Although recognizable brands still drive audiences to theaters, the promise of an epic space odyssey on the big screen is often enough to persuade audiences to take a chance on an original film not based on any pre-existing character or video game, as seen with one of 2026's smash hits, Project Hail Mary. Between Interstellarand the Dune movies, sci-fi and space movies are as fashionable as ever, and they routinely amount to box office titans amid the glut of IP.

In most cases, science fiction films err on the side of fiction rather than reality. Sometimes a film, such as Star Wars, is a fantasy film disguised as a sci-fi spectacle, or a film will deviate so far from genuine science that it is pure imagination. Occasionally, science movies will accurately incorporate genre tropes with elements of real-life physics, biology, quantum mechanics, etc. Science-related movies are often more enjoyable when they're based on real science – not every sci-fi flick can pull it off.