It was a good year for science fiction. Especially in cinema, that eyeball-hogging medium that dominates storytelling worldwide. There were great books, yes—William Gibson's The Peripheral, Jeff VanderMeer's Annihilation, and MIT's always killer Twelve Tomorrows come to mind. And I'm biased, but the authors behind our Terraform project have turned out some truly stellar, genre-bending shorts. But this year's movies were unusually potent. 2014's speculative film fiction ran the gamut: from smart, well-produced action films to sweeping big-budget dramas to thoughtful art house oddities.
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Most importantly, the sci-fi of 2014 did a better job of smartly reflecting our cultural, social, and economic anxieties than the genre has in years: Widescreen speculations about ecological collapse, about income inequality, about self-enhancement, about sexuality and predation offered us a future-tinted mirror to consider our modern moment. There were a few notable absences—perhaps next year we'll get an updated, futurized look at racial politics—but by and large, science fiction in 2014 was ambitious, penetrating, strange, and captivating. Just as it should be.Below are the ten films that most powerfully drove the conversation about our near and far future this year. And yes, it's ranked, because it's the end of the year, and I just couldn't help myself. (Warning: spoilers aplenty ahead.)
10. Guardians of the Galaxy
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9. LUCY
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8. Godzilla
7. The Congress
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There's a lot under the microscope here—the corporatocracy of Hollywood (the big studio is, humorously, the Miramount-Nagasaki Corp.), the commoditization of actors and actresses, and that old crucible, entertainment as an opiate of the masses. Eventually, the characters land in a utopic animated world they can bend to their will: there's no competition, no violence, no anger, just technicolor fun. The real, non-animated world is a dystopic ruin, of course—but who knows? Maybe it can just as easily be escaped again with a self-induced hallucination.
6. Edge of Tomorrow
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5. The One I Love
4. Coherence
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3. Interstellar
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