the reality of the situation is the sci-fi genre was generally kind of crap in the old days of cinema and this movie isn’t much different." ~Karo

"The Day The Earth Stood Still finally answers the question of where that quote came from. Does Starman from Earthbound take inspiration from the robot in this film as well? These are the questions that need answering. It's a solid older film, but I don't have anything to discuss about it. " ~Genny

"Klaatu absolutely carries this movie, although the kid character wasn’t bad. The message of the movie is forced but it’s well done here, especially with how Klattu delivers his message at the end of the movie. Most of the movie isn’t too exciting but not enough to maintain some interest throughout the movie." ~JONA

"This falls into the category of movies I can respect more than I can enjoy. The idea of a Christ-figure alien disguising himself as a human to attempt to save humanity from other aliens only to be killed by the humans in his attempt to do so is definitely clever. Still, it's not exactly captivating. The performances outside of Klatuu aren't standout. I recognize its importance to alien films but I don't have much desire to watch it again." ~Johnbobb

"Klaatu and Gort are one of my favorite pairs in sci-fi, especially the design on Gort being one of my favorites. However, the film dates itself with a bit of a ham-fisted commentary on nuclear proliferation, but does manage to hit the right marks when it comes to humans attacking what they don’t know, which is classic cold war paranoia. Overall, the film is classic sci-fi to a T, but only feels average compared to the overall quality of the list. " ~Snake

"I was really into this until the “alien” took off his suit and it was a regular dude the entire time. I thought that decision was lazy and boring and only served to try and sell the “romance” angle. Interestingly enough, they didn’t really get together. There was just an unspoken bond between them. But still! Lazy technique. The alien blending in really served no purpose for his mission. And the only good thing to come out of it was his relationship with the boy. That kid was funny and had some memorable lines. I did also enjoy the race against time to try to make the meeting, but it was seemingly all for naught. He made his speech, but I don’t feel like he accomplished anything. When the whole movie is kind of a wash by the end, that will bug me 9 times out of 10. I will say, however, that the commentary was very biting, especially for the time. It hits home even more in current times.

Travis’s Opinion: When the alien was revived, Travis asked me if he was taking a nap. He also really liked the spaceship. " ~stifled

"What It Is: Keanu Reeves - strike that - Michael Rennie and Gort come to Earth and choose to deliver a particularly ominous message.

Why It Matters: Another great time capsule piece, this movie is recognized as another great representation of the mindset of a Cold War America. Wrestling with understanding the unknown, The Day the Earth Stood Still is easily one of the most pivotal science fiction films. It would go on to influence countless films in the decades to follow.

What I Think: TDTESS has a lot of things I like but nothing I particularly love. That is, aside from a fantastic ending sequence. And on a list where I'm bursting at the seams to talk about what I love in almost every movie, this one sits at a dull simmer for me. I feel like I have to apologize for only somewhat liking this movie rather than loving it like I do for most of this list, but sometimes a ranking doesn't represent the quality of how much someone actually likes something. In the end, this was a progenitor to so many great science fiction films, and honestly if I was ranking these on my normal scale, I would have it higher than this. There are some ham-fisted messages about paranoia, yet I had no real issue with how they were conveyed. That said, they started to become a detriment to the film itself when every interaction started to become repetitive. Of course, some of the message is ingrained in that significant repetition, so even that particular criticism about the movie isn't overly negative for me. Like I said, it's a good movie. But, purely on my enjoyment and entertainment, I can't rate this particularly well." ~scarlet

#29 - Soylent Green (1973) ''Inviso - 6 JONA - 12 Karo - 15 Johnbobb - 25 Wickle - 25 Scarlet - 27 Snake - 31 Stifled - 31 Genny - 32 Charon - 36 KBM - 38'' Total: 277

"The first thing that stands out to me about this movie is just how strong the world-building is. It’s a dystopian society with a massive incoming disparity between the super-rich and even the world’s middle class, like Thorn. And what makes it feel all the more depressing is that this isn’t one of those dystopian movies where the subservient class has a ragtag band of rebels trying to rise up from their station in life. No…all the fucked up stuff in this movie is just accepted, like there’s no other way around it. Charleton Heston is a great lovable rogue in this film (and I love how his method of police investigation involves robbing a dead, rich guy’s apartment and sleeping with his ex). It inspired emotion…more than I would’ve expected from this kind of film; the scene with Saul’s euthanasia was heartbreaking. And even the famous spoiler, while amazing, didn’t overshadow how well the rest of the movie was laid out. This was just REALLY good all around." ~Inviso

"I like myself a detective story and while the mystery is already known due to the movie’s famous line and while the detective story could be better, the investigation is still very intriguing to follow. Charlton Heston makes for a great lead, it’s got a cool, gritty tone and the movie does a great job conveying how much of a shithole the world is." ~JONA

"In a dystopian near future, the world is polluted and overcrowded and everyone eats nutrient bars made with a very special ingredient. A detective investigating a murder ends up ends up getting involved in a very dark secret involving the world’s food supply. As this officer is a douche who casually robs, beats, or has sex with most of the people he interacts with, honestly one has to wonder how he kept his job so long. It is a bit too preachy, and really needed to be set a bit further in the future what with just how bad everything had gotten in such a short time. But it is a brilliant satire of human depravity that manages to be engaging, and the surprise ending still has an impact despite there probably not being a person left on earth that hasn’t heard the famous quote." ~Karo

"I initially always sort of wrote this one off as a movie I never really needed to see since the twist is such common knowledge at this point. While it's not really surprising given the plot is pretty old news and post-apocalyptic futures are a dime a dozen now, it does still have impact. In particular, the riot scoops are beyond horrifying and the euthanaisia scene is painfully sad. I have a handful of issues with the film, it's still an intriguing and mostly enjoyable movie." ~Johnbobb

"I still don’t really like how Shirl is not an -non name like the other furniture, granted, maybe that’s her real name and her furniture name she uses when she’s actually in business is Lindanon. I usually avoid spoilers in my write-ups, or I mark them, but if you know anything about this movie you probably already know the spoiler that Soylent Red is mackerel. Okay, enough with those inside jokes. Similar to most older movies, it’s not an innovating cast, we literally get a girl who just starts fucking the cop that literally robbed her after the man she spent a few years with died. Literally stole the beef the merchant got for her specifically. Sol was a great character though." ~Wickle

"What It Is: People.

Why It Matters: This movie's iconic ending has passed out of its time and into the lexicon of the greatest film endings of all time, right there with Keyser Soze, Dead People, and Gwen's Head in a Box. That alone would land a spot on this list, but the rest of the film was extremely indicative of the late-60s and early-70s push to study the hopeless dystopian potential that hid within the issues pressing modern society. The concept of overpopulation is summed up in a time capsule here that allows us to really understand a generation that came before.

What I Think: I like this film a lot. It has a certain sloggy quality mixed with a roughness that was extremely prevalent in science fiction of the time, but I bought the world and I bought its inhabitants. There are some questionable bits of dialogue that really bugged me from time to time, but this is the sort of movie that sets itself up perfectly for a mini-series on HBO. If you watch this movie, you'll feel all of the plot beats and likely visualize exactly what I mean. This is a great proof of concept for something that could be one of the greatest pieces of Hollywood ever, provided the right director came along. As for the issues explored in this movie, it still is hauntingly prophetic of problems we could very well eventually face in the decades to come. The idea of overpopulation leading to mass starvation is not only frightening, but it's real. We've already faced it in India once before, and only by the grace of scientific gains did we avert it then... but the next crisis is going to be water, and we're woefully unprepared for that. Soylent Green is the sort of film that serves as a potential harbinger for mass casualities in a war against our own planet if we don't heed the clarion calls of films like this one." ~scarlet

"The ending twist is right up there with “I see dead people”, “rosebud”, and “I am your father”. It was spoiled for me way before I ever saw it, and it still gives me the chills to hear it for myself. That’s how you end a movie! Otherwise, it’s a pretty good police noir type story set in a super crapsack world that exemplifies some deplorable and depressing conditions that are a reflection of the times. " ~Snake

"You know that song Power to the People by John Lennon? Well since watching this, I can’t help but plug a new line of “Soylent Green is people!” into it. But yeah, Soylent Green, wow. It was a weird one. It had some really cool stuff like the crowd control trucks and some wild futuristic tech. But then it also focused very little on the title substance for like half the movie. Until Heston actually started investigating Soylent Green, the movie was more like a food tasting and shower simulator. I enjoyed the world building in the first half, but it was honestly just fluff as far as the plot was concerned. It almost felt like episodes of a TV series in how disjointed it felt. Like the murder mystery was a two part episode and then they went into the Soylent Green arc. Kind of a strange format. But I actually did quite enjoy it so hey.

Travis’s Opinion: Travis liked the MGM Lion. He said yay scary lion! But as for the movie itself, it was a pass. He mostly just wanted to play catch with me. " ~Stifled

"Soylent Green is people! Oh my gosh who would've guessed? Well, everybody and their mama probably. Like Planet of the Apes, this movie's most iconic scenes have been parodied to the point where nothing about it will shock you anymore. I'm sure once upon a time that was the revelation of a lifetime, but now it's just incredibly campy. Also both movies star the same lead actor so I guess the dude got typecast a bit. This is a strange future to predict. Did someone really believe that in 4 years the population of NYC was going to be over quadruple what it is currently back when this movie was made in the 70s or was it a hyperbolic conjecture to emphasize a point? Even if the population grew unchecked like that living in such close proximity to one another would surely cause some sort of plague to spread through mankind and bring the census back down to earth... right? And rising heat and humidity would cause the polar ice caps to melt, thereby expanding the ocean instead of drying it out. The science here is so weird... " ~Genny

"So what is it with some of these pre-80's films thinking that in the future we'd all wear these very strange "uniforms" that consist of a baseball cap and attire that puts you in mind of the postal service? The view of the future is disturbing, but not altogether believable either. Having never seen this movie but knowing what Soylent Green is composed of could have impacted my feelings on it, but I don't really think so. Thorn's interaction with the female characters here are, as usual, peculiar for a watch in today's culture. I liked Edward G. Robinson here I guess? Could have used more of him." ~charon

"This movie is just kind of a slog to sit through. I love a good bleak dystopia movie as much as anyone, but Soylent Green is not only unpleasant to think about, it's also thoroughly unpleasant to look at. That gross green filter on all the exterior shots just makes it look like your screen is fucked up or someone dropped the film stock in radioactive waste or something. This ties into the boring direction. There's a lot of people sitting around talking or slowly meandering from scene to scene with very little actually going on – reminiscent of George Lucas' directing techniques, actually. The lead character is also probably the least likeable Charlton Heston character I've seen in a movie, acting even more obnoxiously “alpha” than usual for him.

