History Series / LostInSpace2018

* SciFiWritersHave/NoSenseOfDistance: Maureen says they are "trillions of light years off-course." For reference, the diameter of the entire observable universe is only about 93 ''billion'' light years, that is 0.093 trillion light years - not even ''one-tenth'' of a trillion.

** Maureen Robinson using a piece of garage equipment against a Brainwashed and Crazy Robot

** John and Maureen get another in the S2 finale, as they sacrifice themselves to destroy [[spoiler: the ''Resolute'' and the robots. They get [[BigDamnHeroes rescued by Don at the last moment]].]]

* BlackBox: Hastings, the Director of Advanced Systems on the Resolute, tells Maureen that they couldn't reverse-engineer the alien ship technology. It was like the Cro-magnon trying to understand an airplane before they'd even mastered fire.

*** First, he believes that he failed one of the qualification tests for the mission ([[spoiler:he's correct, but Maureen pulled strings to bring him along]]) and thus is a burden to the family.

** While Will and The Robot were separated [[spoiler:though the two stayed connected via empathic link, it is acknowledged on screen that neither were the same as when they left each other or even when they first met. They've both grown as individuals and, according to Will at least, it's all been for the best.]]

** The high-altitude balloon ("HAB") that Maureen uses to investigate the planet's irregular orbit in "Transmission" is kept stashed away in their Chariot. It comes in handy in "Pressurized" when she and John need a miraculous way to escape from being trapped in a tar pit.

* DueToTheDead: John has Will build a cairn with 27 stones, one for each of the colonists that died when the ''Jupiters'' crashed. He does this to teach him about the true responsibility he shoulders by being in charge of the Robot. Later, [[spoiler:Will places a 28th stone... for the Robot that he has just ordered to destroy itself]].

* EnemyWithin: The robot seems horrified whenever it is reminded of its pre-amnesia rampage and seems to want to atone, to the point where it gets mauled by local wildlife rather than fight back and [[spoiler:it hacks the [=3D=] printer to make a gun for Will to use should the robot begin to regress to its former self.]]
* ETGaveUsWifi: [[spoiler:The ''Resolute'' is powered by an engine that came from a crashed ship that belonged to whatever species created the robots]].

* FantasyGunControl: Outside of the incident where John tried to print a gun and Angela then used it, there are no guns in the series. Even the armed guards on the Resolute, all they carry are batons with a shock rod tip. After John's print gun, the closest thing to a firearm that shows up in humans hands, is Adler's EMF energy weapon.

* LargeAndInCharge: [[spoiler:The lead robot for the attack on the ''Resolute'' in Season 2 is significantly larger, and evidently more powerful, than the other robots accompanying it (and fighting against it).]]

* NegativeSpaceWedgie: The ''Resolute'' and the ''Jupiters'' fall through one during an alien attack, taking everyone to another ''galaxy''. [[spoiler:This is actually a function of the alien engine the ''Resolute'' is powered by.]]

* RaptorAttack: In Season 2, [[spoiler:Judy is menaced by a pack of alien critters clearly inspired by velociraptors.]] The subtitles even straight-up call them "dinosaurs."]]

** Also in Season 2 we get a desert planet with barely any water, vicious [[EverythingsBetterWithDinosaurs velociraptor-like carnivores]], venomous buffalo analogues that can kill a horse by merely scratching it with their horns, and finally [[spoiler:a virulent compound in the water that rapidly corrodes and destroys any metal it comes into contact with. Oh, and this one also has a metal ring like the ocean planet mentioned above.]]

* EverythingsBetterWithDinosaurs: In Season 2, [[spoiler:the second featured planet has predators that are clearly inspired by [[RaptorAttack velociraptors]]. The subtitles even straight-up call them "dinosaurs."]]

* RaptorAttack: In Season 2, [[spoiler:Judy is menaced by a pack of alien critters clearly inspired by velociraptors.]]

** While Will and The Robot were seperated [[spoiler:though the two stayed connected via empathic link, it is acknowledged on screen that neither were the same as when they left each other or even when they first met. They've both grown as individuals and, according to Will at least, it's all been for the best.]]

** John makes Will assemble a cairn of 27 stones by hand, one for each colonist killed in the Robot's attack, to impress upon him the responsibility he now carries with the Robot. The Robot clearly understands what the stones mean. [[spoiler:In Season 2, after witnessing the death of Will's horse, which Will and the Robot had been rebonding over, the Robot picks up a rock and places it on a small mound, referencing the cairn. When Adler asks Maureen what's going on, she replies "He's grieving." This is one of many small moments that convinces Adler the Robot has feelings, free will, and sapience, and that coercing it into helping them is unnecessary.]]

** The planet that the colonists find themselves stranded on is full of people-eating monsters, eels that drink all the fuel and unpredictable geological phenomena. [[spoiler:Exaggerated by the fact that a nearby black hole will soon render the planet uninhabitable.]]
** Season 2 happily continues the trend. As detailed under DeathWorld, every world the Robinsons visit seems to be populated with nothing but lethal wildlife, lethal environmental conditions and other weird but no less lethal phenomena.

* {{Jerkass}}: Victor Dhar, the 24th Colony Group's representative, is such an asshole that the audience has to wonder how he ever got elected for the position; this is lampshaded several times and he ultimately redeems himself by [[spoiler:insisting the ''Resolute'' remain to rescue the ''Jupiter 2'']].

-->'''Penny:''' God I hate this planet!

* MagneticWeapons: The EMF projector and its variants. These weapons can generate a magnetic field powerful enough to crush even an alien robot's armoured carapace, but only when on maximum power. Maureen's room-sized EMF, at 83% of maximum power, can only slow down the enemy robots.

