Science fiction television has rarely been more fertile or fantastic than in 2025. More specifically, between the series premiere of FX’s cinematic small-screen adaptation of Alien: Earth and the Season 3 premiere of Apple TV+’s Invasion occurring this summer, the third planet from the sun is currently under extraterrestrial siege in the best way possible.
Combined with the third season of Apple TV+’s Foundation and Paramount+’s Star Trek: Strange New Worlds and Season 4 of Prime Video’s Upload, hardcore sci-fi fans are having one repeated field day after another this late summer season. Between aliens visiting Earth and the futuristic representation of artificial intelligence as an existential threat to humanity, the world of sci-fi TV in 2025 feels more urgent and precautionary than ever before.
Hulu
Set two years before the events of Ridley Scott’s classic sci-fi opus Alien, Alien: Earth takes place in the year 2120. As the five largest international megacorporations vie for control of the planet, the story concerns the rivalry between the Prodigy corporation and the infamous Weyland-Yutani corporation. When the Maginot space vessel belonging to Weyland-Yutani crash-lands on Earth, Prodigy’s erratic CEO claims the wreckage as its property.
Aboard the Maginot is a research crew composed of cyborgs, synthetics, humans, and hybrids. Led by Wendy (Sydney Chandler), the first human whose mind and consciousness have been uploaded into an android. Trained by Prodigy’s chief engineer, the fully synthetic Kirsh (Timothy Olyphant), Wendy is assigned to educate and prepare a group of hybrid children, known as The Lost Boys, to undergo a transfer of consciousness and help them assimilate.
While the moral and ethical questions surrounding future AI remain the theme of Alien: Earth, the action-packed thrills relate to the Alien biology hardened sci-fi fans have come to know and love from the Ridley Scott-led franchise. Wendy loses her brother, Hermit (Alex Lawther), during the crash, prompting a dogged search and rescue mission among hordes of slavering Xenomorphs, facehuggers, chest-bursters, and a whole new rash of mortifying monsters that attack the cyborgs, synths, humans, and hybrids.
Three days after Alien: Earth’s third episode aired on FX, Season 3 of Apple TV+’s hit sci-fi series Invasion premiered in a perfect confluence of small-screen sci-fi storytelling.
‘Invasion’s Similar-Themed Premise
Apple TV+
Created by Simon Kinberg and David Weil, Invasion premiered on Apple TV+ in October 2021. The story begins with mystifying phenomena occurring around the world, which prove to be a harbinger of a global alien attack on Earth. While the frightening extraterrestrial species look much different from those in Alien: Earth, the basic conceits are similar; not only in terms of humans and hybrids protecting their planet from a deadly alien incursion, but also in terms of the sprawling international scope and the need for human cooperation.
As Invasion skips around the globe to spotlight various survivors working together to fend off the attack, the focus turns on Aneesha Malik (Golshifteh Farahani) and her children, Luke (Azhy Robertson) and Sarah (Tara Moayedi). Other main characters include former Navy SEAL, Travante Cole (Shamier Anderson), Mitsuki Yamato (Shioli Kutsuna), Caspar Morrow (Billy Barratt), and Jamila Huston (India Brown), all of whom have their own intimate circles to protect while cooperating with survivors abroad.
While Alien: Earth and Invasion revolve around alien incursions and the efforts made by Earthlings to protect the planet, they also differ in one key area. Whereas Alien: Earth has no shortage of terrifying monster action and deadly alien creatures that advance the franchise’s mythology, Invasion uses its scary creatures sparingly. Alien: Earth bombards viewers’ senses with unremitting carnage, while Invasion relies more on old-fashioned tension and suspense.
While some have criticized Invasion’s lack of intense alien action, both it and Alien: Earth offer enough similarities and differences to sate even the most calloused sci-fi fans. And that’s not even considering the additional handful of riveting sci-fi shows currently on the air.
Additional Sci-Fi Series To Keep Genre Fans Busy in 2025
It’s Been a Great Year for Sci-Fi Fans
Apple TV+
With Alien: Earth and Invasion 3 running concurrently, sci-fi fans have no shortage of Earthly devastation this summer. However, there’s an additional slew of scintillating sci-fi series that overlap with the two. For instance, Apple TV+’s acclaimed 2021 series Foundation premiered its third season in July 2025, with episodes slated to continue until the season finale on September 12, 2025.
Set far in the future, when the galaxy has been conquered and ruled by despots in the Galactic Empire, Foundation is inspired by Isaac Asimov’s classic book series. Once the Galactic Empire falls, the story follows a band of exiled survivors who work together to build a civilized society from scratch. Fusing ancient and futuristic iconography, Foundation also explores artificial intelligence through a genetic dynasty propagated by the female android (gynoid) Lady Demerzel (Laura Birn).
If Asimov’s inspirational writings are too esoteric, sci-fi fans still have plenty of options this summer. Season 4 of Prime Video’s Upload debuted on August 25, 2025, giving sci-fi fans a dose of brevity and levity. The half-hour sitcom imagines what it would be like if humans could pre-select a virtual afterlife to spend eternity in following death. It’s a wonderful premise that entertains first and foremost, while also raising serious questions about singularity, AI, human longevity, and the like.
To this end, Apple TV+’s underrated Murderbot show wrapped up its first season in July and has since been renewed for a second season. The half-hour sci-fi comedy stars Alexander Skarsgård as the titular Murderbot, an autonomous cyborg comprised of human DNA and robotic parts. As the Murderbot completes perilous assignments for his private security company, it gradually comes to identify with humanity’s flaws and virtues. Along with Alien: Earth, Upload, and Foundation, Murderbot has plenty to say about the rapid transition from biology to artificiality.
Of course, it’s impossible to omit Star Trek from the current sci-fi conversation. Season 3 of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds premiered on Paramount+ on July 17, 2025, and is scheduled to conclude on September 11. Conceived as a prequel to Star Trek: The Original Series, the story occurs in the 23rd Century as the crew members of the USS Enterprise embark on various missions under Captain Pike’s (Anson Mount) command. While less sentient, the USS Enterprise’s AI computer system also becomes a thematic throughline.
Whether stories are set at home or in a far-off galaxy, sci-fi fans have no shortage of stellar TV options as the summer wanes. Between Alien: Earth, Invasion, Foundation, Upload, Murderbot, and Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, it’s hard to find a better time to be a TV sci-fi fan than in 2025.
Release Date
2021 – 2025-00-00
Network
Apple TV+
Directors
Alik Sakharov, Amanda Marsalis, Brad Anderson, Jamie Payne, Mathias Herndl, Sylvain White, Daisy von Scherler Mayer
Writers
Dan Dietz, Tatiana Suarez-Pico, Aditi Brennan Kapil
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Shioli Kutsuna
Mitsuki Yamato
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Shamier Anderson
Trevante Cole
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India Brown
Jamila Huston
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