From Startups to Scandals: The Best Tech TV Shows And Movies Of All Time

There was a time when technology in TV and film meant a robot sidekick, a rogue AI, or a floppy disk saving the day. Fast forward to 2025, and tech is no longer a background prop – it’s the main character. From start-up scandals and influencer meltdowns to true-crime catfishes, we’ve reached an era where our favourite on-screen villains aren’t people – they’re platforms.

We watch them not just for escapism, but because they mirror our own digital chaos. Whether it’s The Dropout making us question every LinkedIn success story, or The Tinder Swindler reminding us that charm and cryptocurrency don’t mix, tech stories have become modern morality plays for the screen-obsessed.

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Technology isn’t just shaping the way we live – it’s scripting the way we entertain ourselves. These films and shows capture the absurdity, innovation, and existential angst of a generation raised by screens. Some are based on true stories; others feel true enough to be. And as our lives become more entangled with algorithms, this cultural canon only grows more relevant.

So plug in, stream on, and prepare to question your next Terms & Conditions scroll – these are The Modems’ Best Tech TV Shows and Movies of All Time…

How We Chose The Best Tech TV Shows And Movies Of All Time:

Our methodology was both emotional and algorithmic (naturally). We sought stories that didn’t just feature technology but interrogated it – that looked at code and saw character, at apps and saw addiction. We valued originality, cultural relevance, aesthetic innovation, and whether or not the show made us reconsider our relationship with our devices (bonus points if we checked our phones mid-episode).

Each title here passed The Modems test: it had to be stylish, smart, and say something about how tech touches love, ambition, and identity. In short – not just “robots go rogue” or “founder goes broke,” but stories that reveal what it means to live, love, and lose in a digitised age.

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What’s New In 2025:

SWIPED (2025)
Directed by Rachel Lee Goldenberg, Swiped is a glossy, emotionally charged biographical drama about Whitney Wolfe Herd, the founder and CEO of Bumble. Lily James stars as Wolfe Herd, charting her journey from Tinder’s turbulent beginnings to launching the world’s first female-first dating app. With Dan Stevens, Myha’la and Jackson White rounding out the cast, the film explores sexism in Silicon Valley, digital feminism, and the billion-dollar industry built on swipes, likes and love.
Why We Love It: It’s part empowerment story, part cautionary tale – and Lily James embodies the grit, grace, and glow-up of a woman who reprogrammed dating culture.
Watch Now: Disney+

 

UNKNOWN NUMBER: THE HIGH SCHOOL CATFISH (2025)
Based on the shocking true story of Lauryn Licari, a Michigan teenager terrorised by anonymous text messages that turned out to be sent by her own mother, Unknown Number is a true-crime docu-thriller that unravels a mystery stranger than fiction. Through real footage, digital reconstructions and chilling re-enactments, it follows the 15-month investigation led by local police and the FBI that exposed a web of deceit, manipulation and digital obsession. The result is a story about trust, technology, and the terrifying intimacy of the devices we keep closest.
Why We Love It: Proof that the real danger isn’t in your phone – it’s who might be holding it.
Watch Now: Netflix

 

EMILY IN PARIS: SEASON 5
Yes, it’s frivolous. Yes, it’s filtered. But Emily is technically a “social media marketer” – and that counts. Beyond the berets and hashtags, the series captures influencer culture’s glossed-over chaos: algorithms, aesthetics, and ambition colliding on every post. Season 5 is out on December 18. 

Why We Love It: It’s the frothy fantasy of our digital daydreams – proof that sometimes, tech can look très chic.
Watch Now: Netflix

 

DON’T DIE: THE MAN WHO WANTS TO LIVE FOREVER (2025)
In this gripping new documentary, tech entrepreneur Bryan Johnson puts both his body and his fortune on the line to challenge mortality itself. Determined to reverse ageing through science, data, and self-experimentation, Johnson’s multimillion-dollar anti-ageing regime unfolds like a Silicon Valley sci-fi thriller. From blood transfusions with his teenage son to lab-grade meal plans and biometric tracking, Don’t Die asks how far one man – and one industry – will go to outsmart time.
Why We Love It: Because it’s equal parts horror, hope, and human vanity – the ultimate biohacking binge-watch.
Watch Now: Netflix

