5 Underrated Sci-Fi Cartoons Everyone Needs To Watch At Least Once

Those of us who grew up in the '80s and '90s and were practically raised on television didn't know how good we had it. The amount of great cartoons we got to consume and be shaped by (in healthy portions) during our formative years was pretty outstanding in retrospect. Compared to the abundance of soulless slop that kids get these days (with a few notable exceptions) under the guise of child-friendly animation, we were fortunate to come up in an era that birthed such special shows as "Batman: The Animated Series," "Hey, Arnold!," or the immortal "DuckTales."

But besides those classics that virtually everybody knew, there were also a few outliers and less popular shows that flirted with sci-fi in one way or another to capture our undivided attention. Thankfully, animation has evolved and matured so much in the past few decades that we now get more and more brilliant, complex, and unabashedly daring series, often catering to an adult audience who still harbor the same undying passion and love for the genre as they did before. Today, we're here to pick and praise five of those (both old and fresh) that deserve more attention — or, at the very least, a single watch.

Let's dive right into nostalgia with 1986's "Centurions," a show that kicked off as a five-part miniseries and later expanded into a full-blown series that ran 65 episodes over two seasons in the same year. "Centurions" was a show designed to make little boys who owned as many G.I. Joe toys as their parents' valet could afford obsessed. It followed a trio of elite soldiers — Max Ray (Pat Fraley), Ace McCloud (Neil Ross), and Jake Rockwell (Vince Edwards) — assigned to a space station ran by a magnificent woman named Crystal Kane (Diane Pershing), who sent them to Earth on various missions to stop the attempts of cyborg megalomaniac Doc Terror (Ron Feinberg) from conquering the planet and turning people into slaves. Max, Jake, and Ace all donned exoskeleton suits (distinguished by color and elemental powers) that could be equipped with different cool-as-hell weapon systems, depending on the requirements of each mission.

"Centurions" was practically an unofficial prototype for the "Iron Man" cartoon that came eight years after it. I personally preferred this series to Tony Stark's adventures because it was overflowing with creativity on several levels. Unbound by the limitations of pre-existing source material, "Centurions" went to town on the infinite possibilities of transforming the soldiers' suits into inventive, impressive assault weapons and showing what they could do in epic battles. Overall, the story might've been quite basic and clichéd, but the ingenuity of the future tech, executed in flashy yet stylish action scenes, easily made up for the cartoon's shortcomings. Which isn't all that surprising considering the animation was done by the Japanese Sunrise Studios at the time.

"Centurions" is definitely among those sci-fi cartoons that should've become a lot more popular than it did. Still, the hardcore fans (including me) stand by it to this day.

I've already praised HBO Max's most underrated sci-fi series on here, and I can only repeat my words: 2023's "Scavengers Reign" is an uncanny concoction of beauty and horror, sci-fi and adventure, creativity and vision. It's the epitome of what animated storytelling can do in this day and age and an indication of where it could go in the future. But the price of creating something so obscure, unusual, and trippy is that you likely won't capture a large enough audience to continue painting your vision on the small screen — as the cancellation of "Scavengers Reign" after a single season showed.

Still, it's a miracle that we got to see this small group of lost people (both literally and figuratively) after their cargo ship crash-lands on a foreign planet called Vesta, wandering around in a haze of shock and wonder. Despite what the plot seems to be (following the human characters on their individual journeys of discovery), the main protagonist of "Scavengers Reign" is the vivid, constantly moving, twerking, jerking and pulsating Vesta itself. This planet is a living organism overrun by flora and fauna in a way that's damn near incomprehensible to our human minds, yet endlessly fascinating — and at times horrifying, too. Although critics instantly eulogized the show upon release and it continues to win over more and more viewers over time, "Scavengers Reign" is still a largely underseen and undiscovered masterpiece that needs all the help it can get to avoid oblivion.

After Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones exploded the movie scene in Barry Sonnenfeld's 1997 comic book adaptation, "Men in Black," the alien fever spread like wildfire. Warner Bros. couldn't launch its follow-up alternative sequel in the form of an animation series titled "Men in Black: The Series" fast enough to ride the gigantic wave the blockbuster had created. Developed by Duane Capizzi, Jeff Kline, and Richard Raynis, the cartoon leaned even harder into the comedic and bonkers aspects of this universe to great effect. I always felt like the series was somewhat overshadowed by the original film (and later its sequels), without getting the credit it deserved for what it did with aplomb.

Drenched in a sleek, minimalist 2D animation style that was championed by many other cartoons before it, "MIB: The Series" had a smooth swag to it, complemented by some effortlessly funny writing and even better voice acting. Naturally, no one can really replicate the bravado and charisma of Jones and Smith, but the duo of Keith Diamond and Gregg Berger as protagonists Agent Jay and Agent Kay came pretty close. The truth is that "MIB: The Series" was a pretty fun and welcome addition to the franchise, allowing us youngsters to indulge even further in the world of strange, gross, and silly extraterrestrials who lived in New York City among humans. But despite running for four seasons between 1997 and 2001, the cartoon never really came close to matching the popularity of the first two films, which is a shame because it was a total blast.

Joseph Bennett and Steve Hely's 2024 adult animation, "Common Side Effects," is another series that I yapped about here with gusto before to spread the word about how freakin' incisive and mesmerizing it is. Unsurprisingly, it comes from one of the co-creators of "Scavengers Reign," yet it's a somewhat lighter and more accessible show with plenty to say about the pharmaceutical industry, greed, and the responsibility of discovering a plant that can cure all the world's illnesses.

"CSE" follows protagonist Marshall Cuso (Dave King), a quirky botanist, after he discovers the Blue Angel mushroom in the Peruvian Highlands and its singular healing effects. To his detriment, he also rekindles an old relationship with his former classmate, Frances (Emily Pendergast), who happens to be an employee of Reutical Pharmaceuticals (the Big Pharma of this universe) vying for a promotion she thinks would come if she shared this groundbreaking discovery of Marshall's with her smug and self-important boss.

There are a lot of moving parts in this show, with sharply drawn characters, an absorbing plot, and a peculiar animation style that is perfectly in sync with the premise and vibe the project aims for. Although its dark and dry humor is an absolute highlight, the occasional hallucinations that range from sweet and innocent to downright haunting and horrifying are what drew me in instantly early on. There are also some inexplicable, baby-like creatures connected to the effect of Blue Angel that are as cute and charming as they are mysterious and unsettling. Overall, "CSE" is a wild trip you shouldn't miss if you're into mind-bending and peculiar sci-fi animation.

I'd be lying if I said that I haven't debated whether to include this increasingly didactic and admittedly environmentalist '90s cartoon on this list. "Captain Planet and the Planeteers" has never been subtle in its aspirations and moral lessons (that even my young brain could spot immediately at the time), but it was a superhero show with interesting powers after all, mixing multicultural characters, fast-paced action, and morality lectures on environmental and socio-political issues.

The plot followed a group of five young people chosen by Earth's spirit Gaia (voiced by Whoopi Goldberg), who gave each of them a ring with a specific elemental power (wind, fire, etc.) to prevent or fight environmental disasters. And if they came up short, they just combined their rings' power to summon Captain Planet (David Coburn), an Eco-Superman, to help them in their battles.

I can imagine that "Captain Planet and the Planeteers" doesn't really hold up today other than as a time capsule of its time, filled with '90s nostalgia for those of us who got to experience it as clueless kids around the world. Nevertheless, it was a vital cartoon (running for six seasons between 1990 and 1996) that undeniably played a significant role in our upbringing and pop culture-influenced education. Was it a little cringe, clumsy, and try-hard? Sure, but that was also its charm, not to mention its voice cast, which featured stars such as Meg Ryan, Martin Sheen, Jeff Goldblum, and Tim Curry, in addition to the regulars. So, for a trip down memory lane, it's worth a watch overall.