Live Poll: What Is the Best Disaster or Marooned Movie or TV Series in Space?

@AlbertoMazarro​  added.

If you use a shorter title, you could move the question above the other text to make it visible.

Suggested edits:

What is the best disaster movie set on a spaceship or in space?

By disaster movie I mean either something that happens on a space ship that causes being marooned on another planet or damage to the spaceship or space station and the crew has to struggle to survive or struggle to survive the trip home. Because so few of these films have been made, I had to extend this list into horror movies and stranded onto an alien world films. But I prefer it to be confined to the space ship. But I had to make a compromise to include marooning in order to make a decent list. But the borderline is “Star Trek 2: The Wrath of Khan” which did include a marooning. And one entry will be from a tv show. 

I’ll make edits later on tonight.

@Peter_pbn​ Is this okey? And why is the i in “Is” capitalized?

@dgranger​ 

As always, edits need to be made in the list, not the thread.

"Is" is capitalized because it's a verb. "The" is not capitalized because it's an article (unless it's at the start of the title).

@TheOldJalapenoman​ ,

I really like Silent Running; who could possibly dislike a film that features drones named Huey, Louie and Dewey? However, I really dislike Peter Schickele's score for Silent Running. I'm a fan of Professor Schickele and this is the only piece of music he composed that I dislike.

@dan_dassow​ Wait. Wait. Wait a sec?! P.D.Q. Bach was a film composer?!

@TheOldJalapenoman​ all added. “Silent Running” was one of the first I had thought of for this list. I had just added it haphazardly because there were more popular films that I had thought of later that people would remember more. That is how powerful that film was. It was right with “Marooned”, “Robson Crusoe on Mars”, then “Silent Running”, then “Firefly: Out of Gas”, and “Alein”.

@Tsarstepan​ yes. 

@Tsarstepan​,

In the spring of 1980, I attended a P.D.Q. Bach concert at the University of Minnesota’s Northrop Auditorium. During the performance, Peter Schickele performed a recurring comedy bit where he would "auction off" one of his records to the audience.

Later that year, in December 1980, I moved to St. Louis. When the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra sponsored a P.D.Q. Bach performance the following spring, I saw an opportunity. I purchased two tickets in the fifth row and made sure I had a crisp $5 bill ready in my pocket.

As soon as Mr. Schickele began the auction bit, I stood up and yelled, "Sold!" The moment was a success, though perhaps a bit too much of one. When I met Mr. Schickele afterward, he was kind enough to sign the record, but he couldn't help mentioning that I had actually "ruined" the bit—my immediate response and front-row seat made me look exactly like a planted actor!

@rubyfruit76​ is this better?

@rubyfruit76​ , speaking of your old polls about trail blazing women . I would like to offer:

“Young Women and the Sea” about Gertrude Ederle.

@dgranger​ FYI, this might be a good poll to sandwich on Thursday or Saturday around National Space Day on Friday, May 1st, 2026.

@dan_dassow​ done. Thank you.

@dgranger​ ,

You corrected the typo in this thread, but the typo (misspelling) of captain is still present in the list:

@rubyfruit76​ thank you and the changes are done. I’m grateful. Every-time this happens, I get over whelmed. 

@dgranger​ 

You didn't edit the title as I suggested nor make all the text edits suggested by Djesika.

@Peter_pbn​ read @tsarstepan’s post. I edit the title to reflect that the list has both movies and television shows like he asked. And I had to keep marooning in the title because you need a planet or moon or asteroid to be marooned on for that type of space disaster to happen. 

As for Jessica’s edits, I did it by following Rubyfruits76’s excellent suggestion. I took more than what Jessica had suggested to edit off of the list page entirely, and wrote the part about coming to this page and read the Captain’s Log to see how the original entries were selected and to review the other IMDb members (I.E. “Captains”) entries.

then on this thread page, I had moved the whole section that was suggested to be edited and moved it down the opening post and entitled it as “Captain’s Log.”

The Captain’s log doesn’t appear on the list page or the poll page. It only appears here on the thread page.

I also moved the poll question from the bottom of the first paragraph to the first sentence of first paragraph on list page/poll page but I forgot to do it for threads page. That is going to be corrected in a few seconds for this threads page.

@dgranger​ 

This is the text in your poll:

What is The Best Disaster Movie or TV Series in Space? By a disaster movie I mean ether something happens on a space ship that causes a maroon on another planet or the damage the spaceship or space station and the crew has to struggle to survive or struggle to survive the trip home.

The following edits need to be made:

What is The Best Disaster Movie or TV Series in Space? By a disaster movie I mean either something that happens on a space ship that causes being marooned on another planet or damage to the spaceship or space station and the crew has to struggle to survive or struggle to survive the trip home.