BAD INFLUENCE: THE DARK SIDE OF KIDFLUENCING (2025)
Bad Influence dives deep into the multi-billion-dollar world of child content creators, exposing how viral fame often comes at the expense of childhood itself. Through candid interviews and case studies, it reveals the murky legal loopholes, emotional toll, and blurred lines between play and profit. What begins as cute family vlogging quickly becomes a chilling portrait of exploitation in the age of algorithms.
Why We Love It: Because no child should have to trend before they can read.
Watch Now: Netflix

 

TWITTER: BREAKING THE BIRD (2025)
A behind-the-scenes look at the platform formerly known as Twitter. Using leaked memos, employee interviews, and archive footage, it charts the social network’s chaotic transformation into X – a cautionary tale about ego and algorithms.
Why We Love It: It’s digital history told like a Greek tragedy – only with more memes.
Watch Now: BBC iPlayer

 

THE SECRET GENIUS OF MODERN LIFE (2022-2025)
Dr Hannah Fry returns for a third series uncovering the hidden tech behind our daily lives – from air fryers to rollercoasters. Expect gorgeous visuals, fascinating science, and plenty of “wait, what?” revelations.
Why We Love It: Hannah Fry makes circuit boards sound sexy.
Watch Now: BBC iPlayer

 

TITAN: THE OCEANGATE SUBMERSIBLE DISASTER (2024)
Netflix’s meticulous retelling of the Titan sub tragedy explores hubris, innovation, and the peril of cutting corners in deep-sea tech. Using never-before-seen footage and expert analysis, it’s both haunting and human.
Why We Love It: A sobering reminder that innovation without ethics is a sinking ship.
Watch Now: Netflix

 

SALLY (2025)
A moving portrait of astronaut Sally Ride – the first American woman in space – whose legacy extended far beyond NASA. The documentary intertwines her achievements with her long-hidden personal life, offering a story of courage, curiosity, and quiet rebellion.
Why We Love It: Because Sally Ride showed us that breaking barriers sometimes means orbiting outside the system.
Watch Now: Disney+

 

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The 10 All-Time Best Tech TV Series

THE DROPOUT (2022)
The story of Elizabeth Holmes and the fall of Theranos is the modern-day myth of Silicon Valley: brilliance meets blind ambition in a lab coat. Amanda Seyfried delivers a chilling performance as Holmes, whose obsession with innovation becomes her undoing. Through sterile labs and shaky prototypes, The Dropout captures how tech’s promise of disruption can mutate into deceit.
Why We Love It: It’s cautionary, compulsive, and feels one fraudulent keynote away from our own reality.
Watch Now: BBC iPlayer

 

WECRASHED (2022)
Jared Leto and Anne Hathaway star as Adam and Rebekah Neumann, the chaotic couple behind WeWork. What begins as an idea for a shared workspace spirals into a cult of personality fuelled by hype, incense, and venture capital. WeCrashed dissects the performative optimism of start-up culture – all buzzwords, barefoot meetings, and billion-dollar delusion.
Why We Love It: A masterclass in how “changing the world” became a business plan.
Watch Now: Apple TV

 

BLACK MIRROR (2011-2023)
Charlie Brooker’s anthology remains the definitive mirror (pun intended) to our digital lives. Each episode offers a speculative glimpse into how technology distorts love, work, politics, and selfhood – from rating-obsessed societies to AI afterlives. Bleak, brilliant, and oddly addictive, it’s the one series that makes doomscrolling feel like research.
Why We Love It: Because every episode feels one software update away from coming true.
Watch Now: Netflix

 

ROBOT (2015-2019)
Rami Malek’s Elliot Alderson is a cybersecurity engineer by day, hacker by night, and social anarchist by default. With dizzying visuals and dense tech realism, Mr. Robot turns code into poetry and paranoia into art. It’s a love letter to loneliness in the digital age, soundtracked by server fans and existential dread.
Why We Love It: No show has ever made terminal windows look this sexy.
Watch Now: Amazon Prime | YouTube | Apple TV

