The Decline and Fall of British Sci-Fi is a video essay channel exploring science fiction after the adventure ends — looking at the worlds, systems, and human behaviour left behind when certainty, authority, and meaning begin to fray.
Focusing on British science fiction, cult cinema, and classic genre films, these essays examine sci-fi not as prediction or nostalgia, but as social memory: stories about aftermath, survival, power, community, and the quiet costs of progress and collapse.
Topics include British TV sci-fi, Cold War cinema, post-war futurism, dystopian film, nuclear anxiety, technology and society, and cult science fiction from the 1950s–1980s — including films and series often overlooked or misunderstood.
No culture-war takes. No nostalgia bait.
Just thoughtful analysis, historical context, and science fiction taken seriously.
The Decline and fall of British Sci-Fi
Right, you lot, the wait is nearly over, and so is the mystery. Well, one of them anyway.
New video tomorrow!
We're going all the way back to December 1963, when Doctor Who introduced the Daleks to an unsuspecting British public.
Today, we know practically everything about the horrible little turds. But back in 1963, nobody had the faintest idea what was lurking inside those ridiculous metal shells.
And I think that was precisely what made them so bloody frightening.
Tomorrow, we're going to explore why.
**Thursday, 6 PM.**
The Decline and Fall of British Sci-Fi.
1 week ago | [YT] | 7
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The Decline and fall of British Sci-Fi
Right, here's the only clues you lot are gonna get as to what I've been working on.
Admittedly, I've made it as unhelpful as humanly possible, but you lot are annoyingly good at guessing these things anyway.
All will be revealed later this week.
Any guesses? 👀
1 week ago | [YT] | 4
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The Decline and fall of British Sci-Fi
The Decline and Fall of British Sci-Fi Halloween special coming soon. 🎃
2 weeks ago | [YT] | 4
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The Decline and fall of British Sci-Fi
Coming soon to The Decline and Fall of British Sci-Fi. The day the Earth caught fire
Everyone remembers the bombs, the heat and the planet being knocked off course. But the thing I kept noticing was power.
Who has it. Who only looks like they do. And what happens to everyone else when the decisions shaping their lives are made somewhere they can’t reach.
This one goes from Washington and Moscow to Fleet Street, post-Suez Britain and one spectacularly self-destructive journalist who can barely keep hold of his own life.
1 month ago (edited) | [YT] | 5
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The Decline and fall of British Sci-Fi
There’s a clue in this photo about my next video.
That’s all you’re getting because some of you lot are frighteningly good at this stuff.
What do you all reckon I’m working on?
2 months ago | [YT] | 9
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The Decline and fall of British Sci-Fi
It’s been a little while.
Tonight, that changes.
My latest essay looks at Equilibrium through a lens I’d never considered until I sat with the film for far longer than was probably healthy.
It’s not really about Gun Kata.
It’s not really about fascism.
I think it’s about something much stranger.
📺 Premieres tonight at 19:00 (UK).
3 months ago | [YT] | 10
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The Decline and fall of British Sci-Fi
It’s been a few months.
Thanks for sticking around.
I’ve spent most of that time reading, thinking, rewriting, and occasionally staring at Equilibrium until it started looking stranger than I remembered.
The next video is nearly ready.
See you soon.
3 months ago | [YT] | 10
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The Decline and fall of British Sci-Fi
Quick update, lovely people: there wasn’t a new video on this channel in May.
That’s because I’ve been finishing a video for my second channel, The Venuzian Jungles, where I’m taking a look at The Amazing Digital Circus.
It’s not a lore video. It’s more about identity, performance, algorithms, and the horrible little ways digital spaces can flatten people into smaller, simpler versions of themselves.
So yes: bright colours, clown shoes, and psychological damage.
I’ll be back here with more British sci-fi melancholy in June. In the meantime, I’d be massively grateful if you checked out the video, which is now live over on The Venuzian Jungles.
The Amazing Digital Circus Isn’t About Escape — It’s About Control
https://youtu.be/s-a3V7402nY
5 months ago | [YT] | 3
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The Decline and fall of British Sci-Fi
New video up on Aliens.
The older I get, the less this film feels like a war movie.
For me, the emotional centre of it is Newt — the child hiding in the walls, expecting every adult to fail her.
That’s what the new video digs into: why saving Newt matters so much, and why Aliens feels sadder, stranger, and more intimate than people usually admit.
Watch here: https://youtu.be/NOHk8yVg6Gc?si=erCUu...
6 months ago | [YT] | 12
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The Decline and fall of British Sci-Fi
Coming soon:
Aliens isn’t really about war.
It’s about going back into the worst place you’ve ever known…
…and bringing something vulnerable out of it alive.
6 months ago | [YT] | 12
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