The best movies and TV shows started with classic sitcoms and then morphed into one of the most exciting young careers in Hollywood history. Fox got his big break on television in the sitcom Family Ties, where he played "Young Republican" Alex P. Keaton, while his parents were both liberals who grew up as hippies in the '60s and '70s. Fox won three Emmys and a Golden Globe, leading to him getting picked up for some movie roles, one of which made him an icon.

In the same year he picked up a role in the teen horror movie Teen Wolf, Fox gained the role of Marty McFly in Back to the Future, which he remains best known for to this day. The movies he made outside of Back to the Future and its sequels were not as successful, but Fox still delivered great performances in a variety of genres, including dramas, comedies, and even a war movie. However, before his Parkinson's diagnosis led to his official retirement in 2020.

Michael J. Fox was part of the ensemble cast for the Tim Burton-directed alien invasion movie Mars Attacks! The film was set up like a comedy, a satire of the alien invasion movies from the 1960s. As the title suggests, the invaders here are Martians who launch an all-out attack on Earth and begin to indiscriminately kill while the U.S. military tries to find a way to turn the tides. for a national news network and the boyfriend of Sarah Jessica Parker's talk show host.

This is an ensemble film with a giant cast of recognizable names. However, . Highlights include his interactions with his vindictive chihuahua, his shocked expressions when he sees deranged things happening, and his final moments in the movie as he tries to reach his girlfriend during the all-out alien attack. Fox was a perfect casting choice in Mars Attacks!

In 1998, Michael J. Fox had to step down from the lead role in his sitcom Spin City after revealing to the cast and crew that he had Parkinson's disease. He mostly stepped out of the public eye and stopped acting for several years, making onlyh a few small appearances in Scrubs, Boston Legal, and Rescue Me. However, in 2010, as attorney Louis Canning.

This was a very much out-of-the-box role for Fox, as he played an antagonistic character in the series, a villain role he had rarely played throughout his career. It was also a role where Fox used his Parkinson's disease as a character trait, as Louis Canning used his erratic movements to earn sympathy from the judge and jury in cases. He appeared in over 20 episodes of the hit legal drama throughout its run. Fox earned Emmy nominations for three consecutive years.

The last full-time role that Michael J. Fox starred in was in the sitcom Spin City. Premiering in 1996, Fox was the lead character, While Barry Bostwick stars as the mayor of New York City, it is Mike who is pretty much in charge of everything, including dealing with political spin to ensure that things appear as his boss needs them to. However, he is terrible at handling his personal life. Sadly, in the third season of the show, Fox let the crew know he had Parkinson's and had to step down.

Charlie Sheen took his place as the new lead in the final two seasons, although Fox did return as a guest in the final season. While he only lasted for three seasons before his medical condition forced him to retire from full-time acting, Fox was highly acclaimed for his performances. Fox won three consecutive Golden Globe Awards for the three seasons he starred in and also took home the Primetime Emmy Award in 2000.

While Michael J. Fox had to step back from full-time acting in 2000, he could still contribute to smaller things during that time. He voiced the lead role in the Stuart Little franchise for three movies. The first came before he announced his diagnosis, and he voiced the role twice after that (2002 and 2005). The franchise is a live-action/CGI hybrid series in which Eleanor and Frederick (Geena Davis, Hugh Laurie) and make him part of the family unit.

The first movie has Eleanor and Frederick happy to have Stuart as part of their family, while others are not as eager to welcome him in, with their son George (Jonathan Lipnicki) feeling neglected and the family cat Snowbell (Nathan Lane) wanting to eliminate Stuart completely from the house. That first film was a monster success, making $300 million at the box office, and critics called it a "flawless family film," all led by the Michael J. Fox-voiced Stuart Little.

In 1989, Michael J. Fox starred in a film unlike any other he had ever acted in. Brian De Palma (Scarface) directed the war drama Casualties of War, which and Sean Penn as Sergeant Tony Meserve (based on David Edward Gervase). Based on a New Yorker article by Daniel Lang, this film tells the story of the Incident on Hill 192, which involved an American squad in the Vietnam War who kidnapped, gang raped, and murdered a young Vietnamese woman.