 

SILICON VALLEY (2014-2019)

A comedy about coders that somehow became a searing critique of capitalism. The series follows a group of socially awkward geniuses navigating the minefield of funding rounds, IPOs, and corporate espionage. Silicon Valley nails every nuance of the tech bro ecosystem – the Patagonia vests, the jargon, the fragile egos.
Why We Love It: It’s proof that the real bug in the system is human behaviour.
Watch Now: Now TV | Amazon Prime | YouTube | Apple TV

 

UPLOAD (2020-2025)
In the near future, death is optional – your consciousness can be uploaded to a digital afterlife called Lakeview. What sounds like paradise soon feels like a customer service nightmare, complete with data limits and pop-up ads. Upload is a biting satire on digital immortality, tech monopolies, and our dependence on “the cloud.”
Why We Love It: It’s The Good Place meets Black Mirror, with in-app purchases.
Watch Now: Amazon Prime

 

DEVS (2020)
From Alex Garland (of Ex Machina fame) comes a slow-burn sci-fi thriller set in a quantum computing lab. When a software engineer vanishes, her partner uncovers a deterministic machine that predicts the future – and maybe rewrites it. Visually hypnotic and philosophically dense, Devs is a meditation on fate, free will, and the arrogance of genius.
Why We Love It: It makes you question every “Terms and Conditions” you’ve ever accepted.
Watch Now: Disney+

 

HALT AND CATCH FIRE (2014-2017)
Before Silicon Valley was a zip code of billionaires, it was a garage full of dreamers. Set in the 1980s PC boom, Halt and Catch Fire follows the rebels who tried to reinvent computing. It’s part workplace drama, part emotional odyssey – tracing the birth of the internet through ambition, betrayal, and endless coffee.
Why We Love It: A nostalgic, neon-lit love letter to the code that built our world.
Watch Now: ITVX | Amazon Prime | YouTube

 

STARTUP (2016-2018)
A gritty, under-the-radar drama about the dark web, cryptocurrency, and digital capitalism. Startup blends financial thriller with social commentary, following unlikely partners who create a new form of money – and unleash chaos.
Why We Love It: It’s Breaking Bad for the blockchain generation.
Watch Now: Amazon Prime | YouTube | Apple TV 

 

YEARS AND YEARS (2019)
Russell T Davies’ dystopian family saga compresses 15 years of political, social, and technological upheaval into six gripping episodes. Smart homes, AI relationships, and biohacking meet love, loss, and resilience in this hauntingly plausible vision of Britain’s near future.
Why We Love It: Because sometimes the future isn’t science fiction – it’s tomorrow’s news.
Watch Now: Netflix | Amazon Prime | YouTube | Apple TV

 

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The 10 All-Time Best Tech Documentaries:

CODED BIAS (2020)
When MIT researcher Joy Buolamwini discovers that facial recognition systems fail to identify darker-skinned and female faces accurately, she launches a movement that challenges Silicon Valley’s ethical blind spots. Coded Bias transforms a technical flaw into a global feminist tech reckoning, showing how algorithms can reinforce inequality when left unchecked.
Why We Love It: Because code isn’t neutral – and this documentary proves who gets left out of the data matters.
Watch Now: Netflix

 

THE INVENTOR: OUT FOR BLOOD IN SILICON VALLEY (2019)
Alex Gibney’s razor-sharp exposé of Elizabeth Holmes and Theranos captures the dizzying optimism and devastating downfall of a company built on smoke and mirrors. Using real interviews and surreal re-enactments, the film peels back the glossy marketing to reveal a culture obsessed with disruption at any cost.
Why We Love It: It’s a front-row seat to tech’s favourite fantasy – the genius who flew too close to the incubator light.
Watch Now: Amazon Prime | Sky Documentaries

 

