Film

Star Trek: First Contact

The best of the Star Trek films because it finally lets the show be scary. Picard's Enterprise chases a Borg incursion back to 1963, splitting into a claustrophobic ship-under-siege horror story and a warmer comic plot about humanity's first contact with aliens. Confident, tense, occasionally very funny — and it takes its captain's obsessions dead seriously.

TMDb rating7.3

If you liked this

Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan1982

The template for every good Trek film since: a personal, aging villain, real stakes, and a captain forced to confront his own choices rather than just fire phasers. Still the gold standard.

But Slower pace, dated effects, and a plot that leans hard on prior series knowledge you may not have.

Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan poster

Aliens1986

Cameron's own dry run for the siege-on-a-vessel structure First Contact borrows wholesale — soldiers, a queen, and dwindling numbers in tight corridors. Pure adrenaline, brilliantly staged.

But Considerably more violent and body-horror-adjacent than anything Trek would attempt.

Aliens poster

Terminator 2: Judgment Day1991

An unstoppable, adaptive machine menace and a small crew improvising against it, with the same Cameron instinct for scale and momentum. Arguably still his best film.

But Action-first filmmaking with far less interest in ideas or dialogue than Trek fans might want.

Terminator 2: Judgment Day poster

The wildcard

Something you would not have found on your own.

Invasion of the Body Snatchers1956

The Borg's collective 'resistance is futile' logic is this film's body-snatching conformity dread, just moved from a small American town to the galaxy.

Black-and-white Cold War paranoia about losing your individuality to something that looks like community — the Borg's whole horror, forty years earlier and scarier for being human-scaled.

But Slow by modern standards, and the effects are entirely suggestion rather than spectacle.

Invasion of the Body Snatchers poster
More like this (8)

Galaxy Quest1999

A loving, note-perfect satire of exactly this franchise, with real emotional stakes hiding under the jokes. Impossible not to grin through.

But Comedy first, sci-fi second — if you want another straight adventure, this isn't it.

Galaxy Quest poster

Star Trek2009

Another crew, another time-travel villain, another Enterprise in crisis — a fizzy, fast reintroduction to this universe for anyone who wants more of the same energy with new faces.

But Younger, glossier, and more interested in momentum than the philosophical weight the TNG era had.

Star Trek poster

Independence Day1996

Same year, same pulpy confidence, different flavor: humanity banding together against an overwhelming alien force, played entirely straight and enormous.

But Broader, cheesier, and far less interested in character than in spectacle.

Independence Day poster

Event Horizon1997

If the Borg-infested corridors were your favorite part, this doubles down — a ship, a crew, and something inhuman spreading through the walls. Genuinely unsettling.

But This is horror first, sci-fi second, and it gets considerably nastier than Trek ever would.

Event Horizon poster

Serenity2005no page yet

A tight ensemble crew, banter under pressure, and a film-sized send-off to a beloved show — the same pleasure of familiar faces facing a bigger threat than usual.

But Works best if you've seen Firefly first; some emotional beats land harder with that context.

Stargate1994no page yet

Pulpy, earnest, big-scale adventure sci-fi from the same era, with a real sense of wonder about what's on the other side of the unknown.

But Thinner characters and a simpler moral universe than Trek's usual ambitions.

Ghost in the Shell1995

Both stories ask what's left of a person once machinery starts doing the thinking — First Contact just answers with a phaser instead of a question mark.

A meditative Japanese anime about a cyborg operative wondering where her humanity ends and the machine begins — gorgeous, philosophical, quietly unsettling in exactly the way Data's arc gestures at.

But Contemplative and talky where you might want action; the pacing is deliberately slow and dreamlike.

Ghost in the Shell poster

The Stepford Wives1975

Same nightmare as the Borg — losing yourself into a uniform 'we' — shrunk from the cosmos down to a cul-de-sac, and played as creeping satire rather than action.

A satirical horror about a community quietly replacing its women with obedient, identical copies — assimilation dressed as suburban perfection instead of galactic conquest.

But Dated gender politics and a much smaller, domestic register than a starship battle.

The Stepford Wives poster

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Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan