Movies like The Past Tense (2020)
The best movies like The Past Tense (2020) are Doctor Who: The Curse of Fatal Death (1999), Relax, I'm from the Future (2023) and Blackadder: Back & Forth (1999). If The Past Tense hooked you with its science fiction and comedy, these 30 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Quick picks
- Highest ratedRegular Show: The Movie (2015)7.9/10 from 455 votes
- NewestAfterburn (2025)Released 2025
Doctor Who: The Curse of Fatal Death (1999)
Before the Doctor can settle down to married life, he must face one last confrontation with his deadly enemy of certain death - the Master.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy & science fiction
Worth the HypeMovies like thisRelax, I'm from the Future (2023)
Casper is a time traveller who arrives in the 2020s in an attempt to prevent a major future catastrophe. He meets Holly, a queer black woman he befriends and draws into his plan by giving her his knowledge of the future so that she can make quick money. However, they unwittingly alter the future themselves with their actions, until Doris, another time traveller, arrives to stop them.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy & science fiction
SnoozefestMovies like thisBlackadder: Back & Forth (1999)
What was a cunning plan from Lord Edmund Blackadder V to fake a time machine on his gullibly incompetent friends, turns out to be the real thing and hurls him and his imbecile underling, Baldrick, through the course of human history.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy & science fiction
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Adam Project (2022)
After accidentally crash-landing in 2022, time-traveling fighter pilot Adam Reed teams up with his 12-year-old self on a mission to save the future.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction & comedy
Worth the HypeMovies like thisReal Men (1987)
A womanizing CIA agent and an insecure insurance agent are paired together to make sure a deal goes through with aliens for the future of mankind.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy & science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisRegular Show: The Movie (2015)
After a high school lab experiment goes horribly wrong, Mordecai and Rigby must go back in time to battle an evil volleyball coach in order to save the universe — and their friendship.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy & science fiction
Absolute CinemaMovies like thisMinutemen (2008)
When three high-school friends invent a time-machine, they decide to use it to go back in time and prevent other youngsters from making humiliating mistakes.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy & science fiction
SnoozefestMovies like thisAfterburn (2025)
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 treasure hunters who extract such objects as the Mona Lisa, the Rosetta Stone and the Crown Jewels while facing rival hunters, mutants and pirates.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction & comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension (1984)
Adventurer/surgeon/rock musician Buckaroo Banzai and his band of men, the Hong Kong Cavaliers, take on evil alien invaders from the 8th dimension.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction & comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisMen in Black 3 (2012)
Agents J and K are back...in time. J has seen some inexplicable things in his 15 years with the Men in Black, but nothing, not even aliens, perplexes him as much as his wry, reticent partner. But when K's life and the fate of the planet are put at stake, Agent J will have to travel back in time to put things right. J discovers that there are secrets to the universe that K never told him - secrets that will reveal themselves as he teams up with the young Agent K to save his partner, the agency, and the future of humankind.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both comedy & science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Time Shifters (1999)
Tom Merrick gets caught up in a time-traveling conspiracy and must set the timeline right before it is irrevocably altered.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction
SnoozefestMovies like this12:01 (1993)
Office employee Barry Thomas is caught in a "time bounce" caused by a glitch in the company's secret project. Now the same day occurs again and again - and Barry's the only one who can do anything about it, including saving the life of beautiful research assistant Lisa Fredericks.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like this57 Seconds (2023)
When a tech blogger lands an interview with a tech guru and stops an attack on him, he finds a mysterious ring that takes him back 57 seconds into the past.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisCode 8 Part II (2024)
In a world where superpowered people are heavily policed by robots, an ex-con teams up with a drug lord he despises to protect a teen from a corrupt cop.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisSpace/Time (2025)
After a fatal test shuts down their project, a disgraced team of scientists enters the criminal underworld to rebuild a forbidden space-bending engine that could rescue humanity or annihilate it entirely.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction
SnoozefestMovies like thisStargate: Continuum (2008)
Ba'al travels back in time and prevents the Stargate program from being started. SG-1 must somehow restore history.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction
Worth the HypeMovies like thisTimescape (1992)
Before they can complete renovations on their new country inn, a widowed father and his young daughter are visited by a strange group of tourists. He soon makes a chilling discovery: they are disaster junkies from the future who visit the past to witness history's greatest catastrophes—and his small town is their next stop.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisSpectral (2016)
A special-ops team is dispatched to fight supernatural beings that have taken over a European city.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisBabylon 5: The Legend of the Rangers - To Live and Die in Starlight (2002)
After being punished for retreat from combat, Ranger David Martel is given command of the Liandra, a haunted 20-year old Minbari fighting ship. He's escorting ambassadors to a secret archaeological site, the oldest city on record and a clue to a dangerous ancient race.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisIn Time (2011)
In the not-too-distant future, the aging gene has been switched off. To avoid overpopulation, time has become the currency and the way people pay for luxuries and necessities. The rich can live forever, while the rest struggle to negotiate for their immortality. A poor young man who suddenly comes into a fortune of time finds himself on the run from a corrupt police force known as the "time keepers".
