TV & Film

Journey Through Sci-Fi: Science Fiction Film History

by James Payne

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Every Single Sci-Fi Film Ever*

Latest episodes

It Came from Outer Space (1953) & Warning from Space (1956): Don't Be Afraid

October 7, 2026 · 1 hr 4 min

It Came from Outer Space (1953) and Warning from Space (1956). Two sets of aliens who mean us no harm, and both decide the safest thing to do is put on a human face. Journey Through Sci-Fi continues We Come in Peace, our series tracing…
The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951 & 2008): Come in Peace, Or Else

September 23, 2026 · 1 hr 28 min

The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951) and its 2008 remake. The alien who comes in peace and brings a threat with him. Journey Through Sci-Fi continues We Come in Peace, our series tracing the history of friendly aliens on screen. This…
A Message from Mars (1913): The First Friendly Alien

September 9, 2026 · 50 min

Where does the friendly alien begin? Not with E.T., but with a Martian exiled to Edwardian London to reform the most selfish man alive. Journey Through Sci-Fi returns with a brand new series. We Come in Peace traces the history of…
We Come in Peace! Series Trailer

August 26, 2026 · 2 min

Some of them came to warn us. Some of them just wanted to go home. We Come in Peace is a new series from Journey Through Sci-Fi, tracing the friendly alien across a century of film and television. We start in the earliest days of visitors…
Sci-Fi Starter Pack: Star Wars, Blade Runner, The Matrix, Mad Max & More

July 30, 2026 · 27 min

New to Journey Through Sci-Fi? Start here. Before we launch our next full series on friendly aliens, we're taking a journey back through the archive with a special starter pack episode, featuring some of our favourite clips from past…

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Disclosure Day: Spielberg and the Return of Friendly Aliens

June 24, 2026 · 8 min

A little bonus transmission from the JTSF Patreon feed. We've been chatting about Spielberg's Disclosure Day, and because our next main-feed series is all about the history of friendly aliens in sci-fi cinema, this felt like the perfect…
The Mad Science Movie Awards: 58 Films, So Many Bad Ideas

May 6, 2026 · 1 hr 34 min

We close out our Mad Science series the only way we know how: with a very serious, deeply prestigious and completely unofficial Mad Science Film Awards. After 58 films and more than a century of sci-fi cinema, we look back at the…
Mad Science in Star Trek: Khan, Bashir and the Eugenics Wars

April 22, 2026 · 60 min

This week on Journey Through Sci-Fi, we head into the Star Trek universe to explore one of its most enduring mad science taboos: genetic engineering. From Space Seed and the rise of Khan to Enterprise's Augments arc and Deep Space Nine's…
Frankenstein (2025) & The Bride! (2026): Mad Science Comes Full Circle

April 9, 2026 · 1 hr 32 min

What happens when one of sci-fi's oldest stories is reimagined for a modern audience? In this episode of Journey Through Sci-Fi, we return to the origin of mad science — Mary Shelley's Frankenstein — through two new adaptations…
Get Out (2017) & Possessor (2020): Losing Control of Your Own Body

March 26, 2026 · 1 hr 7 min

In this episode of Journey Through Sci-Fi, we dive into the terrifying idea of mad science controlling the human mind through two modern sci-fi horror films: Get Out (2017) and Possessor (2020). Jordan Peele's Get Out hides a chilling…
The Human Centipede (2009) & Tusk (2014): Turning People into Monsters

March 12, 2026 · 1 hr 1 min

Two kidnappings and two grotesque transformations. Listener discretion advised... This week on Journey Through Sci-Fi, we head into the grisliest corner of our Mad Science season as we explore The Human Centipede (2009) and Tusk…
Hulk (2003) & Iron Man (2008): When Scientists Become the Experiment

February 26, 2026 · 1 hr 8 min

Two Marvel origin stories. Two very different mad scientists. Only one built a cinematic empire. This week, we revisit Hulk (2003) and Iron Man (2008) to explore the science behind the superheroes and why one experiment failed while the…

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About the show

A film history podcast that takes one big science-fiction idea and follows it through the decades. Hosted by James Payne and Matt Willcock, Journey Through Sci-Fi traces the evolution of science fiction on screen, from the silent era to the present day. Each episode pairs two films to ask what changed in between: how they were made, what they reveal about the world that produced them, and how science fiction keeps reinventing the same hopes, fears and questions for a new generation. Previous journeys have explored Artificial Intelligence, from Metropolis and The Terminator to Ghost in the Shell, The Matrix and Ex Machina. Space Opera, from the Star Wars trilogies and Dune to Starcrash and the silent-era A Trip to Mars. Plus Time Travel, Dystopias, Virtual Reality and Mad Science, with regular detours into science-fiction television. Next journey: Friendly Aliens, We Come in Peace! New episodes every other Thursday. Bonus episodes, Patron's Picks and franchise deep dives at patreon.com/JourneyThroughSciFi Part of the EOH Network