Predator: Badlands

by Mike McGranaghan

When Dan Trachtenberg’s Prey - an entry in the wildly uneven Predator franchise – debuted on Hulu, it earned good reviews from both critics and audiences. A lot of people wondered why it didn’t go to theaters. (Most of the other entries bombing is the likely explanation.) The mistake is not being repeated. Trachtenberg’s follow-up, Predator: Badlands, is on the big screen where it belongs. Rather than fumbling to figure out what audiences want from the character, he does the smart thing, relying on his own vision. If this isn’t the best entry in the franchise, it’s at least tied with the original.

This time, the Predator isn’t simply a monster for people to fight, he’s the protagonist. Dek (Dimitrius Schuster-Koloamatangi) is considered by his father to be the weakest of the Yautja species. To prove him wrong, he sets out for the planet Genna to slay one of the allegedly unkillable beasts known as the Kalisk. Once there, he finds the planet is dangerously inhospitable. A chance encounter with a synthetic woman named Thia (Elle Fanning) leads to a deal: she’ll lead him to a Kalisk den if he’ll help her retrieve the lower half of her body.

When I was 13, my parents took me to see Raiders of the Lost Ark. I still recall the breathless feeling I had watching it. There seemed to be a thrilling new element every couple minutes, and that created a sort of euphoria. Predator: Badlands gave me a little bit of that feeling again. It’s action-packed - not in the frenzied Marvel kind of way, but in the way where each addition serves the story and builds on what came before. Dek starts off facing living tree limbs that try to grab him and deadly “razor grass,” and things become even more perilous from there. The film hits the ground running, then keeps the breakneck pace going until the very end.

Dek and Thia’s shared adventure is enormously fun, filled with surprises and delightfully weird creatures. It is not, however, without substance. A Shakespearian quality infuses Dek’s arc. He has a “golden” brother he strives to live up to, plus a disapproving father willing to kill him for his perceived weakness. This background allows him to become a more fully developed character than any previous Predator. A theme of “clan” also runs through the plot. Dek is attempting to prove himself to his Yautja clan yet must form a new one with Thia if he wants to survive.

Performances in the movie are surprisingly good. Schuster-Koloamatangi brings a strong physicality to Dek, helping the action sequences achieve maximum impact. Fanning is good, too, in a difficult role. She gives Thia real personality, despite her being a synthetic. The actress is just a head and a torso, worn by Dek like a backpack, for the first half. Actually, Fanning has a double role; I don’t want to spoil her other function, except to say that she scores on both counts.

Visual effects in Predator: Badlands are excellent, as is the cinematography from Jeff Cutter. Care has obviously been taken to create a look that builds an atmosphere to enhance the story. Cranking out another fan-service Predator sequel would have been easy. Trachtenberg and his team understood that the best way to continue the franchise was to simply make a kick-ass movie. And that’s precisely what they’ve done.

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