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Tim Burton's warmest film: a dying father who has always told his life as a series of tall tales — a giant, a witch who shows your death in her eye, a perfect hidden town called Spectre — and the grown son trying to sort truth from myth before it's too late. Ewan McGregor plays the young father in the fables, Albert Finney the old man telling them.
![Video thumbnail — The Chronicles Of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch And The Wardrobe - Official® Trailer [HD]](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/cNuoUKDbX_4/maxresdefault.jpg)
C.S. Lewis's seven-book fantasy series that opened via a wardrobe and stayed in your head for decades. For 90s and 2000s kids, Narnia lived in classroom read-alouds, Scholastic box sets, and library paperbacks with that iconic cover art — the White Witch, Turkish delight, and Aslan waiting inside.
J.K. Rowling's magical phenomenon launched June 1997 in the UK as Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone (Sorcerer's Stone in the US). Three books released before the decade ended; by 1999 the series topped global bestseller lists and sparked a franchise that never stopped—within a year, midnight release parties were a cultural tradition.
Peter Jackson's monumental film trilogy adapting J.R.R. Tolkien's masterpiece: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001), The Two Towers (2002), and The Return of the King (2003). Filmed entirely in New Zealand, it defined epic fantasy for a generation with breathtaking scale, iconic performances, and midnight premieres that felt like cultural events.
Richard Garfield's 1993 creation, Magic: The Gathering invented the collectible card game genre and became a phenomenon that consumed thousands of hours and dollars from basement dwellers and tournament pros alike. Casting spells, summoning creatures, and crushing opponents with clever deck construction, Magic made trading-card games respectable — and obsessive.
Lucy Lawless as Xena, a reformed warrior with a chakram and an iconic battle cry, fighting alongside Gabrielle through six seasons of syndicated adventure. Filmed in New Zealand and beloved far beyond its time slot, this spinoff of Hercules became one of the highest-rated syndicated dramas of the era and an enduring cult classic.