* BecauseYouSavedMyLife: The reason why Robot befriends Will and later the robot Sally bonds with Penny after Penny rescues her from the wreckage of the invasion ship. It's also why Dr. Smith has a soft spot for the Robinsons.

* TimeSkip: Seven months pass between the Season 1 finale and the Season 2 pilot.

** The planet that the colonists find themselves stranded on is full of people-eating monsters, eels that drink all the fuel and unpredictable geological phenomena. [[spoiler:Taken UpToEleven by the fact that a nearby black hole will soon render the planet uninhabitable.]]

* AdultFear:
** First off, the idea of you and your kids being trapped on an unknown planet with nobody else around. But it only gets worse.
** Being forced to watch, helpless, as your child suffocates to death.
** Getting separated from two children at the same time and having to choose which one to help.
** Having to choose, again, between rescuing one family member and getting the rest to safety.
** Being told, point blank, by your child that bringing them on the trip was a mistake because they're to blame for everything that went wrong.
** Having the opportunity to save all of your family. . . [[spoiler: except your youngest, because he didn't pass the rigorous stress tests. Leave him behind all alone, give up the one chance for a better life to keep the family together, or cheat to take him with you?]]
** Letting a person into your home, into your family, trusting them around your kids and belongings, and then find out they're a criminal, pathological liar, only out for themselves, borderline sociopath and borderline murderer? And they've been spending the bulk of their time making friends with your youngest and most impressionable child?
** Putting your trust in a psychologist, giving them access to your freshest and most painful mental wounds, and, instead of working to heal your mind, rubs salt in those wounds to manipulate you into an even more vulnerable mental state purely for their own ends.

** In a much more minor case, Don West is changed from a classical hero pilot to a LovableRogue who abandons the ''Resolute'' in the face of danger and runs contraband to the colonies. Season 2 roles back most of these changes to turn him into a snarky but unambiguously heroic character.

* EarthThatUsedToBeBetter: The colonization effort is the result of a meteor impact that created a nuclear winter on Earth, making the planet incapable of sustaining its population.

* SpiritualSuccessor: While the constant and bizarre dangers are in keeping with the show's roots, the addition of constant flashbacks means that Lost in Space now feels an awful lot like ''Series/{{Lost}}'' [[RecycledInSpace In Space]]. The show also draws noticeable inspiration from ''Literature/TheMartian'', being on the [[MohsScaleOfScienceFictionHardness harder]] end of sci-fi (''especially'' compared to previous incarnations, at least until the SufficientlyAdvancedAlien robots and BizarreAlienBiology crop up), more focused on the difficulty of survival in hostile alien environments, and frequently throwing problems at the characters they have to science their way out of. The solutions may be a bit less grounded than ''The Martian'', but far more so than "ReverseThePolarity [[{{Technobabble}} Of The Neutron Flow]]."

* NoPlansNoPrototypeNoBackup: The ''Resolute'' is a one-of-its-kind vessel that mankind cannot afford to lose because it is their only means to evacuate Earth and they are incapable of building another one. [[spoiler:This is less a matter of resources or money and more because its mysterious FTL drive is actually stolen alien tech piloted by an enslaved alien robot nicknamed Scarecrow. Said alien robot's buddies finally track the ship down while it's on its 24th journey to Alpha Centauri, which kicks off the show's plot. The ''Resolute'''s uniqueness is also what gives its total destruction in the Season 2 finale significantly more weight beyond "now we're really lost in space".]]

* MadeOfIndestructium: Future humans are amazing engineers. The Robinson's Jupiter gets smashed by a large chunk of the Resolute, it then gets crushed under tons of glacier ice while having its interior flooded for hours and it's still capable of flying. Their Chariot is almost as tough, withstanding the heat of submersion in a tar pit.

* FoodEnding: Almost. The Robinsons and their friends have their first holiday meal on Alpha Centauri, but there's still a few minutes left to look at Will and Robot exploring other worlds.

* WhamLine: In "Unknown"
-->'''Will:''' You need to help us get home!\\

* TwentyMinutesIntoTheFuture: The series is set "30 years in the future", from an unspecified baseline that is most likely the show's release year (2018). The major difference is part of the show's premise: a meteor impact has caused serious environmental damage. Human society looks pretty similar but we have some cool computer tech and, of course, spaceships that can travel to Alpha Centauri. One clue is that Don West, who appears to be in his twenties, mentions that the Columbia disaster in 2003 was before he was born. A line in season 3 establishes that it is set in 2050

* TwentyMinutesIntoTheFuture: The series is set "30 years in the future", from an unspecified baseline that is most likely the show's release year (2018). The major difference is part of the show's premise: a meteor impact has caused serious environmental damage. Human society looks pretty similar but we have some cool computer tech and, of course, spaceships that can travel to Alpha Centauri. One clue is that Don West, who appears to be in his twenties, mentions that the Columbia disaster in 2003 was before he was born.

The first season of 10 episodes was released on Creator/{{Netflix}} on April 13, 2018. The first teaser trailer can be seen [[https://youtu.be/I5X3vC-XsU0 here]] and the official trailer [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fzmM0AB60QQ here]]. It was renewed for a second season, which was released on December 24, 2019. On March 9, 2020, the series was renewed for a third and final season, released on December 1, 2021.

Set 30 years in the future and with space colonization now a reality the series recounts the adventures and misadventures of the Robinson family, one of those tested and selected to leave Earth in search of a planet capable of sustaining human life and make a new life for themselves in a better world in the Alpha Centauri system.