Recommended Sci Fi TV: Science fiction and fantasy shows from the past decade or so that you may have missed and that we believe are worth checking out.
What Is It?
This series follows a group of strangers who awaken aboard a massive spacecraft transporting colonists to a distant planet, only to discover that most of the passengers and crew have mysteriously disappeared. Stranded aboard the seemingly abandoned ship, the survivors must work together to uncover what happened while dealing with their own troubled pasts and growing distrust of one another. Their situation becomes even more dangerous when they discover that an alien presence may be among them, turning their journey into a tense struggle for survival in which nobody can be entirely sure whom to trust.
Aired: YouTube, 2018, 1 Season Totaling 10 Episodes
Starring: Natalia Tena, Tom Felton, Sen Mitsuji, Nora Arnezeder, Fraser James, Philipp Christopher
Created By: Mika Watkins
Bottom Line:
Origin borrows heavily from other sci fi movies and TV shows, but it still establishes itself as a unique and interesting space-based genre entry that could have turned into a great series if it had not been cut short.
Why Is It Worth Watching?
This mostly overlooked series starts out seeming very much like a mishmash of any number of other genre entries, cobbled together to offer yet another scripted original at a time when those were starting to show up everywhere. It has bits of 2015’s Dark Matter, along with some of the style of Blade Runner and the grittiness of the Battlestar Galactica reboot, while also borrowing heavily from the mysteries upon mysteries and flashbacks of Lost. But despite channeling various sci fi films and shows from the past, it establishes itself right away as its own series and successfully pulls in the audience.
We get a brief introduction to each of the characters, and we learn that they are leaving Earth for a better life. Then, pretty much every episode offers a flashback, Lost-style, delving into their motivations for agreeing to leave their home and colonize a new planet. The good thing here is that the show relies less on cliché with the flashbacks, even though some of that is in there, and does a good job of developing the characters. Some are less likable than we may think at first, while others are given reasons for us to be more sympathetic toward them.
As the series starts, Sen Mitsuji’s Shun seems to be the lead character, and he does take a prominent role in the series. But Origin establishes itself as an ensemble show with a cast that is up to the task of carrying the story as the audience tries to keep up with all the mysteries thrown at them. Things start to converge as the series progresses, and we get some answers, as well as more mysteries, as this one ultimately develops into quite an interesting sci fi tale.
Sadly, though, the series ends just as it is on the verge of taking the story to the next level, and it never continued to a second season. This one arrived at the point when pretty much every content provider decided to get into scripted originals (including PlayStation with the superhero series Powers), and the market could not quite sustain that. I never saw viewing numbers for Origin, and it did not receive a whole lot of promotion, but neither of those may have mattered much because YouTube was already rethinking its strategy for scripted originals.
The service had jumped into the streaming wars and tried to compete with established players like Netflix, Amazon, and Hulu, but producing high-end scripted shows was an expensive proposition. YouTube began shifting its focus away from the Premium subscription model for originals and toward ad-supported programming, and Origin was cancelled in March 2019 as part of that changing strategy. The service would continue producing some original programming for a while, but its ambitions to compete directly with the major streamers with expensive scripted dramas faded pretty quickly (which has worked out pretty well seeing as they are the Number 1 streamer in the U.S. and they rely on other people’s original content).
Origin definitely had some money behind it, as it had excellent production values and the CGI effects it used were first-rate. That also made it the type of expensive scripted production YouTube was becoming less interested in pursuing. And no other venue stepped in to continue the series, so it ended without resolving its storylines.
Still, this one is worth a watch as an interesting and engaging sci fi entry that could have turned into a heck of a good show. Think of it as a Firefly-level cancellation from the early streaming era, though it never reached that level of popularity. It will definitely leave you wanting more, but it is at least worth a look as a first-rate space-based series, something we continue to see far too little of.
Where Can You Watch It?
Unfortunately, Origin has become rather difficult to track down in the United States. It originally streamed on YouTube Premium, but it is no longer available through the service in the States and currently does not appear to be streaming elsewhere domestically. It also has not received a U.S. physical-media release, nor is it available to purchase VOD. That makes this overlooked sci fi series even more obscure than it was when it first arrived, and hopefully it will eventually find its way back to streaming.
Did you watch Origin and do you think it could have turned into a great sci fi TV series if given the chance? Chime in below with your thoughts in the comments.
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