Where I will give this movie some credit is in its famous third act. The slow-burn reveal of the twist ending is played pretty perfectly, and I have to admit I got a little choked up at Edward G. Robinson's suicide booth scene (even if some of the effects were a little iffy). I'm glad I've finally seen this, so that I can say I've seen it, but it's not one I see myself revisiting any time soon. Oh, and the women are called “furniture.” Subtle." ~KBM

#28 - Independence Day (1996) ''Stifled - 4 Inviso - 8 Karo - 16 Charon - 18 Genny - 18 Wickle - 22 Scarlet - 25 Snake - 35 KBM - 36 Johnbobb - 37 JONA - 38'' Total: 257

"Listen. You can keep your Trumps and your Clintons. You can keep your Obamas and your Romneys. I want Bill Fucking Pullman in the White House and I want him in there now. That speech gives me chills every time I hear it. I would march into battle if that man asked me to. I would whoop ET’s ass for him. Just say the word, Mr. President!

All seriousness though, this is the most fun you can possibly have with a movie that obliterates a good percentage of the earth’s population. The cast is outstanding and fun. The action is crazy good. Russell’s sacrifice gets me teary eyed every time, but it was much more intense now that I have a son of my own. My gosh. It’s just such a good movie.

Travis’s Opinion: Travis pointed out all of the various emergency vehicles during the first half of the movie. He was amazed at the flying fire truck. He was mesmerized while everything was exploding. He thought the words July 3rd on the screen was the credits and stopped watching afterwards. Silly boy." ~Stifled

"I’ve watched several internet review shows that call this movie stupid and mindless, and I completely expected those opinions to color my rewatch. And you know what? This movie IS kinda stupid and mindless. The fact that the heroes succeed because Jeff Goldblum is able to hook up a 1996 Macbook to an alien spaceship? Oh BOY that’s dumb. But you know what else? I don’t care. This movie is FUN every time I watch it, and it holds up now as much as it did when I was a kid. It has such a colorful cast of characters that, even though they are often times absurd in their personalities, are likable and fun to watch react to this awful situation. I teared up SEVERAL times during this movie, namely the death of the First Lady, and the sacrifice of Russell. I know I’m easy to make cry, but if a film can do it, that’s certainly a plus.

Also, the effects of the city destruction are a highlight of the film (though the shitty green screen is much more noticeable nowadays), but really, the action in general is pretty awesome. Multiple dogfight scenes occur in the film and they spice things up to really focus in on the characters in the midst of fighting giant-ass alien invader spaceships. And as a result, we get some really cool set pieces, like blowing up LA/NYC/DC, or Will Smith flying and dodging around the Grand Canyon, or a nuke detonating a massive mothership. It’s all just really fun to watch, and I’m okay with turning my brain off just a little bit to enjoy it." ~Inviso

"The quintessential summer blockbuster, where extraterrestrials come to earth and as per the usual case, a lot of shit gets blown up. There are several groups of characters that the plot follows and who eventually converge towards the end where a bunch of silly circumstances lead to human victory, such as delivering a computer virus to the alien mother ship, which apparently runs its spaceship shield technology on the Windows operating system. The movie goes from a snappy and well paced thriller in the first half to an unimaginably boring slog in the second save for the climatic battle. It feels incredibly overlong and drawn out in places, and could probably could have used a trimming down to a 'meager' two hours. The characters are not good, and regardless of how many melodramatic scenes you put in of dying First Ladies or Will Smith marrying a stripper, they will stay this way. This film does one thing very well, and that is being a high-energy popcorn flick. Whenever it stays on this path, it is very watchable. Whenever it doesn’t... yeesh." ~Karo

"More disjointed than I recall, but I still enjoy this film. The biggest negative I can point to is the lack of a central character; there are so many different focal points that it feels like an episode of Game of Thrones in that regard. But the performances themselves are pretty solid, from Smith to Goldblum to Pullman. They created characters that were sort of personified by a single human emotion and as a team were able to use those human emotions to defeat the alien invaders. " ~charon

"Having either never seen Independence Day or having seen it so long ago that I can't recall ever seeing it, I was surprised how little the movie actually focused on Will Smith, or rather, how much it seemed to focus on everyone else. This movie kind of felt like a game with an ensemble cast where for the most part everyone is off doing their own thing until they all come together to fight off the ultimate big boss... and actually that approach was certified fresh and kinda cool. You don't really see things like that in modern films, especially ones with a couple of big name actors. Anyway the aliens were interesting and I wish we got to see them interact more outside of their space crafts. I would've liked to know more about their motivations, but I guess that would've been counterintuitive in dehumanizing them. The humor was fun, and I found myself laughing more at Goldblum and his flamingly Jewish parentage than anything to do with Will Smith kicking an alien while he's down- literally. " ~Genny

"Always a cheesy movie, the ending song of the movie made me start humming the final song of Star Fox 64 too, though that was released after. Pieces are sad, I cried with the thing about the first lady. I oddly always watched the end of this movie, but never anything from the beginning to that end. The President’s speech was pretty good, a couple other good moments but otherwise… really was just cheesy as I said." ~Wickle

"What It Is: Will Smith joins the Welcoming Committee but has trouble not saying Earf while doing so. At the same time, a political career is put in jeopardy when a Democrat physically loses most of a traditional Democratic voting bloc thanks to illegal aliens who then do a terrible job trimming the hedges at the White House.

Why It Matters: Outside of Star Wars and Star Trek keeping science fiction alive, the genre spent a long time quietly waiting for big budget blockbusters to prove themselves viable in Hollywood. Once Independence Day arrived, the trend was firmly set in stone, and you can pin a huge chunk of modern Hollywood on the unmitigated success that Independence Day became.

What I Think: Absolutely stupid in even the most sensical, coherent scenes of this movie, it's thanks to an extremely charismatic main cast that this movie is propelled into the realm of exciting. Much like a great sports underdog story, it's one of those movies where at the most fundamental level, you just want to see the little guy win. Throw in the exceptional speech by Bill Pullman and the underrated performance by Brent Spiner, and you have a film that rises to the occasion and does exactly what it sets out to do." ~scarlet

"Filled to the brim with crowd-pleasing moments, Independence Day never aspires to be more than a popcorn blockbuster and it suceeds in spades. Try not to feel inspired after hearing President Whitman’s speech!" ~Snake

"A super hard one to place. On the one hand, this is a great movie to watch when you just want to turn off your brain and enjoy a schlocky '90s action movie. On the other hand, it's a schlocky '90s action movie, that seems to have gotten schlockier every year that's passed since 1996. Even then it was a little hard to take the whole “Windows 95 virus takes down an alien race” thing, and two decades later, Roland Emmerich's signature stereotypical characters and random landmark-wrecking come off more dull and played-out than anything else.

Some of these actors do manage to take their characters a bit past the lazy screenwriting. Will Smith, Jeff Goldblum, and Bill Pullman are all giving this material their all. It's also always nice to see Mary McDonnell in things, and even though her character eventually gets the shaft, she manages to turn in a good, nuanced performance as the doomed first lady. This was back in the day when people took Emmerich movies seriously, as opposed to post-'90s Emmerich where the actors are clearly just showing up for the paycheck. Is this movie kind of iconic? Certainly. But it's also very long, very dated, and pretty stupidly written, and disaster movies aren't normally really my thing to begin with. I enjoyed it back in the day, but it just doesn't hold up except as a movie to laugh at." ~KBM

"This really just isn't a very good movie. The effects are great for their time and hold up even now, and I do like Will Smith a lot, but ultimately this is a two and a half hour movie with only a small handful of scenes worth seeing. Almost the entire first half an hour is just government officials running around going "What do we do?" There's hours of cliches and the plot is pretty dumb, but at the very least we've got Will Smith and an unrealistically patriotic president to entertain us." ~Johnbobb

"It’s a fine summer blockbuster movie and has some enjoyable characters, although that’s more because of the actors instead of the characters themselves, but there’s nothing in the movie that really grips me or stands out. It’s just not a creative movie and that really hurts the movie, especially on a list like this. It has its fun moments but they’re not enough to get a higher ranking." ~JONA

#27 - 2001: A Space Odyssey ''JONA - 5 KBM - 6 Wickle - 13 Snake - 16 Johnbobb - 17 Scarlet - 26 Karo - 29 Genny - 30 Charon - 37 Inviso - 38 Stifled - 40'' Total: 257

"It’s odd that I actually have never seen this movie before the list but I feel like I’ve seen every scene in this movie parodied or at least referenced in some sort of media. Really shows how influential this movie is. I can really see people not liking this movie and I wouldn’t blame them. I loved how the beginning and ending acts just had great visuals and music with no dialogue. They can go a bit too long but it really fits and it’s a great contrast to the middle of the movie and to each other with the beginning and ending representing the primitive and advanced. The middle of the movie is great too with HAL 9000 trying to appeal to the scientists’ humanity once the scientists have the advantage. There is just so much you can talk about with this movie. It’s a piece of art and there’s no movie that fulfills the same experience." ~JONA

