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Science fiction is a well-known and popular genre with dozens, if not hundreds of new movies and TV shows premiering each year. However, considering that science fiction has so many subgenres, there are some that might not be so familiar to the audience and are underrepresented.
New Weird is one of them since this subgenre is still primarily in literature and only a handful of movies and TV shows can be said to fit it. Luckily, some of them are awesome enough to help people get into the genre. New Weird can seem less accessible at first but as soon as the audience learns its basic principles, they're in for a unique experience.
5 Donnie Darko (2001)
Since its release in 2001, Donnie Darko has already become one of the science fiction cult classics. Just like many New Weird tales, it doesn't always make sense, and it's up to the audience to try and decipher what's going on. Another aspect of the movie that's usual for New Weird is that it toys with philosophy and mixes multiple science fiction elements, such as time travel and space. Jake Gyllenhaal is excellent in the titular role of Donnie, a young man who sees a large talking rabbit Frank and might be the only one capable of stopping the end of the world.
The movie is known for being hard to interpret, but it has both a talented cast (other than Gyllenhaal, it also stars his sister Maggie Gyllenhaal and Patrick Swayze) and a soundtrack that fits the overall mood of the movie. For the director Richard Kelly, Donnie Darko was his directorial debut and even though Kelly went on to direct two more feature films, to this day, Donnie Darko remains his most talked-about and iconic movie.
4 John Dies At The End (2012)
John Dies at the End is one of the New Weird movies that mixes multiple genres, such as comedy and thriller, and it's very much unpredictable, which is usual for New Weird movies. It tells the story of a world where a new drug can help a person travel through time and space, but the downside is that some people who take it stop being human. In the end, it's up to John to stop the end of the world or die trying.
The movie is both funny and intense since it's unclear what's going to happen the next moment if everybody's going to die or not. In the end, though, the movie isn't about the result, but about the journey the characters undertake to get there...and this journey is both crazy (in the best meaning of the world) and unforgettable.
3 Annihilation (2018)
One of the best-known New Weird movies is based on Jeff VanderMeer's book and directed by Alex Garland who previously directed the critically acclaimed science fiction movie Ex Machina (2015). The movie centers on Lena (Natalie Portman), a biologist who goes on to explore a strange new ecosystem that appeared on Earth. Lena has a personal motivation as well since she wants to learn what happened to her missing husband Kane (Oscar Isaacs).
The movie offers a big mystery and keeps the audience guessing as to what's going on, whether Lena will succeed in her mission and reunite with her husband or not. It can be challenging to try to grasp what's going on in Annihilation since the movie leaves room for interpretation, but it's still more accessible than other stories belonging to this genre.
2 Legion
Superhero shows are usually civil and accessible even when they work with science fiction concepts impossible in the real world, such as time travel or special powers. But Legion stands out among the rest and can easily be considered a New Weird TV show. David Haller (Dan Stevens) has been living with the diagnosis of schizophrenia, but things get more complicated when he discovers that he has special powers.
On paper, the story sounds like a common superhero origin story, but the way Legion presents it is anything but common. It makes it difficult to know what's real and what's not since David himself struggles with this. Dan Stevens also gives an excellent performance. Legion ran for three seasons and has 27 episodes in total.
1 The OA
One of the TV shows that can be considered a part of the New Weird genre ran for two seasons and 16 episodes in total. The show centers on Prairie Johnson (Brit Marling) who appears in her home city seven years after her mysterious disappearance. But she's no longer the same as she once was.
Prairie not only can now see, even though she was once blind, but she also refuses to tell her family the truth about what happened to her. In this case, the truth might be stranger than anybody could have imagined. The OA didn't draw too much attention to itself while it aired despite offering a clever and surprising story that keeps the viewers invested. It helps that Marlin's Prairie is sympathetic, and it's intriguing to watch how her life will evolve after her return.