Entertainment

The Biggest Sci-Fi Hit of 2026 Is Officially Back in the Streaming Spotlight

Published

on

We’re just a couple of months away from the biggest date in the 2026 sci-fi calendar. On December 18, on the same date as Avengers: Doomsday, Dune: Part Three will cap off Denis Villeneuve‘s acclaimed trilogy adapting Frank Herbert‘s Dune novels. Four-time Oscar nominee Timothée Chalamet returns as Paul Atreides in the Brian K. Vaughan-penned movie, joined by a stacked cast including Zendaya as Chani, Javier Bardem as Stilgar, Rebecca Ferguson as Lady Jessica, Anya Taylor-Joy as Alia Atreides, Florence Pugh as Princess Irulan, Jason Momoa as Hayt, and many more.

But for Dune: Part Three to perform as some predicted and become the year’s best sci-fi film, it faces tough competition from a novel adaptation that took the world by storm earlier this year. Of course, we’re talking about arguably the defining film of 2026 so far, Project Hail Mary. The Phil Lord and Christopher Miller-directed masterpiece earned near-perfect responses from critics, including a 9/10 review from Collider’s Ross Bonaime, who called it “the first great film of 2026.”

But Project Hail Mary wasn’t just an almighty success in the eyes of critics. In total, the adaptation of the 2021 novel by Andy Weir has earned $682 million worldwide, split between a domestic haul of $344 million and a further $338 million from overseas markets. This helped it become one of the year’s earliest blockbuster triumphs, although the likes of Christopher Nolan‘s historical epic, The Odyssey, and Spider-Man: Brand New Day have since stolen that spotlight. But Project Hail Mary has moved seamlessly to streaming, becoming an unsurprising hit in homes around the world. At the time of writing, it has rejoined the Prime Video top ten in the U.S., ranking in ninth place.

Advertisement



















Advertisement
Collider Exclusive · 8 Questions · 2 Minutes
Which Star Wars Crew Should You Join?
Falcon · Ghost · Skeleton Crew · Razor Crest

Eight honest questions about how you actually are: what your friends come to you for, how you handle a night that falls apart, what you want out of work, what keeps you going. Answer them and we will tell you which ship has your seat. Four crews are hiring: the smugglers, the rebels, the kids who got hopelessly lost, and the one man who works alone until he does not.

🚀Falcon(Original Trilogy)

👾Ghost(Star Wars Rebels)

🗺️Skeleton Crew(Skeleton Crew)

Advertisement

🪖Razor Crest(The Mandalorian)

Advertisement

01

What role do you play in your friend group?
Everybody has one, whether they admit it or not.




Advertisement

02

How do you pack for a trip?
This says more about people than it should.




Advertisement

03

Your plans collapse an hour before. What do you do?
Everybody reacts to this differently.




Advertisement

04

What would you actually want out of a job?
Be honest rather than impressive.




Advertisement

05

What do people come to you for?
You already know which one it is.




Advertisement

06

How do you handle a disagreement with a friend?
This is where people differ most.




Advertisement

07

What does a really good Saturday night look like?
No wrong answers, but there are revealing ones.




Advertisement

08

What actually keeps you going?
Eight questions in, this is the one that picks your crew.




Advertisement
Docking Clamps Released
Your Crew Is…

Four ships, four completely different reasons to be up there at all.
Here is the one that has your seat, what flying with them would cost you, and what it would give
back.

Advertisement


Star Wars · Original Trilogy · Since 1977

Millennium Falcon

You belong on the fastest piece of junk in the galaxy, with a
crew that took the job for the payday and then quietly stopped caring about the payday.
Nothing on the Falcon has ever gone according to plan, and everybody aboard prefers it that
way.

  • You improvise better than you prepare, which is why you keep ending up in situations
    that a careful person would have avoided.
  • The Falcon is the only ship on this list that is genuinely funny, and half of that comes
    from it breaking at the worst possible moment.
  • You would pretend the whole thing is transactional right up until somebody you like is
    in trouble, and then the pretending stops instantly.
  • This crew is the reason the rebellion had a chance at all, and not one of them would
    ever admit to that out loud.

Advertisement


Star Wars Rebels · Disney XD · 2014 to 2018

The Ghost

You belong with the crew that turned a tiny cell of misfits into
an actual rebellion. The Ghost is a home before it is a ship, and everybody who boards it
arrived with something broken that the rest of them decided to look after.

  • Found family is the whole engine here, and Rebels earns it by making you watch these
    people choose each other over and over again.
  • You are in it for the cause, but what actually keeps you going is the four people who
    would notice immediately if you stopped showing up.
  • Hera is one of the best captains in the franchise, and the show is smart enough to make
    her competence the quiet centre of everything.
  • This crew pays for its wins, which is exactly what makes the wins land the way they do.

Advertisement


Skeleton Crew · Disney+ · Since 2024

The Skeleton Crew

You belong with the four kids who found a buried ship, launched
it by accident and are now extremely lost in a galaxy that eats people like them. Nobody
here knows what they are doing, and that turns out to be the fun of it.

  • Your instinct is to open the door that says do not open, and you would do it again
    tomorrow.
  • Skeleton Crew is the closest Star Wars has come to an eighties adventure movie, where
    the stakes are real but the wonder never gets sanded off.
  • You make friends out of whoever is standing next to you when things go wrong, which is a
    genuinely useful survival skill.
  • The pirates in this one are properly frightening, and that is precisely why the kids
    being out of their depth works so well.

Advertisement


The Mandalorian · Disney+ · Since 2019

The Razor Crest

You belong in the quietest ship in the galaxy, with one small
passenger and a code you have never explained to anybody. You told yourself this was a job,
and then it stopped being a job somewhere around the second week.

  • You work alone by preference and by habit, which lasts exactly as long as it takes for
    somebody small to need looking after.
  • The Mandalorian works because almost nothing gets said out loud, and the armour does the
    acting that a face usually would.
  • Your loyalty is narrow and absolute, so there are very few people on your list and
    nothing will move you off it.
  • The Mandalorian and Grogu took all of that to the big screen over Memorial Day 2026, the
    first Star Wars film in seven years.
Advertisement

Ryan Gosling Has Joined Two More Iconic Franchises

After delivering an arguably career-defining performance in Project Hail Mary, Gosling has his sights set on a galaxy far, far away. He will join director Shawn Levy on the upcoming Star Wars: Starfighter, before finally taking the MCU plunge with the same man, who will direct him in a new Ghost Rider film that was announced during Marvel Studios’ Hall H presentation at San Diego Comic-Con 2026.

Project Hail Mary is available to stream on Prime Video. Stay tuned to Collider for more streaming updates.

Advertisement


Advertisement


Release Date

March 15, 2026

Advertisement

Runtime

157 minutes

Director
Advertisement

Christopher Miller, Phil Lord

Writers

Drew Goddard, Andy Weir

Advertisement

Producers

Aditya Sood, Amy Pascal, Andy Weir, Christopher Miller, Phil Lord, Rachel O’Connor, Ryan Gosling

Advertisement

Advertisement

Advertisement


Advertisement

Source link

You must be logged in to post a comment Login

Leave a Reply

Cancel reply

Trending

Exit mobile version