"One of Kubrick's very best works. 2001 was rereleased in theaters for its 50th anniversary a couple months ago, and I got to see it on the local LieMAX, which was a hell of an experience. It may have highlighted a couple of the stretches of the film that are a little longer than they needed to be, but very few films have managed to grasp the feeling of sheer immensity of scope that 2001 has. It attempts to tell the entire history (and future?) of man, right up to the point where one of us goes through a crazy wormhole and evolves into an enormous space-baby. Apes evolve into spacefaring humans in the span of a single match cut. A murderous computer gets to experience existential dread before going into a rousing rendition of “Bicycle Built for Two.” Some of the special effects shots you still can't tell how they managed, even looking at it on a big screen fifty years later. My point is, this is fucking great stuff. There are a few things here that are dated (mostly the hair), but on the whole, this is one I can go back to over and over again and come away with something different every time." ~KBM

"Really weird movie towards its end, making less sense on what happened with the rest of the movie. Didn’t really explain what happened to the people on the moon, and I do not understand why HaL killed off the hibernating guys. This movie kind of overused a couple classic pieces, which of course those couple songs would eventually be oversaturated because of this film’s existence and giving those songs meaning. It’s not a bad film by any means, at least. I also laughed at the occasional spaceship view, knowing George Lucas would eventually copy that exact style of scene." ~Wickle

"Visually haunting and mind-bending, 2001 has one of the best antagonists in film history with HAL 9000, who pushes fear of technology to its natural conclusions. His voice will stick with you forever. Other aspects, like the mysterious black monoliths and its weighty ending showing the nonstop evolution of life give the film its real magic and mojo, crafting an unforgettable experience you won’t ever forget." ~Snake

"I've had a hard time placing my feelings on this movie for at least a decade now. The visual effects are nothing less than stunning, and we're revolutionary for their time, to the point that few movies even today can hold up. The facing is slow and exhausting and large sections of the film (particularly most of TMA-1) feel unnecessary. HAL is a horrifying and memorable villain who is excellently juxtaposed against the idea of existence beyond human understanding represented by the monoliths. The human characters are dull and uninspired and their plights are never particularly intriguing. The camerawork and editing here are excellent, with the match cut between the bone and the space station being one of the most iconic in all of film. Other stylistic choices, such as drawn-out shots of space station doors opening and a final act light show that goes on far too long, just strike me as weird. Take all of that how you will because I don't know how to." ~Johnbobb

"What It Is: Stanley Kubrick directs his treatise on the nature of evolving life.

Why It Matters: So much of this movie passed into the vernacular of filmmaking, and he advanced the nature of filmmaking significantly with this film. Before this, the idea of the vacuum of space resulting in no sound had never been depicted on screen, and that alone was a huge difference between pre-Odyssey and post-Odyssey. You also have a depiction of zero gravity for the first time on screen. The amount of effort that went into doing that on film in an age without CGI was pretty mindboggling. The story also has influenced every science fiction film about either space travel or artificial intelligence since. And, most importantly, a couple of famous pieces of classical music have become indelibly linked to scenes in this movie.

What I Think: Kubrick's deliberate pace is a killer for me early in the movie, and if you know me at all, you know that I live in a world where 80 pages of script in 45 minutes is on the light side for me. I've often joked that the opening of 2001 is the absolute worst. But if you remember running the Random Gauntlet back in the day, you also might recall that I just adore the character of HAL. HAL is such a great, unique piece of filmmaking. It's one of those instances where, despite being inscrutable, every action HAL makes can be traced clearly and logically from a few core processes. And I think that a lot of screenwriting (and writing in general) works by using the HAL sense of logic - your characters have motivations, and you use them to clash with between characters or inside of a single character itself.

I really enjoy the depiction of changing intelligence on multiple fronts, whether it be the evolution of HAL over time (and is HAL truly intelligent or just a simulation of intelligence?) or the evoution of humanity over time. But the big kicker is that if I was grading this film against Star Trek: The Motion Picture, I would have to take off equal points for both films because plodding shots built around symphonic scores do not an engaging film make. When I go to the symphony, I can visualize scenes that move me in ways that Kubrick's somewhat primitive forms of visuals don't. Look, I have screensavers with more pizzazz than the kaleidoscope of marginally interesting dazzle that Kubrick banks on. But when he digs in the muck, in the philosophy, in the HAL of it all, I love it.

So I'm going to predict that everyone but me is outlying hard on this film because there are definitely two different points of view on how to watch this, and I think I represent both." ~scarlet

"A well known classic sci-fi movie that is about people doing things in space. Except the parts when it is about monkeys. Or about LSD. Anyway, when most people think of 2001 they think of HAL the sociopathic computer and his conversations with the astronaut. Indeed, while this is one of the most iconic scenes in all of sci-fi, unfortunately it is literally the only small part of this film worth seeing. The rest of the movie is a two-and-a-half hour long slog filled with unexplained alien monoliths, bizarre drug trips, and Stanley Kubrick masturbating to classical music while taking pictures of his shitty plastic miniatures." ~Karo

"I'm perfectly aware that 2001: A Space Odyssey is widely regarded as one of the finest films of all time, and I'm not going to dispute that because Stanley Kubrik is a wonderful director and this is an expertly crafted project... however it's just not my cup of tea. I did marvel at how well put together the opening montage was, and it perfectly illustrates the evolution of man and how he came to depend on tools, but unfortunately that was the best part of the movie for me. I found a great deal of 2001 boring, and dreadfully so. Perhaps the biggest letdown was HAL-9000. I already knew what role he would serve in the plot well in advance, but I thought his character arc would be a lot more interesting. As such I didn't care for his reveal nor did I care when he suffered an anticlimactic defeat. By that ridiculously surreal ending with the floating space fetus of light I had already checked out mentally and was just eager to go to bed. I can have immense respect for a film yet not actually like it (see: Snow White or Fantasia), and I'm afraid this is just one of those cases. I could go into greater detail, but I'd rather keep these writeups simple." ~Genny

"Call me a heathen if you'd like I guess, but this movie was largely dull and seemed as if it would never end. Obviously, I had heard of this movie as characters like HAL transcend into pop culture, so coming in I expected a lot more than what I got. It's like three different movies without any obvious connection, though I surmise maybe it's related to the evolution of life or something. The beginning of the film felt at times like one of those 4K TV test screens you see in electronic departments. It was pretty, especially given the age of the film. I can't say it was exciting or riveting though. By the time you do see the film's most well known entity, I was thinking "finally, something interesting". And it was. Until it was over, pretty quickly I might add. Then we get an acid trip at the end. I just didn't "get it", sorry, heathen and all that." ~Charon

"I definitely feel like I’m gonna get a pretty sizable outlier bump for this ranking…because I didn’t care for like, 75% of this movie. The intro is like 25 minutes, and it’s just a bunch of apes being apes until they touch an obelisk and suddenly have their mental evolution kickstarted. I could GET and accept this if the movie made a decent effort to connect back to that scene beyond just “oh, here’s an obelisk we found somewhere on Earth from millions of years ago” and “here’s a weird ending where a guy ages rapidly and then becomes a space baby.” Yeah, that ending is another 30 minutes of nonsense. Plus after the apes, there’s another 30 minutes of people just chilling onboard space airplanes and hanging in space airports.

The middle hour is fine, and I like the concept behind having an AI fearing for its life and realizing that humans are detrimental to its continued existence…but with all the padding at the beginning and end, even THAT plot feels rushed. We’re introduced to HAL, within a few minutes there are hints of unease, soon after that, the humans have already deemed him malfunctioning, then he kills one human, and then the pace feels like Dave just shuts HAL down far easier than the parodies of this movie led me to believe. That’s the real issue: the pacing. You could fit all that filler in if you trimmed it WAY down, and puffed out the space station stuff. It’d probably make more sense, too. I know it’s an artistic movie, and I don’t want to question Kubrick’s vision…but I just found it poorly paced to the point where it genuinely started to put me to sleep." ~Inviso

"When I watch these movies, I take notes so I can remember things I want to talk about in the writeups, and also remember what Travis did during them. Ordinarily, I use the notes to make a fresh writeup. But there is nothing I can say that will do justice to how I felt about this movie except my notes. This movie is traditionally loved by most. I suspect a lot of you probably liked it too. Well I completely despised it. So before I have to hear a bunch of bullshit about “wahhh you tanked my movie on purpose”, here is the proof that I did not tank anything. For the first time, I present to you, the Gauntlet Crew, and whoever else is reading, my wall of text reaction notes that also include reactions from Travis. Enjoy.

WOOOOOOO! Travis asked me to turn the volume down during Ric Flair’s theme. I did not. Planet of the Apes?! Oh hey we’re finally in space for that space odyssey. I thought perhaps it was National Geographic: The Movie instead. I know this is supposed to be a classic and all, but this shit is putting me to sleep. It took 25 minutes to finally stop the classical music concert and the nature special. Grip shoe girl is cute. “Sorry, sweetie. Daddy will miss your birthday because he needs to listen to Blue Danube for like a week straight.” Oh god here it is again. I almost fell asleep. It took 42 minutes to insert plot into this movie. Everything else has been monkeys, classical music, space porn, and shit that doesn’t drive the story forward. Has Kubrick ever heard of the cutting room floor? Oh for fuck’s sake now they’re doing stereotypical spooky music. Are ghosts gonna come out now? Wait...Space Ghost?! He could make this movie fun! Oh gee obnoxious beeping now. Thanks a bunch, movie! Travis asked if it was the credits when it said “Jupiter 18 months later.” I told him I wish it was. Star Destroyer prototype?! It has a little Death Star in the front! Oh hey this looks like what I thought I’d be watching. It just took almost an hour of drivel to get there. Wait...why isn’t that Floyd guy there? Wow that first hour really was a waste. This is awful. You have to wonder why Scarlet thought a movie over two hours long with an hour of useless trite was worthy of the Gauntlet Crew. Please kill them, HAL. Kill them all and bring me the credits so I can watch something else. Oh cool more obnoxious noise while he floats out in space. Outstanding. This is such a slow moving movie. My gosh. The word movie has MOVE in it dammit! “I have a bad feeling about this.” lololol uh oh. Intermission?! Oh. My. God. This movie needs to end sooner, not later! Oh cool HAL killed someone. Even the death scene was slow and boring wow. Oh hey he took so long to float away and die that they were able to perform an extremely slow rescue operation. Yay more annoying beeping! Oh cool HAL successfully murdered the sleeping doctors and won’t open the doors. Oops butterfingers. *floats away slowly*. I would rather watch the Ponies and Care Bears. Oh my God. This is torture. More beeping and blooping. Oh hey he made it. “Yay”. Is this supposed to be the epic showdown between HAL and Dave? Even that is super slow. “I can feel it. My mind is going.” I know the feeling, pal...err...HAL. Spoooooky music again oh noooooo! Vibrating, glowing, epilepsy face. I went to pee while the bright flashing colors were on the screen. Do you know what was on the screen when I returned? Bright flashing colors. This could have easily been a half hour TV special instead of over two hours of movie. I feel like a bunch of screen savers are playing on loop. More obnoxious noise on top of the trippy colors. I feel like I’m watching a security broadcast alert after being heavily drugged. People seriously think this is an all time great movie? Shameful. Oh hey normal scenery with a space pod clunk in the middle. I know he’s in a space suit, but he’s even WALKING at a snail’s pace now. Move it along plz. Guy at desk is even slower than guy in space suit. Please stop. Now I’m watching him eat. Now he’s in a bed. Now he’s a baby in an orb. Now Ric Flair and earth again. Is this a joke? I’m not laughing. God dammit. This is the worst movie I’ve ever seen. At least Travis cheered me up by dancing to the credits music AKA Blue Danube AGAIN!" ~Stifled

