Babylon 5’s is great if you like serialization. The first season is very weak due to a major health crisis in the principal character that occurred between the shooting of the pilot and the launch of the series. The story was adjusted so that a new station head and actor could take on the lead.

Farscape is an absolute gem and a wild ride. It really picks up after the first 12 episodes. It’s so incredibly influential on so many science fiction shows in the streaming era that it’s worth watching just for that alone. Be aware that the show was canceled before it could wrap up its full arc. A limited series was made later to wrap up the storyline — make sure you’ll be able to be able to get it.

I’m a fan of many of the old 1960s and 1970s shows but watching them really depends on your tolerance for older production styles and scripting. Space 1999 is worth tracking down for sure.

In terms of more recent shows, three serialized shows that involved time travel that actually stuck the landing are Continuum, Travelers, and 12 Monkeys. All are very good, with strong ensembles, but reflect the darker sci-fi trend of the 2010s.

Battlestar Galactica (2004) is my all-timer. A lot of it feels incredibly salient today imo.

The Orville is very good, as it also explores ethics and philosophy like Star Trek and has refreshing ship designs (for example, more vulviform or squid-like, instead of the usual saucer or phallic designs)

I'm here to recommend The Expanse. It's more of a near-future dystopian scifi setting than Star Trek, with humanity petty much limited to our own solar system by technology. I read the books before the show became a thing, and I like them both.

Babylon 5 is fantastic - I guess if I were to describe it briefly (and vaguely), it would be "interstellar political drama with mythological undertones."

Any of the classics really are worth a watch.

The Expanse - more realistic sci-fi that actually accounts for thrust as gravity and slingshots around planets and such. Dystopian but not quite depressingly so. I'm on season 2. Much more serious. Still good. Read the books with a friend.

Babylon 5 - Deep space 9 basically. Complete with godlike alien beliefs and a Vulcan like character. Honestly holds up really well from what I recall though it's been a while since I watched it.

Stargate - very fun. Campy. Not afraid to make fun of itself. Much more action and tropy but a very fun watch. Added bonus, between all three shows you've got like 18 seasons. Plenty to bite into. Honestly one of my favorite shows still.

Firefly - A Western, in space. Very good. Very fun. Love it.

Farscape - almost but not quite a sci-fi parody, but good. Guy gets lost in space, meets aliens, goes on adventure. Several of the actors also got roles in later seasons of Stargate.

Here to fanboy over Babylon 5.

B5 is a political comfort show for me, especially these days. It was brazen for the 90s, with characters facing questions like: recovering from drug addiction, cross-cultural romantic relationships and their hurdles, colonization and genocide, bisexual representation, the loss of family members, and what to do if you're a military member serving a regime that you hate. It's deeply philosophical and mature, and it's had a profound impact on my life.

It had the time to develop complex relationships between characters. One of my favorite characters is an alien ambassador named G'kar, played by Andreas Katsulas.

Apple TV has had such an amazing run of good sci-fi lately

Silo, Foundation, For all mankind, Murderbot (honestly my favorite), Dark Matter, Pluribus

They are putting out a ton of great stuff.

bc i havent seen anyone else post it... Galaxy Quest!

If you want funny scifi but with a frequent emotional edge, Red Dwarf is fantastic.

The Expanse is nice, but the later seasons left me disappointed.

Andor is top of my list still for good story mixed with sci-fi.

Did you watch SeaQuest? Worth a look.

Babylon 5

Stargate SG-1

Farscape

Not sure if you’re actually wanting animated or not, but Scavenger’s Reign is a good animated sci-fi miniseries of a spaceship crew stranded on a strange planet.

For live action check out the two Callister episodes of Black Mirror.

The Two are nice. Babylone 5 could seems dated today but there’s some really cool things in it

I’m on my first watch of Farscape, so far so good, great puppets

Firefly maybe ? But Adam Baldwin and Joss Whedon are two very big asshole

Lexx.

I hated it, but it's something alright.

I don't know anything about Babylon 5. But just watch the expanse without knowing anything first season is a slow burn but the payoff in season 2 is well worth it. Some of the best scifi I've watched

Somebody's got to mention Red Dwarf. It's kind of like if The Office (UK) and Farscape had a baby and raised it on an old Dr. Who set.

Start gate series is my second favorite to star trek, I heard Babylon 5 is good. Didn't like the expanse felt to just more capitalist hellscape then scifi to me but I only watched the first episode but that's just my opinion and observations.

Dr who is a good sci-fi show as well as a rarely talked about show sliders from the 1990s. (Besides the last season imo)

The Orville, Foundation, farscape, sliders (stop at end of s3), Stargate

Space:1999

stargate certainly and battlestar galactica. if you can handle tos and the old batte star you may want to give buck rogers a try and space 1999.

Dark Matter was a series I really enjoyed that sadly got canceled abruptly after the third season.

Final Space is an animated comedic take.

Coming back to add that, if you like character-driven stories, but have never thought that kaiju might be your thing, Monarch: Legacy of Monsters now in its second season on AppleTV might be for you.

The show takes place in the middle of the Monsterverse continuity that currently has the licence for Toho’s Godzilla monsters. It’s an entry point nonetheless. You needn’t have ever seen anything in this continuity or others to get into it.

It’s less focused on fighting Titans than on the mystery of understanding them, the weird science fiction efforts humanity uses to share a world with them, and most of all the characters whose lives are intertwined with the mystery.