Movies Like DEFCON-4

If you liked DEFCON-4 (1985), a science fiction and thriller movie directed by Paul Donovan and Digby Cook, here are 20 movies with a similar feel, based on TMDB's recommendations. Each one links to its cast, trailer and where it's streaming.

1
Afterburn (2025)
★ 6.2/10Also action and science fiction
Set against the backdrop of a postapocalyptic Earth whose Eastern Hemisphere was destroyed by a massive solar flare, leaving what life remains mutated from radiation and fallout. The story revolves around a group of…
2
Spectral (2016)
★ 6.6/10Also science fiction and thriller
A special-ops team is dispatched to fight supernatural beings that have taken over a European city.
3
Monsters of Man (2020)
★ 6.4/10Also science fiction and action
A robotics company vying to win a lucrative military contract team up with a corrupt CIA agent to conduct an illegal live field test. They deploy four weaponized prototype robots into a suspected drug manufacturing…
4
Die Alone (2024)
★ 6.4/10Also thriller and science fiction
Lost in a world reclaimed by nature and overrun by mysterious creatures, Ethan, a young man with amnesia navigates the dangerous landscape in search of his lost love Emma. His journey takes an unexpected turn when he…
5
Right at Your Door (2006)
★ 5.8/10Also thriller and science fiction
A dirty bomb goes off in Los Angeles, jamming freeways and spreading a toxic cloud.
6
These Final Hours (2014)
★ 6.5/10Also science fiction and thriller
With the end of the world only hours away, self-absorbed James heads to the ultimate party-to-end-all-parties. On his way there, he saves the life of a young girl named Rose who is searching desperately for her missing…
7
The Kovak Box (2006)
★ 5.8/10Also science fiction and thriller
David Norton is used to being in control. As a best-selling author, he decides the fate of his characters, their lives and their deaths. But what happens when his fictional world becomes all too real?
8
Panic in Year Zero! (1962)
★ 6.3/10Also science fiction and thriller
While on a fishing trip, Harry Baldwin and his family hear an explosion and realize that Los Angeles has been leveled by a nuclear attack. Looters and killers are everywhere. Escaping to the hills with his family, he…
9
The 5th Wave (2016)
★ 5.9/10Also science fiction and action
16-year-old Cassie Sullivan tries to survive in a world devastated by the waves of an alien invasion that has already decimated the population and knocked mankind back to the Stone Age.
10
Monster Hunters (2020)
★ 6.2/10Also science fiction and action
When an alien prison ship crash lands and unleashes creature after creature in the California desert, they make quick work of the army that tries to stop them. Now, the only hope of stopping the aliens rests with a…
11
Extinction (2015)
★ 6.4/10Also science fiction and thriller
And suddenly, overnight, the world came to a halt. Two men, two survivors, one kid, and hatred that separates them. A place forgotten by everyone, including the creatures that inhabit the Earth... until now.
12
Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991)
★ 8.2/10Also action and thriller
Ten years after the events of the original, a reprogrammed T-800 is sent back in time to protect young John Connor from the shape-shifting T-1000. Together with his mother Sarah, he fights to stop Skynet from…
13
The Terminator (1984)
★ 7.7/10Also action and thriller
In the post-apocalyptic future, reigning tyrannical supercomputers teleport a cyborg assassin known as the "Terminator" back to 1984 to kill Sarah Connor, whose unborn son is destined to lead insurgents against 21st…
14
Osiris (2025)
★ 6.2/10Also science fiction and action
Special Forces commandos on a mission are abducted mid-operation by a mysterious spacecraft. Upon waking aboard, they find themselves prey to a relentless alien race in a fight for survival.
15
Riddick (2013)
★ 6.3/10Also science fiction and action
Betrayed by his own kind and left for dead on a desolate planet, Riddick fights for survival against alien predators and becomes more powerful and dangerous than ever before. Soon bounty hunters from throughout the…
16
ARQ (2016)
★ 6.1/10Also science fiction and thriller
Two old friends living in a dystopic future become trapped in a mysterious time loop — one that may have something to do with an ongoing battle between an omnipotent corporation and a ragtag band of rebels.
17
Chief of Station (2024)
★ 6.3/10Also action and thriller
After learning that the death of his wife was not an accident, a former CIA Station Chief is forced back into the espionage underworld, teaming up with an adversary to unravel a conspiracy that challenges everything he…
18
The Mandela Effect (2019)
★ 6.3/10Also science fiction and thriller
A man becomes obsessed with facts and events that have been collectively misremembered by thousands of people. Believing the phenomena to be the symptom of something larger, his obsession eventually leads him to…
19
Land of the Dead (2005)
★ 6.3/10Also science fiction and thriller
The living dead have taken over the world, and the remaining humans live in a walled city to protect themselves as they cope with the situation.
20
Daylight's End (2016)
★ 5.9/10Also action and science fiction
Years after a mysterious plague has devastated the planet and turned most of humanity into blood-hungry creatures, a rogue drifter on a vengeful hunt stumbles across a band of survivors in an abandoned police station…