#26 - Metropolis (1926) ''KBM - 7 JONA - 10 Genny - 14 Johnbobb - 16 Snake - 18 Scarlet - 19 Inviso - 26 Charon - 34 Stifled - 35 Karo - 38 WickIe - 40 (Wickle also watched it in German. Wickle doesn't speak German.)'' Total: 257

"The grandfather of everything else on this list, I am very grateful to this list for finally getting me to sit down and watch Metropolis (the real Metropolis, not that weird anime Metropolis we watched a few years ago that was just okay). The sets are still spectacular, surpassing a lot of the stuff on this list, and a lot of the acting feels, if not exactly naturalistic, than more so than a lot of the acting from the silent era. Brigitte Helm is particularly great in her dual role as Maria and the android bearing her likeness, and it's a shame she (and quite a few others who worked on this movie) was basically run out of film because the Nazis took over the German film industry. This film's philosophy, though, is quite un-Nazi-ish – it's more of an odd combination of Christian mythology, Marxist ideals, and a little Nietschze because Germany – but it works great and lends a lot of depth to the relatively straightforward Frankenstein-esque plot. Aside from the last ten minutes, which try to wrap things into a nice little bow with a moral that's a bit too simple and neat to be effective, I was as enthralled as I've ever been by a film from the silent era. The 2010 restoration was also well worth the extended runtime." ~KBM

"The film being in black-and-white and a silent movie actually helps the movie a lot with its atmosphere of a dystopian future and its class divide. The special effects still look great, especially when there is CHAOS in Metropolis. Freder’s development is pretty believable despite how fast it takes to change his ways. The version I watched felt a bit too long but it’s absolutely worth watching since it is pure kino." ~JONA

"Metropolis was... interesting to say the least. I'm pretty sure that "erotic" dance will haunt my nightmares forever. Thanks scarlet! For an older film- and a silent one at that- I was shocked that I actually enjoyed it, and not just for the social impact it has on the film industry. No I legitimately enjoyed it despite thinking more than once that the male lead looked entirely too effeminate. I will likely never watch it again, but I'm glad I did once." ~Genny

"In a movie about a mad scientist turning a robot into an identical copy of a woman, the least believable scene is our spoiled, rich hero holding off an entire army of angry blue collar workers by blindly flailing his arms at them. I did enjoy this movie quite a bit, but I almost wish I had watched one of the shorter edits, because this isn't a story that really took 150 minutes to tell. But it IS a damn good story with some brilliant cinematography. Ultimately what made me like the movie as much as I did was Robo-Maria, who was absolutely chilling and by far the best part of the movie. It's a little silly at times and comes on a little strong, but it's also easy to see why it's had such an impact." ~Johnbobb

"A groundbreaking, landmark achievement in film. Despite being made all the way back in 1927, Metropolis still feels fresh and modern, from its great architectural vistas and instantly iconic mechanical Maria. Also timeless is its commentary on class warfare, which makes even this silent picture feel loud and boisterous in its message, with limited use of intertitles for the time. It’s a true visual masterpiece that captures what makes film so special in the first place. " ~Snake

"What It Is: The story of socialism overthrowing a fascistic classist system in a retrofuturistic society replete with robot girls.

Why It Matters: It's the first. And that alone should be enough. It's science fiction film numero uno. EVERYTHING that comes after Metropolis owes this movie at least some acknowledgement.

What I Think: Now that we're in the top half of this list, we're just chock full of absolutely fantastic movies that are each separated by mere hairs from one another. If there's any downfall with Metropolis, it's me. The generation gap and the style of film-viewing with which you need to view this belongs to an audience that is no longer contemporary. There may be cultural differences between the Germany of then and the United States of now that also affect by somewhat adulterated appreciation of this movie, but I just marvel at so much of what the movie attempts to convey. It's a true example of what science fiction represents, at least too me: taking the issues of today and addressing them in the context of tomorrow. While there are antiquated notions in the movie, and the same time, seeing the historical imagination and ingenuity of this world from nearly 100 years ago facing certain issues we still wrestle with today... it's all just fascinating to me. It's like reading Frankenstein still today... which is an apt comparison because this movie even seems to borrow a bit from Frankenstein." ~scarlet

"I want to preface this write-up by stating that however low this movie winds up on this list is not necessarily because of any fault of its own, but rather it’s just such a daunting movie to watch for a variety of reasons, and rewatchability DOES ultimately hurt certain movies on these lists. That being said, I’m pleasantly surprised at how high-quality Metropolis was. The two-and-a-half hour runtime is unforgiving, to say the least, and that’s expounded by the fact that it’s a silent movie. Yet, it maintained my flimsy attention perfectly almost the whole time through. Admittedly, the plot is a bit simplistic and kinda rushes some elements, but I’m assuming that’s just a sign of the times it was created in, so I’m willing to give some benefit of the doubt.

I just feel like gushing about Metropolis just because it FAR exceeded my expectations. The lead actress was amazing, essentially playing a double role where she has to be both the overly-sensitive Maria, who winds up as a damsel-in-distress on multiple occasions…but also as the robotic Hel, which allows her to REALLY ham it up with quirks and mannerisms that accentuate her dastardly plans. Throw in a ton of physical exertion to really sell the struggle faced by the characters, and this is a DAMN solid film for something 90 years old." ~Inviso

"This is probably the oldest movie I've seen, ever. It's a little difficult ranking a silent picture up against the rest of this list, since this movie is over 20 years older than any other film on this list. There are definitely some translation problems when it's nearly 100 years later now; the main character is very hard to take seriously with a face full of makeup on like that. Then there's the highly, highly awkward "sexual" dancing scene with Maria and the group of horny men. It's jarring and breaks your suspension of disbelief due to how hokey it is. However, I'll give this movie some credit. For its age, some of the effects and props were actually quite good; actually surpassing some of the older films of this list which it predates by a great deal." ~charon

"I have a lot of respect for this movie. For its time, there was a lot going on. Utopian society, unique setting, robots, crazy futuristic looking machines, you name it! I was impressed. The story really got me interested and kept me hooked to the end. However, and I’d really hate to be that guy, but the picture quality just does not hold up that well. While I enjoyed it more than a few of the movies I ranked above it, Metropolis just really suffers from being a silent film. The actors were as expressive as possible, which I have a ton of respect for, but I also have to give the nod to films that feel more complete. If this ever gets a remake, which I very much hope it does, then I will gladly watch it. If it already has, please tell me I am stupid and point me in the remake’s direction.

Travis’s Opinion: Travis really liked the Pampers commercial that played before the movie. He loved the gears and the clock. Hearing him try to say Metropolis was adorable. He ended up falling asleep on me and missing around half of it, however." ~Stifled

"In a dystopian future city, a downtrodden working class lives in a subterranean complex where they run the silly machines that power the city. The story is that this rich kid gets a soft heart regarding the hardworking people of the city, and leads us to a plot that goes everywhere from the prince and the pauper to dr frankenstein to the book of revelation. A mad scientist builds a robot duplicate of a rebel nun for the president of Metropolis, which he uses as a tool to incite rebellion to wreck his own city. This is explained as being needed as an excuse to crack down on rebel elements in the underground, except he doesn’t actually do anything. In fact he goes out of his way to tell his men to stand down and do nothing while everything gets broken. Most of the characters look very similar to each other, and unfortunately as this is a silent movie visuals are the only real means of discernment between individuals. Throw in plot points about robot clones and characters trading clothes and things get even more of a mess. The movie ends with everyone suddenly forgetting they want to murder each other and with the moral 'it takes a heart to join the hands and the head', which sounds like tripe found on a motivational poster or somebody failing anatomy 101. Much is often said about this film being 'good for its time' (see also: Toy Story's animation), but in reality there is no such thing. It's like saying a one-armed guy from the Special Olympics is a better boxer than Mike Tyson because he tries his golly gee darnedest! To paraphrase the wisdom of Yoda, a movie is good, or it is not. This film is the latter." ~Karo

"Yay, bearded dude and slim guy shook hands and the girl lived. It’s a happy ending! Also crazy dude died like Frollo, also happy ending! Yeah… I’m not sure how or if anyone got a version where the intertitles were subtitled. I tried a few different things and never could, had to read the entire plot from Wikipedia just to understand what the fuck happened. Wasn’t a joyous occasion, I’m grumpy as hell that I had to basically watch acting and not really read the story, then turn around and read the plot, often ahead of time. Also, it never crossed my mind that the movie was also in freaking English." ~Wickle