@Jessica​ how about “ … causes a marooning …”? 

@dgranger​ 

Sure, I guess that works.

And please edit the title as Peter suggested:

What Is the Best Disaster Movie on a Spaceship or in Space?

@dgranger​ 

Thanks for making the edits. The poll has been re-pushed. You're welcome.

@dgranger​ , I just thought off these two films with both featuring an all-star cast and feature as the climax of both films, individual astronauts who choose to self-maroon themselves on the moon in order to successfully fulfill their missions.

Countdown is a 1967 American science fiction film directed by Robert Altman, based on the 1964 novel The Pilgrim Project by Hank Searls. The film stars James Caan and Robert Duvall as astronauts vying to be the first Americans to walk on the Moon as part of an accelerated program to beat the Soviet Union.

Countdown (1967) related plot points

In the late 1960s, after learning that the Russians will be launching a Moon landing mission in four weeks, NASA decides to activate the "Pilgrim Project". The project is a secret plan to send one astronaut to the Moon in a one-way rocket (depicted in the film as a Titan II), using a modified Project Gemini craft. He (James Can as Lee) would stay on the Moon for a few months in a shelter pod launched and landed before him and wait for astronauts from an Apollo mission to arrive and retrieve him.  .... After a press leak about Pilgrim, the Russians launch a week early. Deflated at not being first, everyone carries on. The shelter pod is launched and landed successfully. Lee is launched on schedule. He encounters a power drain malfunction en route which tests his character and hinders radio contact. The Russians have also lost contact with their team. As Lee orbits the Moon, he does not see the beacon of the shelter. With only seconds left before he must abort and return to Earth, he lies about seeing it. Mission Control okays his retro burn and he lands, but radio contact is lost. Lee exits of the Gemini lander and walks around with one hour of oxygen in his suit. He finds the crashed Russian lander on its side, the three dead cosmonauts sprawled around the ship. Lee takes the Soviet flag from a dead cosmonaut and lays it on a nearby rock with his own American flag. With little air left and nowhere to go, Lee spins the toy mouse his son gave him. It points right, so he walks in that direction. A red glow on his arm catches his attention: it is the locator beacon atop the shelter. Lee is last seen walking towards the shelter (presumably) towards survival.

Space Cowboys is a 2000 American adventure drama film directed and produced by Clint Eastwood. It stars Eastwood, Tommy Lee Jones, Donald Sutherland, and James Garner as four aging former test pilots who are sent into space to repair an old Soviet satellite.

Space Cowboys (2000) related plot points

... Frank and Hawk space walk to the satellite in time to activate a booster rocket and slow the orbit's decay. After rescuing Ethan, they realize that the only option is to have someone ride on the satellite as they fire the missiles' engines so that it escapes into deep space. Hawk (Tommy Lee Jones as Hawk), who was recently widowed and who has eight months to live from pancreatic cancer, sacrifices himself, hoping that he will be able to land on the Moon to fulfill his life's dream.  ....  The film ends with the Frank Sinatra song "Fly Me to the Moon", zooming in on the surface of the Moon showing that Hawk had not only landed there before he died, but survived long enough to lie against a rock formation, looking back at Earth.

@urbanemovies​ they are added to the list.

but I think that “”Space Cowboys” as more of a disaster movie because of the point that the man ending up on the moon  was more of a consequence of the solution to the problem of how to get rid of the nuclear missiles being too close to the earth that if they are fired off here, earth’s gravity would have pulled them back to earth, thus they needed to be fired off away from earth at the farherest point away from earth’s gravity. It was a one way trip, and one of the astronauts was dying anyway in a few months from natural causes. So he chooses the moon as where he would die. It was a Suicide.

@dgranger​,

I agree they are imperfect cases, especially where both astronauts self a marooned themselves as a choice. Either way, both were stranded on the moon for at least a year or the rest of their lives. Your call on inclusion, but thought both would be worthy of consideration.

@urbanemovies​ check the poll now. Others thought so too. 

@Jessica​ and @dgranger​,

This is one of the quickest polls to go from going live to being featured on the IMDb Home Page. This poll went live on April 29, 2026 and was featured on the IMDb Home Page on May 2, 2026.

@dan_dassow​  now, I am awestruck. Thank you again. it appears I am the only who remembers “Marooned”. 

@dgranger​ ,

I remember seeing marooned in college as part of the University of Minnesota film series in the early 1970s. It's a good film, but I found it depressing.

@dgranger​   I also saw Marooned many years ago.  It was not, however, my favorite on the list.