Penn played the soldier who planned out the abduction, assault, and murder. Fox plays the only soldier who does not take part and ends up turning in his fellow soldiers, even as they threaten his life. The movie was a box office failure, but it holds high ratings from critics, with an 84% on Rotten Tomatoes. The film also earned a Golden Globe nomination for its score by Ennio Morricone.

In 1985, Michael J. Fox got his second starring role in a feature film, as Teen Wolf came out the same year as Back to the Future. While not a remake of the 1957 movie I Was a Teenage Werewolf (starring Michael Landon), the movie has the same basic premise with a high school student named Scott (Fox) starting to turn into a werewolf. Unlike other 1980s werewolf movies, a werewolf did not bite Scott, but it was instead hereditary. Also, unlike other movies, Scott didn't become a monster; instead, .

In this specific werewolf movie, Scott has control of himself as a werewolf, and his father (also a werewolf) helps teach him how to manage the affliction and use it for his own good. The movie was a massive success, making $80 million on just a $4 million budget. While it received mostly negative reviews, critics praised Fox's performance, and it has since become a cult classic. It even spawned a sequel (without Fox) and a live-action TV series that aired from 2011 to 2017.

In 1996, Michael J. Fox joined the Peter Jackson horror comedy The Frighteners​​​​​​. Made a few years before Jackson started working on the Lord of the Rings Trilogy, this movie has Fox stars as after his wife's death. However, he decides to do the wrong thing and works with the ghosts to scam people out of money by performing fake exorcisms after befriending several ghosts willing to help him.

As expected, Frank soon runs across a home haunted by the spirit of a mass murderer who is posing as the Grim Reaper — a malevolent spirit who can hurt both the dead and the living. The Frighteners was a box office failure, but it gained a massive cult following in the years since its release, and it is often seen as one of the most underrated movies of Jackson's entire career. The Saturn Awards nominated The Frighteners for Best Horror Film, Best Director, and Best Actor for Fox.

The TV show that made Michael J. Fox a star was the sitcom Family Ties. The series aired from 1982 to 1989, during almost the entire presidential run of Ronald Reagan. The show played into that as Fox played Alex P. Keaton, a "Young Republican" who was the oddball in his family, which consisted of former hippie parents Steven and Elyse Keaton and his more materialistic sister, Mallory. The series' humor mostly focuses on the cultural divide between the more liberal parents and the more uptight Alex.

The series uses humor to discuss politics. Keaton is a devout supporter of Reaganomics, his mother is a feminist, and his sister is apolitical. The series was mostly a snapshot of the people living in the '80s and the cultural divide that existed then. Family Ties rose in popularity through the fifth season before ratings dropped, and it ended after the seventh. It also won five Primetime Emmy Awards, with three of those going to Fox.

Still: A Michael J. Fox Movie is not one of Fox's acting roles. Instead, this was a recent documentary that showcased Fox's life and career, and took a long look at his battle with Parkinson's disease and how it changed his life. Director Davis Guggenheim was responsible for three of the highest-grossing documentaries of all time, which included An Inconvenient Truth. With this specific release, but focused more on his post-Parkinson's disease life.

Critics loved the documentary, awarding it a 99% Certifed Fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes. The pundits pointed to the fact that Fox was such a beloved human being for being why this hit so hard. It also helped that Fox refused to allow the documentary to feel sorry for him or make him an inspirational figure. Instead, he chose to show his self-effacing personality, and this kept his reputation intact as an honest and beloved actor. It won the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Documentary.

The best and most important movie of Michael J. Fox's career was his first major starring role. In 1985, Fox took on the role of Marty McFly in Back to the Future. Alongside Christopher Lloyd as Doc Brown, Fox led the trilogy that saw him go back in time to when his parents were in high school before later moving forward in history to an altered dystopian future and then all the way back to the old West before the story came to a close. However, the best of the best is still the first movie.

While not the first choice for playing Marty McFly, it is impossible to imagine the character now without seeing Michael J. Fox's face. The film is full of fan-favorite moments, from Marty's awkward interactions with his teenage parents to his playing Johnny B. Goode on guitar. It was a huge success, making $388 million on a $19 million budget. Back to the Future received four Golden Globes and four Oscar nominations, and the Library of Congress added it to the National Film Registry in 2007.

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  Michael J. Fox