'''#25 - They Live! (1988)' Snake - 1 JONA - 4 Scarlet - 12 Stifled - 12 KBM - 18 Inviso - 28 Genny - 31 Charon - 32 Johnbobb - 32 Wickle - 32 Karo - 39'' Total: 241

"Part action, part horror, part satire, all awesome! "Rowdy" Roddy Piper’s aloof and awkward (in a good way) performance as John Nada is the perfect medium to stumble down this rabbit hole of subliminal messaging, conspiracy, and misdirection. The sunglasses that reveal the truth to you is one of my favorite film concepts ever, and the scene where Nada first tries them on is so shocking and incredible. It makes you instantly think of the real world, and how subliminal messaging is a totally real thing. I could easily sit here and list all my favorite parts and lines, but special mention needs to made to the near six-minute long straight fight scene between Nada and Frank, which is almost so unnecessary and overly brutal that I couldn’t imagine the film without it. Finally, the classic Carpenter score puts the perfect little cherry on top to make this a near perfect film." ~Snake

"A big reason this ranks so high is because of that damn fight scene. It is so fucking great. One thing I liked about the movie was the difference in John Nada’s attitude before and after learning the truth about the aliens. Piper’s character acts rather reserved before the big moment and then just explodes afterwards. The aliens have great designs and it’s not just that one fight scene that’s great in terms of action. The big climax of the movie is very thrilling. Just an awesome ride." ~JONA

"What It Is: In an effort to eradicate a group of elitists with a stranglehold on modern society, two homeless guys resort to the use of asskickery sans a supply of chewing gum.

Why It Matters: They Live has become an utter cult classic, with a large and passionate following. The film has been referenced countless times and many aspects of its plot as well as lines have entered modern vernacular.

What I Think: There’s been a lot said about gaslighting in America as of late. Partisan cable networks and politicians often rattle off falsities (fake news) that makes us question what truths, facts, and reality even are anymore. If people can’t understand the truth, what do they even know? Carpenter’s scathing satire about unfettered capitalism can be read any number of ways, beyond its primary anti-Reagan themes. But in the current American political climate, Rowdy Roddy Piper’s tumble down the rabbit hole somehow gives audiences a new sense of empathy for his everyman character. Piper uncovers a reality that most people can’t even perceive, and in turn he has to prove his sanity by convincing others of the truth. There’s it feels so timely in a world where people are capable of living in a reality with falsehoods being misrepresented as truth.​​​​​​​

"I was very confused about what form of Roddy Piper I was getting. At first, he was coming off like a strong silent type. Then he was acting like a bumbling, clumsy idiot. Then he was screaming like a classic Roddy Piper promo. WHO ARE YOU, PIPER?! But those inconsistencies aside, this was a wild ride of a movie. Every aspect of it was as good as the next. The homeless camp told a really good story in of itself. The church stuff and the alien reveal was great. The impromptu back alley brawl was amazing and was probably the best part. Piper brazenly picking fights with every alien he sees, not giving a shit if he is vastly outnumbered is video game logic and I love it. The only thing that really irked me was the girl. There was nothing good about her. She was robotic, she was a backstabber, and she wasn’t even pretty. I don’t even think the movie knew exactly what her deal was and just decided as it went along. Hostage? Love interest? Enemy? Let’s just not commit to any of them and have her show up everywhere for NO REASON! Ugh. Piper was already having to battle in a friendship on a pole match with Keith David. He didn’t need any addition antagonism. But that hiccup aside, I will definitely watch this again.

Travis’s Opinion: I probably could have gotten away with showing him this one. It really wasn’t that bad. But after I screwed up with District 9, I tried to be more conservative with the R rated movies. Maybe next time I’ll let him watch it with me. He’ll probably love the wrestling match. " ~Stifled

"One of my personal favorite John Carpenter movies, just short of the likes of The Thing, Halloween, and In the Mouth of Madness. This is one of those where the social commentary is poured on almost painfully thick, and I really enjoy it anyway (sci fi and horror being two of the genres that can get away with this more effectively than, say, a historical drama). A subversive take on Reaganomics and consumerism (of which Carpenter is clearly not a fan), They Live! Turns out to be a ridiculously entertaining middle finger of sorts. Rowdy Roddy has an impressive screen presence, and great chemistry with the always-wonderful Keith David (not to be confused with David Keith). No scene better encapsulates both the entertainment factor and the unsubtlety of this movie than the scene where the two of them are just beating the shit out of each other for like half an act. I also love the concept of the sunglasses, and the way everything looks through their lens is great." ~KBM

"This is a movie that lives or dies on how much you enjoy cheesy, corny movies…and I feel like They Live! manages to be a perfect degree of cheese to be enjoyable, while I can still admit that it’s not as good as a lot of other films on this list. “I’m here to chew bubblegum and kick ass…and I’m all out of bubblegum.” “You either put on these glasses…or start eating that trash can.” “You’re okay. This one? REAL fucking ugly.” It’s just so corny and hilarious at the same time. And even the premise is this bizarre parody of Invasion of the Body Snatchers, mixed with an anti-capitalist message. Rowdy Roddy Piper is just such a hokey action hero that he single-handedly elevates this film to newfound degrees of hilarity. And honestly? If the ending felt more satisfying (not-Kirstie Alley randomly turning heel is downright stupid), I could honestly rank this several spots higher. But I think this is still a good placement given the caliber of films on this list." ~Inviso

"They Live! is probably the most quotable movie in existence in contention with like T2: Judgment Day, but unlike that movie it's not very good. It's super campy and the pacing is very bad. I get that the fight choreography was realistic and entertaining, but so much time is wasted on it that it actually took me out of the movie wondering when the hell it was going to end. It ends up meaning nothing when David's character gets the glasses on anyway. I have no words." ~Genny

"Very campy and odd of course, this film is a bit of an oddity to me. It's obviously how most common people know Roddy Piper I think, as the phrase he utters is obviously pretty well known. It reminded me of how good of shape he was in the 80's. The premise is interesting but it doesn't really do anything too astounding either, and I feel like you'll either hate or love the very extended fight scene between the main protagonists that lasts longer than some WWE matches today do. It's kinda cool and cheesy, but I can't say it stands up that well against more thought provoking content." ~Charon

"I've seen this movie referenced so many times without seeing it, and now that I have... yeah, I guess that's kind of what I expected? It's hard to call a GOOD movie. Roddy Piper isn't a particularly good actor. So he puts on some glasses, things look weird through them, and his first reaction is to immediately kill some cops, steal their guns and go shoot up a bank. I mean, I guess he was right, but it immediately sends the movie into "what the fuck is happening" mode and it never really comes out of it. Maybe that's the point? There's is a good bit to enjoy here though, namely the long fight between Piper and Keith David. " ~Johnbobb

"A movie that did Invasion of the Body Snatchers a lot better… except also not, as the characters were still dull, and it decided to play one scene off as satire when this entire movie was PG-13 had they not just thrown some random naked girl having sex with an alien at the very end. Like really? Fuck off. That scene was goddamn pointless and utterly unfunny for the satire it’s trying to achieve. (To explain said satire, they were showing that everyone is seeing the aliens, including the TV programs, and one of the programs had a guy doing the sort of complaint about sex and violence on TV). Yeah, I’m often that kind of guy, you’ll have some movies on this list I stop talking about it on at least." ~Wickle

"A homeless professional wrestler stumbles onto a terrible secret with the help of some rad sunglasses that reveal rich people as evil bug-eyed aliens who are mind controlling the working class and gee we're not even going to be subtle about this, are we. Basically the protagonist wanders about slowly in a daze while somebody plays the same five notes on a bass guitar over and over again. And over and over and over and over and over again. It doesn’t matter whether the scene is supposed to be relaxed, tense, or god knows what else, it is always dooo-DO-doo-DEE-doooo. Every so often we pause to get some awful ham-fisted dialogue or idiotic one-liners spouted from our neanderthal lead just so the audience knows that he has barely enough IQ to form human speech. Fighting against 'The Man' is something that is done a lot in movies, but this goes so much further than that, and the result is truly horrifying. The glorification of class warfare reaches a point where the film demonizes those who have done well in life as either monsters or traitors, and are literally not even worthy of drawing breath. In one scene the 'hero' busts into a bank and starts blowing away random unarmed people with a fucking shotgun because he sees the truth and all those damn fat cats had it coming. Jesus Christ. The message it is trying to deliver is so incredibly heavy-handed that it makes FernGully look sane, and in all honestly the plot feels like a ridiculous wet dream of someone from the occupy wall street movement who has sexual fantasies about shooting up the 1% with a AK-47. In a time where there is a proliferation of gun violence and dehumanization of those who think different runs rampant, a film like this is akin to a large bottle of salt poured into a festering wound. It is as dated and cringey as some old-time actor dancing around in blackface, and should be thrown down the deepest darkest pit in damnation, along with Roddy Piper's acting career." ~Karo

#24 - Total Recall (Not 2012) ''Stifled - 3 Karo - 12 Charon - 15 JONA - 15 Inviso - 16 Genny - 22 KBM - 29 Snake - 29 Johnbobb - 30 Scarlet - 31 Wickle - 35'' Total: 237

"RECALL RECALL RECALLLLLL! I absolutely love in-film propaganda. All of the news updates on the rebellion on Mars and all of the Recall commercials make the experience so much more immersive. Ahnold (typo intended) is at the top of his game for this one. While I may prefer a certain movie about killer robots to this one, Doug Quaid/Hauser is actually my favorite performance of his. The cackling, the one-liners, the actual battle with himself, and everything else is just stellar. I shudder to think of anyone doing this movie besides him. The rest of the cast is great too, particularly evil Ronnie Cox. I could be happy with Ronnie Cox being the baddie in every 80’s movie, honestly. The action is great. The chick with three boobs is completely out of left field, but works so well in a movie like this. It’s amazing, campy, bullet-ridden fun at its finest. This is one of those movies I’m always down to watch.

