The Best Sci-Fi Movie From Each Year In The ’90s, Ranked

With the dawn of CGI technology, the ‘90s was an exciting decade for fans of science fiction. It suddenly became a lot easier for filmmakers– particularly filmmakers with huge budgets and massive teams– to realize spectacular sci-fi visions on the big screen.

From Steven Spielberg bringing dinosaurs back from extinction to James Cameron creating a Terminator made of liquid metal, computer-generated effects gave blockbusters a real shot in the arm— before the industry got a little too reliant on them in the years to follow. Some of the best sci-fi movies of all time were released in the ‘90s, full of visually dazzling, thought-provoking masterpieces.

10 Godzilla Vs. Mothra (1992)

The sci-fi pickings were incredibly slim in 1992, with crushing disappointments like Alien 3, Universal Soldier, The Lawnmower Man, and Memoirs of an Invisible Man. Godzilla vs. Mothra is far from perfect, but the kaiju smash-‘em-up is the best that 1992’s sci-fi cinema had to offer.

Although it was rushed into production— and it shows in the effects— Godzilla vs. Mothra makes up for it with genuinely interesting human characters, something dearly missing from today’s monster movies.

9 Stargate (1994)

The movie that launched a franchise spanning movies, TV series, comic books, novels, and video games, Roland Emmerich’s Stargate explores some pretty interesting ideas about ancient aliens influencing human civilization and traveling across the space-time continuum through a wormhole.

It’s far from a masterpiece– 1994 was another pretty slow year for science fiction– but Kurt Russell is a terrific lead and the action scenes are pure escapist fun.

8 Mars Attacks! (1996)

Tim Burton brought his delightfully weird visual style to the story of an alien invasion in Mars Attacks!, a rare gem with surprising source material— a series of trading cards.

The movie’s Martians have a twisted sense of humor, which makes their invasion both shocking and hilarious. There are also plenty of hysterical performances to be found in the movie’s ensemble cast, including such actors as Jack Nicholson, Glenn Close, Martin Short, Annette Bening, and Danny DeVito among many others.

7 Total Recall (1990)

The work of sci-fi legend Philip K. Dick has been turned into some of the best (Blade Runner) and worst (Paycheck) sci-fi movies ever made. Paul Verhoeven’s Total Recall definitely falls into the former category.

Arnold Schwarzenegger stars as a construction worker in the near future who may or may not have been a secret agent involved in a compromised mission on Mars in this fun and thought-provoking flick.

6 Starship Troopers (1997)

Although it’s easy to see the movie as a mindless soldiers-versus-giant-bugs blockbuster, Paul Verhoeven turned Robert A. Heinlein’s military science fiction novel Starship Troopers into a beautifully rendered cinematic satire of the inherent fascism of war.

It bombed at the box office, because audiences were confused by its message— but it’s come to be appreciated as a pitch-perfect lampoon of the military-industrial complex as well as a parody of its own genre, much in the way that Verhoeven’s RoboCop was a decade earlier.

5 The Truman Show (1998)

Jim Carrey made his first foray out of zany comedy and into more dramatic territory for The Truman Show, a social sci-fi satire about a man who has unwittingly spent his entire life in front of TV cameras broadcasting his every move to the world.

A movie like The Truman Show needs more than just its inventive premise. It needs to properly execute that premise, which The Truman Show does spectacularly. There is even a real-life psychological condition— the Truman Show delusion— named after the film.

4 Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991)

James Cameron’s tech thriller The Terminator is one of the great masterpieces of sci-fi cinema, and against all odds, he managed to do it again with the sequel, Terminator 2: Judgment Day. The writer-director shook up the formula by introducing a second Terminator– more powerful and advanced than the last– and reprogramming the first one to be a good guy.

Linda Hamilton solidified Sarah Connor as one of cinema’s most awesome heroines in T2, while Robert Patrick played the T-1000 as appropriately chilling.

3 The Matrix (1999)

The Wachowskis made moviegoers question the nature of reality while also bombarding them with explosions and “gun fu” in their masterfully crafted sci-fi actioner The Matrix. Keanu Reeves, Laurence Fishburne, and Carrie-Anne Moss are a captivating trio in the lead roles.

Drawing from a wide range of influences– cyberpunk novels, Hong Kong action movies, Japanese anime, et al– the Wachowskis put together a truly unique blockbuster.

2 Ghost In The Shell (1995)

There’s an urban legend that when the Wachowskis were pitching The Matrix to studios, they screened Ghost in the Shell for executives and told them they basically wanted to make that in live-action.

Ghost in the Shell‘s, about a cyborg tracking down a hacker, touches on themes like people losing their identity in an increasingly technologically advanced world. It remains one of the biggest mainstream hits in anime history.

1 Jurassic Park (1993)

Steven Spielberg’s Jurassic Park might just be the pinnacle of the blockbuster. It has huge cinematic set pieces, like the T-Rex’s escape from its enclosure and the raptor attack in the kitchen, but it also has deeper themes involving the dangers of playing God.

As the tale of a mad scientist’s hubris unleashing something unnatural and monstrous on the world, Jurassic Park is a modern take on the Frankenstein story.

About The Author

Ben Sherlock
(3483 Articles Published)

Ben Sherlock is a writer, comedian, independent filmmaker, and Burt Reynolds enthusiast. He writes lists for Screen Rant and features and reviews for Game Rant. He’s currently in pre-production on his first feature (and has been for a while, because filmmaking is expensive). You can catch him performing standup at odd pubs around the UK that will give him stage time. Previously, he wrote for Taste of Cinema, Comic Book Resources, and BabbleTop.

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