15 Most Rewatchable Sci-Fi TV Shows Of The 21st Century

Some shows can’t stand up to repeat viewing, whether their labyrinthine plots unravel under further inspection or their relentlessly downbeat worldview means no viewer is masochistic enough to endure the entire series all over again (looking at you, The Walking Dead).

But some series positively demand a re-watch or twenty, particularly in the world of sci-fi where further viewings reveal hitherto unseen depths of world building and subtle clues to twists which hit us like a ton of bricks on first viewing.

Some of the shows on this list are simply the best that the last few decades of televisual sci fi had to offer, and we couldn’t in good conscience leave them off a list of the new millennium’s most re-watchable shows as a result.

But some of these shows are actually fairly flawed and, though they’ll never grace the pages of anyone’s “Best Of” lists, they’re nonetheless well worth re-watching to unspool their what worked about their stories—and what went wrong—before they came to an end.

When Nathan Barley creator/ professional smart-arse Charlie Brooker began his updated, hard R-rated spin on The Twilight Zone, few viewers could have guessed just how prophetic Black Mirror, a bleak blackly comic satire, would prove in the years to come.

Whether it’s former British prime minister David Cameron’s romantic entanglement with a piece of livestock or some more subtle predictions such as the show’s skewering of so-called cancel culture as early as 2016 well before the phenomenon became inescapable, this series seems uncannily able to guess where our society and culture is headed, whether we want to hear it or not.

For this eerie relevance alone, Black Mirror is well worth revisiting regularly.

Well, the first few seasons, at least. Before Miley Cyrus arrives.