Travis’s Opinion: I believe I mentioned a chick with three boobs somewhere in my write up. No thank you! Travis skipped this one. He saw enough accidental boobs with all of those “PG” movies that tricked me. Gotta parent when I can!" ~Stifled

"So a futuristic doctor is able to plant memories of exotic vacations into peoples heads and for some reason this is a successful business. Anyway, this ordinary construction worker goes there and has a super-spy mars adventure shoved in his head. But maybe he was the spy all along and his other life was fake. Or maybe he is having a mental breakdown. Regardless of what the facts are, Arnold goes through various areas and planets kicking a lot of ass as everyone tries to kill him, including his wife and coworkers. It all comes down to the heroes activating an alien reactor that fills the surface of mars with oxygen and ends with everyone taking their first steps in the now breathable atmosphere of the planet. Shortly afterward everyone dies of exposure because the surface of mars has like an average low of -70 degrees in the best of situations. The plot goes all over the place with evil corporations, worker rebellions, alien artifacts and constant betrayals or plot twists. It does strain the believability at times, though because maybe it was possibly not real that is kind of the point. The silly mutant grotesqueries make the movie seem very dated and most certainly could have been done without, but it is still a fun ride." ~Karo

"The obvious question at the end is if you feel like Quaid does or not; did he really just live out the advertised dream from Rekall? After all, they said the experience would be extremely convincing and real. Everything they said happened did happen; he was a secret agent, he did save the planet, and he did get his dream girl at the end. Now, obviously he was having dreams about Mars before he went, leading you to think maybe he really was a brainwashed ex-agent, but maybe it was simply a meaningless dream that Rekall turned into reality. It's interesting to think about, but even beyond that, the movie itself is very enjoyable. The characters and the world are enjoyable, and Quaid himself is a fun action hero lead. "Hahaha, you think this is the real Quaid?" ... "it is!"." ~Charon

"The premise is awesome and I love ideas that involve messing with your mind and memories. Total Recall’s got a fun, lively and visually appealing world and has some great action and some comedy thrown in there. I love the twist in this movie. It’s very unique and there’s not many particularly like it." ~JONA

"This movie was a trippy mindfuck through and through, and the fact that it was so convoluted actually made it more fun to watch. As usual, Arnold is not the most versatile actor, but when you need someone to be a badass, he’s your man. And he starts out as your typical everyman, just working a crappy construction job on Earth, and he’s bored with his life. He wants to go to Mars for a vacation. And the concept behind Recall itself is intriguing, because it offers a tangible service (which I’d actually like if it were real) that allows for some vagueness to the plot. But then he goes to Recall and things get weird, because everything that happens in the movie is exactly the plot that the Recall sales rep pitched to Arnold. But at the same time, from a cinematic perspective, the plot feels like it HAS to be real, if only because of all the scenes where Arnold is not involved. Ultimately, everything about this, from a secret agent sci-fi spy movie perspective, is amazing. The effects are cheesy, yet fun. The acting is cheesy, yet fun. And it’s an upgrade from Paul Verhoeven, who already did a great job with RoboCop." ~Inviso

"Jason brought up an excellent point regarding Total Recall: You pay your credits or whatever to have these perfect memories implanted of these fabulous vacations or alternate realities, but as soon as you get the bill labeled "Total Recall" your brain is going to recognize them as false immediately so what's the point? Other than that rather gaping plot hole this is a fun movie rife for speculation, at which Jason and I arrived at conflicting opinions as to whether the entire experience was fabricated. Word of God says I'm correct, but that doesn't really matter. All that DOES matter is that you think this is the real Quaid? Ha ha ha, it is!" ~Genny

"I enjoyed the twisting, turning sci-fi potboiler parts of the movie a lot more than I did the Arnold Schwarzenegger '80s action movie parts, but that's really just personal taste, as both aspects of this movie are done well. Both Verhoeven and Arnold have had better projects in their illustrious careers, but Total Recall still manages to be entertaining as hell a majority of the time, even when it's impossible to take seriously. At its best, it's reminiscent of the blood-soaked, manically satirical highs of Starship Troopers, but other times it veers a little too hard into the trashier, Basic Instinct side of Verhoeven that I'm not as big a fan of. The best thing about this movie is the villains – I love a good crazy Michael Ironside villain, and Ronny Cox is great too as the sneering Big Bad Cohaagen. A lot of scenes tend to devolve into loud shootouts with automatic weapons that get repetitive after awhile, but even if this doesn't have quite the edge that other, similar movies have, there are certainly some great moments. Mars has rarely looked prettier." ~KBM

"Buried underneath this otherwise hardcore action film is actually a surprisingly twisty plot that never really reaches the full lengths it could with Schwarzenegger leading the charge. Still, combined with Verhoeven’s penchant for satire, Total Recall is still a pretty fun movie throughout." ~Snake

"God, this is all over the place. I guess I'll start by saying that as much as I like Arnie, he's not a good actor by any stretch of the imagination. It worked in Terminator, where he's specifically playing someone awkward and robotic, but playing the "everyman" is not his forte. Not that the rest of the performances are better. Then again, this isn't the type of movie you go to if that's what you're looking for. I think that was my ultimate issue with it; Total Recall isn't really my kind of movie. It did make me laugh, and it's definitely not boring, so overall I had a good time with it, despite (or maybe because of?) its oddities." ~Johnbobb

"What It Is: The movie that created the Arnold Schwarzenegger soundboard.

Why It Matters: Total Recall was a hugely successful (although not at all faithful) adaptation of a classic Phil K. Dick concept, and it proved to be a massive hit. While Arnold was already on the map, this movie really solidified his starpower.

What I Think: There really aren't too many movies which I bandy about the word "lightweight" on this list, but this is definitely one of them. Nothing really resonated with me after the film ended, unlike much more thoughtful movies further on the list with haunting endings or questions that left me uncomfortable. For me, it's just a slightly higher-budgeted episode of Babylon 5. Which is great, by the way, but not at all reaching the fantastic heights or even the penetrating insights of the cream of the crop (which is most of the list)." ~scarlet

"The Mars suffocation scenes were gross. So was the melee fight when they were breaking out from getting their mind rewritten. Just a movie that tried everything to be an action flick and wasn’t going to be interesting to me." ~Wickle

#23 - Attack the Block (2011) ''Scarlet - 6 Johnbobb - 7 Inviso - 11 Genny - 19 Snake - 20 Wickle - 20 JONA - 21 charon - 28 KBM - 28 Stifled - 28 Karo - 40'' Total: 228

"What It Is: The greatest explanation on why to watch Naruto.

Why It Matters: This movie directly lead to John Boyega taking a lead role in the sequel Star Wars trilogy, and it helped launch Joe Cornish out of being a buddy of Edgar Wright and into a larger spotlight (Ant-Man and soon the adaptation of the seminal classic Snow Crash). And Jodie Whitaker also made her big break here before eventually becoming the Doctor. It also helped reinvent sci fi comedically for the first time in a decade.

What I Think: I absolutely adore this movie. There are so many aspects of this film that resonate with me and constantly make me laugh. The dialogue is so accurate to the time and place of the setting, and there's an earnestness beneath the protagonists (most notably Moses) that allows him to develop as a human being over the course of the worst night of his life. There's also a lot of charm in a couple of the minor characters - most notably Luke Treadaway's stoned-out minor character and Nick Frost. The sparse nature of the dialogue leaves things unsaid and allows me as a viewer to come to the conclusion of the film's quiet cultural and social commentary while still providing a Hollywood-style happy ending that doesn't cheapen my perception of things. All-in-all, it's a high concept piece with a down-to-Earth execution, and therefore it sits unlike everything else on this list as wholly unique." ~scarlet

"This is an alien invasion that's basically the polar opposite of Independence Day. It's small-scale and personal instead of international. It argues the ineffectiveness of the government (both in times of emergency and in daily life) as opposed to blind patriotism. The film is tight and compact and fluidly paced without drawing anything out longer than need be. Also it's British. Attack the Block simultaenously manages to be effective as horror, comedy and sci-fi, tossing in some social commentary and complex character dynamics for good measure." ~Johnbobb

"For a short little sci-fi horror movie, I think Attack the Block does a great job of blending horror, action, and a little bit of humor into a concise package of a film. I like the fact that the “heroes” of the film are kinda scumbags in their own right. It’s always more satisfying to watch those kinds of personalities in a horror movie than good people getting fucked over. But yeah, a gang of teenaged hoodlums starts the movie by mugging The Doctor, only for the gang and victim alike to witness an alien crash landing on Earth. Naturally, because teenagers are assholes, the gang kills said alien and parades it around like a trophy. This is a mistake.