BOMBSHELL: THE HEDY LAMARR STORY (2017)
Hollywood’s golden-age goddess Hedy Lamarr wasn’t just a screen siren – she was also an inventor who helped pioneer frequency-hopping technology that inspired Wi-Fi and Bluetooth. This documentary reclaims her legacy, blending glamour and genius in one mesmerising portrait.
Why We Love It: Because she proved that beauty and brilliance were never mutually exclusive.
Watch Now: Amazon Prime | YouTube | Apple TV

 

THE SOCIAL DILEMMA (2020)
Featuring whistle-blowers and insiders from Facebook, Google, and Twitter, The Social Dilemma exposes how platforms manipulate attention and emotions to keep users scrolling. It’s both terrifying and strangely relatable – especially when ex-engineers admit they can’t resist their own creations.
Why We Love It: It’s the documentary that made everyone re-download Screen Time.
Watch Now: Netflix

 

ALPHAGO (2017)
Chronicling DeepMind’s quest to create an AI that could master the ancient game of Go, AlphaGo captures one of the most emotional man-versus-machine showdowns ever filmed. What begins as a technical challenge evolves into a profound meditation on creativity, intuition, and what it means to be human.
Why We Love It: Because it turns a board game into an existential crisis – and we loved every minute.
Watch Now: Netflix

 

THE CLEANERS (2018)
A haunting look at the hidden world of social media content moderators who decide, click by click, what billions of users see online. Working in secretive offices in the Philippines, these digital janitors sift through humanity’s darkest material – raising urgent questions about ethics, trauma, and responsibility in the age of global platforms.
Why We Love It: Because behind every “community guideline” is a real person having the worst day imaginable.
Watch Now: Amazon Prime

 

TERMS AND CONDITIONS MAY APPLY (2013)
Before Cambridge Analytica and TikTok tracking scandals, this film warned us how recklessly we click “I Agree.” Through wit and horror in equal measure, it examines how companies harvest our personal data and turn it into profit.
Why We Love It: It’s the reason you should finally read the fine print.
Watch Now: Amazon Prime | YouTube | Apple TV

 

LO AND BEHOLD: REVERIES OF THE CONNECTED WORLD (2016)
Werner Herzog brings his signature curiosity and chaos to the internet itself – from its birth in a UCLA lab to its role in shaping human consciousness. The film is divided into ten chapters that explore everything from AI to addiction, revealing how connection can both unite and undo us.
Why We Love It: Because only Herzog could make Wi-Fi feel like a cosmic mystery.
Watch Now: Plex | Amazon Prime | Sky Documentaries | Apple TV

 

GENERAL MAGIC (2018)
Before there was the iPhone, there was General Magic – the 1990s start-up that invented the smartphone too early. Through interviews with its original team (many of whom went on to transform Silicon Valley), this film is both nostalgic and prophetic, showing that failure often seeds the future.
Why We Love It: It’s the bittersweet story of the tech company that changed everything – by disappearing.
Watch Now: YouTube

 

THE GREAT HACK (2019)
This gripping Netflix documentary investigates the Cambridge Analytica scandal and how data mining influenced global politics. Equal parts thriller and wake-up call, it traces how our digital footprints became weapons in the information wars.
Why We Love It: Because in the attention economy, we’re all the product.
Watch Now: Netflix

 

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The 10 All-Time Best Tech Movies:

JOBS (2013)
Ashton Kutcher channels Apple’s visionary co-founder in a sleek biopic that charts the birth of the personal computer revolution. From barefoot brainstorming sessions to keynote mic-drops, Jobs captures the mythology and mania of tech’s most iconic perfectionist.
Why We Love It: It’s a stylish reminder that genius and ego often share the same operating system.
Watch Now: Plex | Amazon Prime | Sky Documentaries | Apple TV

 

THE SOCIAL NETWORK (2010)
The origin story of Facebook plays out like a Shakespearean tragedy set in a dorm room. Jesse Eisenberg’s Mark Zuckerberg builds the platform that changes the world – and loses all his friends in the process. Aaron Sorkin’s whip-smart script and David Fincher’s moody direction transform coding into combat and ambition into betrayal.
Why We Love It: Because it made typing in a dark room look dangerously glamorous.
Watch Now: Sky Documentaries | Amazon Prime | YouTube | Apple TV

