Lucy Owens

The unfortunate truth about sci-fi sequels is that most of them are doomed to become a pale imitation of the movies that preceded them. Case in point are disappointments like The Matrix Reloaded, Jurassic Park III, or Independence Day: Resurgence, which all struggled to recapture the magic of the originals. More important than the monetary budget for a sci-fi sequel is the vision that’s guiding it, and once in a while, a great filmmaker comes along and makes a sequel that lives up to the hype.

In the early 1990s, sci-fi TV was turning away from the planet-of-the-week format and towards longer serialized season arcs. Hit shows like Star Trek: The Next Generation were already expanding what syndicated sci-fi could accomplish, but the idea of a fully serialized and meticulously planned television narrative, like the ones we see today, hadn’t been attempted yet. That is, until one of the era’s most iconic series premiered with a particularly distinctive pilot.

Around the turn of the millennium, science fiction TV was undergoing a period of intense evolution. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, shows were turning towards a serialized format just as cable networks began taking bigger creative swings. It was the cusp of the prestige television era, and sci-fi was getting bigger, weirder, and more cinematic. In the decades since, many defining sci-fi series from the era have returned in some form.