Turns out that the alien was a female, and it was supposed to spread its pheromones around to attract males. Males that come to Earth in droves and chase the SHIT out of anything that moves. And so, the movie becomes all about these thugs being chased through their own apartment complex and trying to improvise ways of killing the aliens that are after that. They run across The Doctor again, who turns out to be a nurse and has to bandage one of them up, but this leads to a ragtag band of criminals-turned-heroes working together and prevent an alien invasion of earth with a little ingenuity and some handy-dandy fireworks. The addition of the drug dealer, the comedic duo of a tweaked-out stoner and Nick Frost, and two of the better children I’ve seen in film only serve to elevate this movie to new heights. It’s really good." ~Inviso

"I know it's awful, truly terrible, but as I was watching Attack the Block I couldn't help but think of Big Shaq the whole time. I'm the worst kind of person, I know. Anyway I called a few of the plot points from this film but it didn't hinder my enjoyment of it- if anything not focusing on the why's of things allowed me to focus moreso on the character dynamics and action sequences which of course made me enjoy it more. I don't really get why Moses got praised as a hero for saving the Block since he ya know endangered it in the first place, but hey he probably ended up saving the whole planet from those gorilla wolf mother fuckers. At least that's what I guess happens when you just leave those things alone and allow them to breed." ~Genny

"Easily the funniest film on this list! The pace is breakneck with some only marginal social commentary and light character development, but I was laughing too much to really notice. I also really liked the unique visual design of the aliens." ~Snake

"Hood rats think they own the neighborhood until they draw problems when no one believes them that they’re fighting monsters that came from space. Just want to point out that there’s still probably a lot of bodies of the beasts around and that no human can really kill these other guys the way they did. So… uh… cops, please. And just remember, when all goes wrong… go home, lock your door, do your homework (if you have any), and watch Naruto. It’ll make everything okay." ~Wickle

"A horror movie on the list, ya serious bruv? I’ll allow it. The best part of the movie is the dialogue. Really quotable and helps the setting of the British ghettos sink in. It’s got a memorable cast and some cool alien designs. However, don’t let this writeup distract you from the fact that Karo is a racist." ~JONA

"A different take on alien invasions is much appreciated, I just wish it was done with lead characters that weren't so morally decrepit. It's difficult for me to root for the band of misfits here when they are portrayed so poorly to begin the film. Now I don't care about some narrative they attempted to throw in there about how disenfranchised inner city youth is. Honestly, I cringed at it a good bit when it was brought up a few times. One character giving another character flak because her husband was a volunteer in Ghana instead of helping out in England instead, or the main character pondering whether or not the government sent the aliens in to kill black people. That's almost comical... and while I feel that shows a lack of responsibility to your own actions, I will give Moses credit for deciding he WOULD take responsibility for the situation in whole by the end. I guess the character progression was okay in that regard, but I still got the impression the movie wanted to say something I didn't really fully agree with in presentation." ~charon

"Through the first act, I was really afraid I was going to spend the entire movie hating all these characters. Fortunately that didn't turn out to be the case, and things picked up quite a bit after that. I got tired of hearing the phrase “THE BLOCK” all the time, though. We get it – the movie has “the block” in the title, and the first shot is literally of the block. You don't have to say it out loud every minute of the runtime. Nonetheless, the initially unlikable characters do grow on you, once the aliens show up and they're forced to stop being idiots and work together (and those aliens are fucking scary; brilliantly designed). You can definitely see why this launched what's already a hell of a career for John Boyega." ~KBM

"I had pretty high hopes for this movie. I was excited about Finn from Star Wars and the fat guy from Shaun of the Dead being involved. But then…Finn is a gang member. Stormtrooper was bad enough! I normally don’t get too mad at type casting or stereotypes, but really? Do the black kids really have to mug people and be in a gang? God dammit. The crew definitely grew on me later in the movie, but they were not at all likeable early on and I found myself rooting for the aliens with the cool glowing teeth. But once a few of them dropped, I was surprised to feel awful for them. The movie sneakily made me care even though I thought I didn’t, so I have to give it props for that. But you know who I definitely 100% didn’t like? That crazy idiot drug dealer guy that JUST WOULD NOT DIE. The plot armor he got was crazy and it all led up to a meaningless final confrontation that didn’t boost anyone’s character development. The aliens were all this movie needed. Gang banger could have been eaten early on and it would have been fine. To be frank, I didn’t like the first half of the movie. But once they got armed up and started fighting the aliens, I had a good time. Their personalities started shining through, they made up for previous wrong-doings (somewhat) and everything was peachy. Everyone cheering for Finn at the end was really cool too.

Travis’s Opinion: Nooooope." ~Stifled

"A bunch of british inner city teens make first contact with a member of an alien race. This group of dumbass cavemen then promptly chases down this poor creature who seemed more afraid of them than anything and bludgeons it to death. This of course leads to larger more aggressive aliens sent down to the hood to chase these wannabe gangstas around. These kids are so stupid it takes until nearly the end of the movie to even realize that maybe the reason behind this attack is that they murdered an extraterrestrial and dragged its corpse off to be displayed disrespectfully at some shitbag's weed farm. Most of the film is just this group of [Editor's Note: Karo used a banned word on GameFAQs at this point] running around being chased by giant dust bunnies all the while speaking in a dialect so irritating it rivals that of Jar-Jar Binks, Bizzaro and Oh the alien. It is just a thoroughly unpleasant experience throughout that adds nothing new to either of its genres, and often feels like watching a loud, foul-mouthed version of Scooby-Doo. Imagine what would have happened if E.T. had landed in this shithole instead of suburban america. 'oy bruv, iz quita bloody big noggin on dat bloke innit, believe!' *smash* *bash* *squish* 'whoa man, yuh merked dat boppa righ' in the wazzit!' *crack* *crunch* 'Yah, dis tha fuckin' block, allow it!' The block not only needed to be attacked, but burned to the ground. With everyone inside." ~Karo

#22 - Blade Runner (1982 or 1997 or 2007 or 2049 or) ''JONA - 1 Scarlet - 7 Karo - 18 Wickle - 19 Snake - 22 Charon - 23 Inviso - 25 Genny - 26 Johnbobb - 26 KBM - 27 Stifled - 32'' Total: 226

"This movie’s setting and atmosphere is just amazing. Absolutely gorgeous yet terrifying. Every moment is either thrilling, emotional or thought-provoking. Sometimes it can be a mix of all three. There are a lot of ideas the movie conveys to talk about and it’s hard to even decide where to begin. Just a powerful movie and a powerful move by Jay White. " ~JONA

"What It Is: The answer to the question, "Do androids dream of electric sheep?"

Why It Matters: THE quintessential adaptation of Philip K. Dick's works, Blade Runner stands as a landmark hard science fiction piece and has been listed as an influence on countless later films in the genre.

What I Think: This film so desperately demands a second watch when the big reveal at the end throws everything into doubt. The beauty of the ambiguity of Deckard's identity makes this movie a psychological mystery - is Deckard a  replicant ? There are strange quirks to his hardboiled detective behavior throughout the movie, but when you start laying out the case for what Deckard truly is, the movie begins to line up and fall into place. Films that explore the fundamental nature of humanity and question it always tend to breed more questions than answers, and I certainly loved ruminating on this movie with my friends after rewatching this movie for the list. I think we spent half the night arguing and debating... and that's a great sign that a movie has reached outside of the screen and really brought some substance to my life. On top of the weighty material, the visuals are an absolute delight. The greasy city scenes and sepia-washed landscapes add to the film’s unforgettable visuals and help make it one of the most arresting sci-fi films ever made. Add to that a captivating performance by Rutger Hauer, and you have something truly special here." ~scarlet

"In the far distant future of sometime next year, Han Solo lives on Coruscant and hunts down fugitive robots. For large sections of the movie it feels like the plot is stuck in neutral gear as the protagonist wanders about the city showing off all the pretty backgrounds. The movie is nearly two hours long, and it often seems there is only an hour of story to go along with it. He eventually ends up falling in love with a pretty girl robot, though they just up and forget about this plot point as soon as it shows up, reappearing only in the final seconds of the movie thus losing any emotional resonance the end scene might have had. In fact, most every character feels so wooden and disconnected that it is surprising that it isn’t directed by George Lucas. Sometimes it seems as if there is going to be some profound point made about the nature of consciousness or what it means to live, but it never really materializes and one just begins to think everyone was just stoned out of their minds while writing the film. Is the movie beautifully scored? Yes. Does it have wonderful cinematography? Yes. Is it hella boring? Unfortunately, also very yes." ~Karo

"They have four years to live, why is it honestly necessary to kill them for being on Earth when they do nothing and die after that time is up? It’s another movie that shows the irrationality of humankind. Not all too uncommon in this sci-fi list. I do wish they developed Roy a little more, he could have been a really tragic villain. Though, the fact that I think that might be more in how much more spoiled I am in writing from movies in our decades." ~Wickle

"There may not really be a perfect version of the film, but no matter which version you end up seeing, Blade Runner’s beautiful, deep, and seedy world captivates in a way so few films ever achieve. Harrison Ford’s Deckard is a weird character, ranging from doofus to badass, but the real star is Roy Batty, who encapsulates the film’s ideas in an intense, lonely sadness that’s deeply impactful." ~Snake

"There's a great premise for something here, but for some reason this film cannot put it all together in a way that makes good sense and is fulfilling by the end. It's all so very vague. Like for instance, why is Deckard so forced into doing this, and exactly why do there seem to be no "good guys" in this movie? He's sort of... threatened by his former superior? Then you have the replicants, who are a mixed bag. They don't give most of them enough time to be interesting or meaningful, like Zhora for instance. She was just suddenly approached and killed. Okay? I will say I loved Roy Batty, he's a great villain who deserved much more screentime. He's really the only person in this movie that even has motives that I can actually understand. By the end, Deckard decides to run off with the pretty replicant after he spends the movie tracking them down and killing them because he was told to, not because the replicants were actually doing something that was unspeakably horrible (outside of Batty, maybe). I just don't know. Cool ideas, poor delivery for me." ~charon

"I like this movie. That final sequence with Deckard and Roy is amazing, and it solidifies Roy as a great character, slowly losing his grip on reality, yet finding his humanity on death’s door. The only reason I rank it this low (and I say “low” as it’s still in the top half of the list up to the point where this write-up was written) is that, while the tone is great, the visual effects are great, Harrison Ford gives a great performance as a lowbrow cop, and Roy Batty is amazing…the movie has a bit of a disjointed feel to it. You’ve got the story with the replicants wanting to extend their lives, and that’s great. But there’s just a bit too much hopping around to various one-off scenes (Zhora in a strip club, Roy meeting up with James Hong, Roy meeting Sebastian and killing him like, one scene later) which sets the pacing off just a little bit for my tastes. It’s still great, but it’s just not as great as I’d like it to be." ~Inviso

"This movie is incredibly dark. No I don't mean the subject, though it paints an eerie (immediate lol) future. I mean it's damn near impossible to see anything. Why the hell is it always night? Anyway, this movie really plays with the subject of what it really means to be a human, and what it means to have a soul. Roy is not a bad person- he's just a bad human, but that's the fault of his father. I felt for him and Pris because they got dealt a bad hand in life- literally. I can't say I wouldn't do questionable things too if I were created with a short time to live and I was expected to spend all that time as a sentient slave. I don't know what I'm supposed to feel for Rachel and Deckard either, because their relationship is odd. She ends up saving him, but as a runaway Replicant him not killing her makes them even? Okay... The way he restrains her to stop her from running away yet again made me cringe a bit but she does seem to care for him legitimately so it's fine I guess." ~Genny

