The sci-fi TV shows discussion thread

It does seem like we're of the same mind on SF series and while, to some extent, it is perhaps about how much either of us read into fiction I do believe there are plenty of SF series which explore politics and or philosophy...

Here let me throw out a few current series, I believe, have blatant political and/or philosophical content:

• The Expanse (we probably agree on this, though)

• A Handmaid's Tale

• Man in the High Castle

• Twilight Zone (the current series)

• Black Mirror

• Doctor Who (the current run is very much morality plays in the tradition of Star Trek:TOS)

• 3%

• Altered Carbon

• Stan Lee's Lucky Man

• The Orville

Here are a couple current series which are a little more subtle with political and/or philosophical content:

• The 100 (Talk about moral compromise...)

• Westworld (Which is about identity, technology and even racism, to an extent)

Also here are a some defunked series to add to the list (though to be fair a lot of these are about identity but many focus on different aspects of identity):

• Travelers (Moral and ethical dilemmas abound in this series, as you know)

• The OA

• Limitless

• Fringe

• Deadly Class

• Philip K. Dick’s Electric Dreams (The nature of who we are and how we effects our reality)

• Star Wars: The Clone Wars (Yes, Clone Wars was filled with moral dilemmas and shady politics)

• Leftovers (Is basically all philosophical conversations)

• Timeless

• Extant (What is reality?)

• Sense8 (What is compassion and how can it connect us?)

• Humans (If it is free thought that makes us real what of those machines we build?)

• Almost Human (What makes us human?)

• Orphan Black (How unique are you, really?)

• Legion (What makes us who we are? How far is too far in making a better world? Etc...)

• Dark Matter (Are you simply the sum of your experiences?)

And if you throw Anime into it, the list would be as long as your arm

My point being, here, IS there are actually a lot of SF programs out there which tackle the deeper topics and while some of it requires the audience to do some work (unlike the morality plays of TOS) it exists. And though, as I said previously, there is a certain homogenization in the look and/or the politics of fictional futures there is a multitude of branches to that tree. The future world of, say, Altered Carbon might be very like that of Dark Matter. They may even overlap in what they explore about those futures and humanity, that being said, it seems to me that they do it in decidedly different ways. For this I feel that we are very lucky to have so many to choose from when it comes to SF with deeper themes as well as have plenty of series that are just mindless fun (some even have both).

Now I don't expect you, or anyone who feels the way you do, to agree with me just by reading this but perhaps... just perhaps, it will give you something to consider?! If not c'est le guerre...