25 TV Shows About The End of the World

Paul Donnett

'Fallout' Season 2 is an unexpected and welcome surprise. I loved Season 1 with all of its game-accurate quirkiness, mayhem, and Walton Goggins at his peak as The Ghoul haunted by the past and looking for his family.

But the new season is taking the story to a whole new level. Episode 5 just dropped and it's a legit heartbreaker. Just excellent storytelling.

I also can't help but notice how much apocalyptic content has been flooding TV over the past decade. Stories about the end of the world and what comes next, with battles between "every man for himself" and communities desperately trying to rebuild.

Here are 25 of my faves:

1. Silo

2. Invasion

3. Foundation

4. 3 Body Problem

5. The Last of Us

6. Pluribus

7. Paradise

8. The Leftovers

9. The Last Man on Earth

10. Twisted Metal

11. Z Nation

12. Y The Last Man

13. War of the Worlds

14. The Rain

15. 3%

16. Aftermath

17. Containment

18. 12 Monkeys

19. Between

20. The Lottery

21. The Strain

22. Sweet Tooth

23. Fear the Walking Dead

24. Into the Badlands

25. Station 11

It's all hitting the Zeitgeist pretty hard as the world worries about the future of America, geopolitics, increasing economic inequality, the environment, imminent global wars, and A.I. Science fiction has always specialized in exploring present-day anxieties through the lens of the future, and it always asks the same fundamental question: Where do we go from here?

But apart from the Cold War era, apocalyptic sci-fi has never been more popular (and well-written) than it is today. Interesting what our entertainment choices tell us about ourselves.