President Barack Obama may be a science-fiction fan, but his tastes aren't exactly futuristic. When the president served as guest editor for Wired magazine this week, he offered up a list of his favorite sci-fi offerings from TV and film.
It's hard to argue with the quality of his list, but let's just say he's not out watching "Primer" or other cult faves. These are solid sci-fi choices that even your grandma has heard of -- and probably seen a dozen times.
Here's the list, along with some of the president's comments.
1. "2001: A Space Odyssey"
Obama says Stanley Kubrick's 1968 film "captures the grandeur and scale of the unknown."
2. "Blade Runner"
The president says the 1982 film -- now getting a sequel -- "asks what it means to be human."
3. "Close Encounters of the Third Kind"
The president calls Steven Spielberg's 1977 film "fundamentally optimistic."
4. "Star Wars"
OK, not all of the president's comments are high-brow and idealistic. Like most of us, he loved the original "Star Wars" because "because it was fun and revolutionized special effects."
5. "Star Trek: The Original Series
"Are you a "Star Wars" person or a "Star Trek" person? Obama, like many of us, is both, saying he loved Gene Roddenberry's show because it "wasn't actually about technology. It was about values and relationships."
6. "The Martian"
The most recent item on the president's list is Ridley Scott's 2015 Matt Damon movie, which Obama said "shows humans as problem solvers."
7. "The Matrix"
The 1999 film that had moviegoers debating between the red and blue pill appealed to Obama, who said "it asks basic questions about our reality -- and looks very cool."
8. "Cosmos"
Only the second TV show on the list, Carl Sagan's beloved 1980 series fed the president's "lifelong fascination with space.