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction
Worth the HypeMovies like thisBill & Ted's Excellent Adventure (1989)
Two rock-'n-rolling teens, on the verge of failing their class, set out on a quest to make the ultimate school history report after being presented with a time machine.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both comedy & science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisTeenage Mutant Ninja Turtles III (1993)
The four turtles travel back in time to the days of the legendary and deadly samurai in ancient Japan, where they train to perfect the art of becoming one. The turtles also assist a small village in an uprising.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both comedy & science fiction
SnoozefestMovies like thisThermae Romae II (2014)
In ancient Rome, bathhouse architect Lucius (Hiroshi Abe) becomes famous with designing the original "thermae" (bathhouse). He receives an order to build a thermae in the colosseum to help gladiators recover from their wounds, but faces difficulties. Thus, Lucius travels again to modern day Japan through the time slip. He meets Manami (Aya Ueto) again, who is now a reporter for a magazine which covers bathroom. With the help of the flat face Japanese tribe, Lucius again designs a new thermae. Meanwhile, Emperor Hadrian (Masachika Ichimura) wants to keep the peace with the thermae, but the Senate wants to extend the land by using force. Emperor Hadrian and the Senate now have a confrontation and Rome becomes divided.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both comedy & science fiction
Meet the Robinsons (2007)
Lewis, a brilliant young inventor, is keen on creating a time machine to find his mother, who abandoned him in an orphanage. Things take a turn when he meets Wilbur Robinson and his family.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both comedy & science fiction
Worth the HypeMovies like thisThe Man with the Objective Lens (1961)
A humorous and satirical comedy, which places a man from the year 2222 one day in the (then) present day life in GDR, East Germany under Communist regime. Using a crystal for mind reading he uncovers some improprieties and moral weaknesses in the "Beautiful future" professed by VEB ("Volkseigener Betrieb" – "State Owned Holdings").
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both comedy & science fiction
Momo (1986)
Momo is a young orphan girl who lives in the ruins of an old Roman amphitheater and becomes friends with everybody in the neighborhood. But when a powerful international corporation starts stealing everybody’s time, nobody has any time left for her, let alone their friends or families. Momo, together with Master Hora, the custodian of time, are the only ones who can go up against the time thieves before all is lost forever.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both comedy & science fiction
Worth the HypeMovies like thisEscape from the 21st Century (2024)
Three friends discover that they have the power to travel back and forth 20 years with a sneeze. However, the future is not as good as they hope, and they need to take on the responsibility of saving the world.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both science fiction & comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisTime for You to Get a Watch (2022)
Patrick is just an average person about to go on a date. On his way he finds a watch.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both science fiction & comedy
Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey (1991)
Amiable slackers Bill and Ted are once again roped into a fantastical adventure when De Nomolos, a villain from the future, sends evil robot duplicates of the two lads to terminate and replace them. The robot doubles actually succeed in killing Bill and Ted, but the two are determined to escape the afterlife, challenging the Grim Reaper to a series of games in order to return to the land of the living.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both comedy
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Butterfly Effect (2004)
A young man struggles to access sublimated childhood memories. He finds a technique that allows him to travel back into the past, to occupy his childhood body and change history. However, he soon finds that every change he makes has unexpected consequences.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both science fiction
Worth the HypeMovies like this
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Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like The Past Tense?
The closest matches to The Past Tense are Doctor Who: The Curse of Fatal Death (1999), Relax, I'm from the Future (2023) and Blackadder: Back & Forth (1999). Below are 27 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after The Past Tense?
Start with Doctor Who: The Curse of Fatal Death (1999), the closest match to The Past Tense.
What is the highest-rated movie like The Past Tense?
Regular Show: The Movie (2015), rated 7.9/10 by 455 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like The Past Tense?
Afterburn (2025) is the most recent release on this list.
Are there English movies like The Past Tense?
Yes: Doctor Who: The Curse of Fatal Death (1999), Relax, I'm from the Future (2023) and Blackadder: Back & Forth (1999).
How are movies similar to The Past Tense chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside The Past Tense, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.