 

EX MACHINA (2014)
In a remote tech lab, a young programmer meets an AI named Ava – and quickly realises who’s really conducting the experiment. Alex Garland’s psychological thriller is sleek, claustrophobic, and eerily sensual, questioning what separates creation from control.
Why We Love It: Because it proves that artificial intelligence has better cheekbones than most humans.
Watch Now: Netflix | Amazon Prime | YouTube | Apple TV 

 

HER (2013)
Joaquin Phoenix falls in love with his operating system, voiced by Scarlett Johansson, in this melancholic exploration of connection in the digital age. With dreamy cinematography and a heartbreakingly human script, Her captures the loneliness of living through a screen.
Why We Love It: It’s the softest film about hard tech – and somehow, it still makes us cry.
Watch Now: Sky TV | Amazon Prime | YouTube | Apple TV

 

SNOWDEN (2016)
Oliver Stone dramatises Edward Snowden’s decision to leak classified NSA documents, turning one man’s moral crisis into a global political thriller. Joseph Gordon-Levitt plays the conflicted whistle-blower with quiet intensity, exposing the chilling reality of mass surveillance.
Why We Love It: Because every time we cover our laptop camera, this film feels justified.
Watch Now: Sky TV | Amazon Prime | Apple TV

 

THE MATRIX (1999-2021)
Before the Metaverse was even an idea, The Matrix gave us digital reality, simulation theory, and the most fashionable leather ever committed to film. A hacker discovers the world is an illusion generated by machines – and decides to reboot reality itself.
Why We Love It: It’s philosophy in slow motion, and it still looks cooler than anything Apple has ever made.
Watch Now: Netflix | Amazon Prime | YouTube | Apple TV | Sky TV

 

BLADE RUNNER 2049 (2017)
Decades after the original, Denis Villeneuve expands Ridley Scott’s neon dystopia into a haunting meditation on identity and memory. Ryan Gosling’s replicant cop searches for meaning in a world of synthetic souls and digital ghosts.
Why We Love It: It’s the rare sequel that feels like an art installation about consciousness.
Watch Now: Netflix

 

MINORITY REPORT (2002)
Tom Cruise stars in Steven Spielberg’s futuristic thriller where crimes are predicted before they happen. Gesture-controlled screens, biometric IDs, and personalised ads make this pre-crime world disturbingly plausible.
Why We Love It: Because it predicted modern tech so accurately, we half-expect Siri to arrest us next.
Watch Now: Netflix | Amazon Prime | YouTube | Apple TV

 

THE IMITATION GAME (2014)
Benedict Cumberbatch plays Alan Turing, the mathematician whose code-breaking genius helped win World War II – and whose life was tragically cut short by prejudice. Equal parts historical drama and tech origin story, The Imitation Game is a portrait of brilliance ahead of its time.
Why We Love It: Because every algorithm owes a quiet debt to Turing’s mind.
Watch Now: Amazon Prime | Apple TV | Sky TV

 

HACKERS (1995)
A cult classic drenched in ’90s cyberpunk aesthetics, Hackers follows a crew of teenage prodigies taking on corporate corruption through chaotic code and neon nightlife. It’s campy, kinetic, and strangely prophetic about the rise of hacker culture.
Why We Love It: It made floppy disks and fish-eye lenses look like rebellion.
Watch Now: Amazon Prime | Apple TV | Sky TV

 

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Why Tech Stories Matter:

Technology isn’t just a plot device anymore – it’s the landscape of modern existence. These films and shows don’t predict the future; they decode the present. They reflect how deeply tech has seeped into our relationships, ambitions, and anxieties, showing that the line between online and off no longer exists – it’s all one continuous feed.

Whether it’s a rogue AI asking to be loved, a start-up imploding under its own hashtag, or a hacker rewriting reality from his bedroom, tech stories remind us of something vital: our creations always mirror us. And maybe that’s the real glitch in the system.