Hail to the Geek: President Obama's Essential Sci-Fi Viewing

Photo by Christopher Anderson for WIRED(WASHINGTON, DC) — It’s well known that President Obama is pretty steeped in geek culture.  He’s a self-confessed sci-fi fan and even once appeared in a Spider-Man comic, so the POTUS guest-editing Wired magazine‘s a good fit.

As such, the president offers a list of his eight favorite sci-fi movies and shows, and what he thinks about each.

Topping Obama’s list is 1969’s influential Stanley Kubrick film 2001: A Space Odyssey, which the president says “captures the grandeur and scale of the unknown.”

Star Wars: Episode IV — A New Hope made #4 on Mr. Obama’s list, “because it was fun and revolutionized special effects,” and is “the ultimate science-fiction popcorn flick,” and gave birth to the franchise that, “will entertain people for generations to come.”

Obama’s most recent entry on the list is 2015’s The Martian, which he says is “my favorite movie of last year,” in part because it “shows humans as problem solvers.” 

Other notables include the original Star Trek TV series, which Obama says “wasn’t actually about technology. It was about values and relationships,” and The Matrix, “because it asks basic questions about our reality — nd looks very cool.”

Here are President Obama’s essential sci-fi TV shows and films:

1. 2001: A Space Odyssey
2. Blade Runner
3. Close Encounters of the Third Kind
4. Star Wars
5. Star Trek (the series)
6. The Martian
7. The Matrix
8. Cosmos (original TV series)

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