Summary
The first season of HBO’s seriesDune: Prophecyhas concluded, and it’s a cliffhanger ending that likely won’t be resolved until some time in 2026. At this point, the next season of the series will drop even before the third installment of Villeneuve’s trilogy, which has an expected release date of December 2026.
That’s a long time to wait, but fans of the series have a few options to keep them occupied until then. There are several other series that use science fiction, political intrigue, and ancient prophecies to tell their stories.
Adapted from a series of novels of the same name,The Expansewas written by Daniel Abraham and Ty Franck under the name James S. A. Corey. The show is set in the future when humans have colonized most of the solar system,with colonies on Mars, the moons of Jupiter and Saturn, and several locations in the Asteroid Belt.
There’s a tenuous peace between all of these various social and political interests, including the Martian Congressional Public and the Outer Planets Alliance. The story revolves around the motley crew of James Holden, which includes a detective and a former politician, who get mixed up in not only politics, but a deeper mystery that involves alien technology and threatens all of humanity.
A science fiction thriller fromthe folks in Netflix Germany,Darkis as much a psychological drama and dark fantasy as it is science fiction. The setting is a fictional city called Windon, and the events of the show are set in motion when a child disappears in the nearby woods.
Urban legends already abound in the little town about the dangerous woods and the mysterious cave therein. As the plot unravels, it reveals the dark secrets of four local families and the time-travel conspiracy they’ve been involved in for generations.
Just like the name implies, this show is a dystopian science fiction story in which the last of humanity’s surviving population is confined to a gigantic underground silo. An interesting connection withDuneis the main character, Juliette Nichols, played by Rebecca Ferguson, who also stars in theDunemovies as Jessica Atreides.
10,000 people are living in this silo, and they’ve been told that the surface of the earth is a toxic wasteland, so nobody leaves for their own protection. The society is strictly controlled, with anyone wishing to “go out” being punished by getting their wish. Couples need permission to try and conceive children, and one of the main characters becomes suspicious when she finds out her birth control removal has been sabotaged.
Foundationis loosely based on the Isaac Asimov novels of the same name, which were famously the same books that inspired theStar Warssaga along with many other science fiction writers. LikeDune, the story takes place in a distant future in which the galaxy is ruled by a despotic Emperor whose reign has lasted for centuries.
Emperor Cleon and his clones rule this universe, and one of its denizens is a mathematician named Gaal who has foreseen a series of catastrophes that lead to the fall of the empire. Gaal and his followers plan to create a repository of knowledge, or a Foundation, to preserve their society as the Empire crumbles.
This dark fantasy is basedon the trilogy of books by Philip Pullman in which humans live in a multidimensional reality and have animal companions known as “daemons.” Lyra, the main character of the show, has a companion named Pan. In the tradition of children’s daemons, he hasn’t decided on his shape yet.
Lyra lives and goes to school at Jordan College, and when a fellow student goes missing, her quest to find him uncovers a secret plot between a ruling monarch and a mysterious woman named Marisa Coulter. This leads to the discovery of a mysterious substance called Dust and extensive travel to other worlds and dimensions.
For those viewers more interested in how events like the Butlerian Jihad can happen,Westworldis an ideal choice, but told from the point of view of the robots. The show is based on a 1973 movie of the same name and includes some of the same characters, settings, and plotlines.
The show has a unique aesthetic that combines the genres of science fiction and theOld West period, set in an amusement park that’s intended to replicate an old-timey frontier town, complete with a saloon, cattle rustlers, and Cabaret girls. In later seasons, the AI would eventually become aware of their situation and rebel, eventually breaking out of the park and into the real world.
The dark fantasyGame Of Throneshas the same despotic government and social intrigue that also frame the story ofDune: Prophecy.HBO borrowed a few ideas about costuming and sets from one of their most successful series when they made their science fiction prequel.
The adaptations of George R. R. Martin’sA Song Of Ice And Fireseries have become so ubiquitous in pop culture that even people who haven’t seen the series understand the basic premise andrecognize the main characters. Max also has the spinoff show,House of the Dragon, which traces the rise of House Targaryen.
