What should be my final pick in the sci-fi top 10: Arrival or Ex Machina?

[Justin.S]

I’m trying to finalize my personal top 10 sci-fi movies of the 2010s, but I’m completely stuck on what should take the final spot. I keep going back and forth between *Arrival* and *Ex Machina*, and I can’t decide which one has the more impactful and lasting thematic depth.

[SavannahL]

I kept swapping them too. The one about language and time pushed at a different part of me, the other about consciousness and control felt closer to home. I want something that sticks around after you go to bed, not just a clever hallway conversation.

[Isabella.H]

I tried a small experiment: watched both again with a notebook, noting lines that grabbed me and moments that felt decisive. The memory of a quiet gesture in the slower film kept resurfacing, while the other kept asking big questions in a way that made me argue with the screen.

[WilliamGM]

Is the real problem maybe that we want a final spot to feel settled, or that we’re chasing a takeaway that can survive a second viewing?

[Ella_L]

I’m rushing this a bit, but I keep leaning toward the one with the sharper arc and then second guessing that choice, like maybe I’m trading one kind of depth for another.