~Johnbobb

"To answer what I'm sure is some people's first question right away, I have only ever seen the Final Cut version of Blade Runner from '07. As visionary as the movie is from a cinematography and effects standpoint, it does have some problems even in this form that I have trouble ignoring. My main problem is that the storyline is really nowhere near as deep or profound as the movie seems to think it is. Ridley Scott puts so much dramatic weight into the framing of every scene, to the point that for me it actually kind of highlights the lack of development that went into basically anything that isn't the lead characters' personalities. Which, in all fairness, Harrison Ford and Rutger Hauer are magnetic in this – arguably even more so than they usually are. Edward James Olmos is also memorable as the origami-obsessed Gaff, and Vangelis' score is one of the greatest film scores from the '80s. I do still consider this a near-classic, and I do think it's one everybody should see at least once. I even see why people love it as much as they do. My reservations come from the fact that the world of Blade Runner (and Blade Runner 2049) is a case of style-over-substance almost as severe as Baz Luhrmann's filmography (if Lurhmann's movies were depressive as opposed to manic). I have my problems with it, but it's a testament to the overall strength of this list that this ends up all the way down at 27th." ~KBM

"Strangely, I did not particularly like any individual part of this movie. The pacing was bad. The characters were boring, even Harrison Ford. His performance was bland and wooden, which is not like him at all. The setting was cool, yet also too gloomy. The action wasn’t even all that great. But I was oddly compelled the whole time to see where it was going. So I have to give this movie points for that. I would call it the best boring movie I have ever seen, if that means anything.

Travis’s Opinion: I might have gotten away with letting Travis watch this, but I decided to abide by the R rating this time. So he skipped it. It wasn’t too bad, but there were boobs and a bit of intense violence. So good call I guess. " ~Stifled

#21 - Men in Black (1997) ''Stifled - 6 Inviso - 13 Wickle - 14 Charon - 17 Johnbobb - 19 Scarlet - 21 JONA - 22 Genny - 23 Karo - 24 Snake - 32 KBM - 33''

"i'm not saying everyone has to love men in black. i get that not everyone is into artsy movies. but some of those writeups just make it seem like the movie is over the writers' heads. (god, i wish their was a less pretentious way to say this but i don't think there is, so whatever.) if all you got out of the movie is "he flashes people with lights" or "elvis is alive" or "aliens explode into goo" you just didn't get it. which in itself is totally fine! i didn't get it when i first saw it either. truffaut's law states that a critic should watch a movie three times, or the review should come with an apology. this law applies more than any other movie to they live. i certainly don't expect everyone to do a deep dive into the movie. my issue is that almost none of the film's detractors acknowledge that they didn't get it (^5 KBM - she actually did say she didn't get it). this just makes the writeups come across as incredibly arrogant and dismissive to me. the fact that people are essentially going "lol this is all stupid nonsensical bullshit by will smith" really rubs me the wrong way.

it's like if someone would look at a picasso and say "LOL WTF IS THIS SHIT HE COULDN'T EVEN DRAW PROPERLY." (the sad reality is that some people DO say shit like that about picasso's work >_>; )

...also, i like interstellar! it just has no business being above men in black on any ranking of science fiction movies that is to be taken seriously. one is an absolute masterpiece and one of the most monumental achievements in movie history, the other is a fun popcorn flick." ~Lasa

"Edgar Bug. Edgar Bug. Extra terrestrial Edgar Bug. Pours sugar water in himself. Crams a waiter in a shelf. IS THAT BETTER?! Here comes the Edgar Bug.

Travis’s Opinion: Travis was interested in weird things like towels and jackets. He ignored the aliens and guns. You know, the meat of the movie. About halfway through when J got the Noisy Cricket, Travis got up on the couch and watched the movie intently. He really liked the Will Smith song." ~Stifled

"Man, what is it about the mid-to-late 90s that inspired movie producers to make a fuckton of goofy-ass alien movies? Galaxy Quest falls under this category too, though it’s not on the list. And I’m not saying this is a bad thing…I’m just saying it’s an interesting trend when you think about it. Anyway, Men in Black is a fun movie. It takes a…not WEIRD concept, but a concept people KIND already think exists, and it manages to flesh it out into reality. Tommy Lee Jones works as a hard-ass government official, and ultimately, the movie turns into a buddy cop film as Will Smith’s fast-talking, street smart Agent J serves as the comedic foil to Jones’ straight man Agent K. I like the fact that the plot is self-contained. Yes, it’s apocalyptic by the end, but for the most part, the plot is just a minor story that doesn’t affect most of the world. That makes it feel more intimate and interesting. The ONE thing I find fault with is the abrupt end to K’s story arc, but again, I’m willing to tolerate that because we got a well-paced action comedy with some REALLY interesting alien concepts." ~Inviso

"Enjoyable at the beginning when it is just Will Smith’s humor, but once that calms down it is a bit disappointing. Also fairly gross, not a great movie to watch with a fear of bugs." ~Wickle

"Some alien encounters are hoaxes perpetrated by your government to manipulate the public. Some of these hoaxes are intentionally revealed to manipulate the truth-seekers who become discredited if they disclose the deliberately absurd deception. No other object has been misidentified as a flying saucer more often than the planet Venus. Even the former leader of your United States of America, James Earl Carter Jr., thought he saw a UFO once... But it's been proven he only saw the planet Venus. Venus was at its peak brilliance last night. You probably thought you saw something up in the sky other than Venus, but I assure you, it was Venus. Your scientists have yet to discover how neural networks create self-consciousness, let alone how the human brain processes two-dimensional retinal images into the three-dimensional phenomenon known as perception. Yet you somehow brazenly declare seeing is believing? Gauntlet Crew, your scientific illiteracy makes me shudder, and I wouldn't flaunt your ignorance by telling anyone that you saw anything last night other than the planet Venus, because if you do, you're a dead crew." ~Charon

"We've got Will Smith at the top of his game, Tommy Lee Jones being just the right balance of goofy and serious, and constant comedy that still makes me laugh. I feel like Jake Peralta from Brooklyn Nine-Nine is VERY inspired by Smith's Agent J. Like Peralta, J is immediately a character you want to see succeed. He never gives the appearance of knowing what he's doing; he's laid-back and comical, but he's also extremely intelligent and damn good at what he does. It mixes the best parts of a buddy comedy with solid doses of sci-fi and cop mystery, overall leaving what is just a very enjoyable movie." ~Johnbobb

"What It Is: I forget.

Why It Matters: A huge cog in the evolution of both science fiction and superhero films into consistent popcorn flick blockbusters, Men In Black spawned a trilogy of some of the most successful science fiction films and helped solidify Will Smith as a bankable superstar.

What I Think: Aside from the delightful and somewhat wicked send-ups of both immigration policy and pop culture, this movie is pretty lightweight. That said, Tommy Lee Jones is maybe the greatest straight man in the business, able to deliver the lines without any buffoonery whatsoever and simultaneously provide credibility and insanity to the concept of this film. I do think this movie has aged better than some on this list thanks to the interestingly topical discussion on immigration and illegal aliens. It's more prescient now than one might expect." ~scarlet

"This movie held up better than I remembered. What really makes the movie for me is the great chemistry between Agent K and Agent J. They’re also fun characters even when they’re not with each other. Thrown in some cool, yet outdated, looking aliens, some decent action and comedy and it’s a pretty fun ride. " ~JONA

"I'm surprised how little I remembered about Men in Black- and yes there's an obvious joke there and I'm perfectly aware of it. Anyway the only things I retained a decent recollection of going into this movie other than who starred in it, was the dang theme song that plays during the credit, and that the pug was an alien. That's it. I didn't recall the ending, I didn't remember a single thing about the villain- an amazing feat given it's so repulsive... I didn't even recall that Will Smith didn't start out as Agent Jay. I may have more memories of the sequel than of the original in fact. Well this was a fun kind of weird adventure sort of buddy cop movie in a sense. I didn't not enjoy it, I just don't think it holds up to some of the other movies on this list. " ~Genny

"There's this secret government organization that deals with illegal alien activity (the flying saucer kind, not the hola amigo kind), and this wacky NYPD cop joins the ranks and much hijinks were had. There is a quite a bit of good banter between the two leads, but it feels wasted on a plot that seems conceived by an 8-year-old and a lame antagonist who does little but lurch about haplessly with contorted facial expressions, struggling to form basic sentences like he has a severe mental disability or is a devout Donald Trump supporter. You can have a comedy without straying so far out of the realm of believability that plot angles that come off as a monkey throwing its feces at a canvas to see what sticks, or as nothing more than an excuse to show off more of the movie's critter effects. It honestly brings to mind all too many of the biggest problems about that era of filmmaking." ~Karo

"Occassionally funny, Men in Black makes the most of the chemistry between Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones and a decent concept." ~Snake

"Here's one that I imagine a lot of people my age probably have nostalgia for, where I have none whatsoever. The third movie would actually have fared better for me. I do love Vincent D'Onofrio's performance as the villain in this – a hilarious physical performance that conceptually feels like one of the cards from the Whose Line game “Party Quirks” (“a cockroach alien trying to pass himself off as a farmer” feels like one Ryan Stiles would have ended up acting out). I will say the more explicitly roach-y scenes were hard for me to watch. The main strike against this movie, for me, is the same problem I have with a lot of Barry Sonnenfield's movies: a lot of random bits of the humor just hit me as really juvenile. Every time a joke would hit, there would be another joke that would miss, and some that would miss obnoxiously enough that I would be actively annoyed. And yet, the cast does have good chemistry, and even if a lot of the movie is overbearingly nineties (definitely not my favorite “nostalgia” decade, aesthetically speaking), a lot of it does work and is a lot of fun. I imagine if I had seen the MIB movies when they came out, and not all in 2018 for the first time, I probably would have a lot more residual fondness for this one." ~KBM