It’s been seven years since a positively-reviewed sci-fi movie became a small hit at the box office, earning $17 million against its $3 million budget in 2018. Now, nearly a decade later, this same sci-fi movie is proving it has legs by dominating Netflix.
Netflix has become a great place for all sorts of movies to find a new life, with recent flops, forgotten favorites, and everything in between having the same opportunity for success on its charts. Now this sci-fi endeavor from Blumhouse is making similar moves as fans flock to watch the cyberpunk revenge fantasy.
The sci-fi genre is a vast canvas with numerous types of films. However, this movie uses some familiar tropes to tell its story, which includes an injured man relying on technology to regain his motor functions. In addition to his injuries which turned him into a quadriplegic, the film’s protagonist loses his wife at the hands of a home invasion, forcing him to take this technology to the next level.
For those unfamiliar, this film is none other than Upgrade, written and directed by Saw co-creator Leigh Whannell. Logan Marshall-Green stars in the film as the aforementioned quadriplegic, Grey Trace, who uses the experimental chip called STEM to help him find the men that killed his wife. Of course, this leads him towards a much bigger conspiracy, one that could cost him the control of his body as STEM takes over.
While Upgrade isn’t the most original concept, the way it blends together these various tropes has proven to be quite entertaining, and something that sci-fi fans continue to seek out even seven years later. There have been talks of a sequel or TV series, but none of this has come to fruition so far. Hopefully with an extended shelf-life thanks to streaming platforms like Netflix, however, we could see a return to the world of Upgrade in the future.
In the meantime, fans can stream the fan-favorite underrated sci-fi movie on Netflix, and see for themselves why this film is starting to stand the test of time. Stay tuned to ScreenGeek for any additional news regarding the latest trending titles on streaming as we have them.