Predator: Badlands

Sometimes I feel like we need to create support groups for movie studio IP (Intellectual Property) lovers who have been heartbroken time and time again by diminishing returns of movie franchises. You know the kind. It’s those first and second initial movies of greatness that give way to mediocre and troubling sequels that get worse with age and frequency. Many examples are out there: the Alien franchise, Terminator franchise, Matrix franchise, and even my beloved Star Wars has let me down many times. And then we have the Predator franchise which never got close to being as good as the original way back in 1987 before cell phones and dial up internet. Many of the Predator sequels have ranged from OK to Meh to Booooo. Yet I’m happy to say Predator: Badlands has successfully broken that dismal streak with an entertaining, captivating, and overall capable film from director Dan Trachtenberg who also gave us the exciting Predator side story “Prey” on Hulu.

In the first PG-13 rated theatrical release of the franchise, we have a Predator that is actually the protagonist who learns, struggles, and earns our compassion. There are no humans present in the whole story and thus no one to be terrorized other than Dek the young Yaujta (the proper name of the Predator species). Dek is seen as the runt of the family…weak and not worthy of respect from the rest of the clan. Dek’s ultra-alpha father seems to have tasked Dek’s physically impressive brother to kill the lesser brother. Thank goodness the he has a soft spot for his diminutive sibling and chooses to spare his life which unfortunately raises the ire of his father. Dek so desires to be proven worthy of respect that he decides to flee his father’s murderous wraith via his spaceship and travel to Genna, also known as The Death Planet, to kill an indestructible creature called the Kalisk. As soon as Dek lands on the planet the action picks up and never lets up as he runs into dangers galore.

When I think about the first Star Wars that was released in 1977 I remember the buzz. There was so much to love in Star Wars; everything from the lightsaber fights to the futuristic costumes to the gripping spaceship battles. Yet the one set piece that was the most talked about was the cantina scene on Tatooine. All those monsters, creatures and characters really struck the imagination of all who watched and became a cultural touchstone. In the same way the tastiest and most striking ingredient in Badlands are the vast numbers of dangerously creative creatures, vegetation, and environment.

I was amazed at the creative energy put behind all these amazing animals, insects, spores, plants, and ecological marvels. Dek is constantly fighting for his life among all these special effects using all those cool weapons the Predators have (and we see some new ones we have never seen before). In the first few minutes of his landing he is chased, grabbed, flayed, tossed, bitten and beaten by everything around him.

As he comes within inches of being paralyzed and eaten by various wildlife he runs into an asset (or what he refers to as a “tool”) in the form of Thia (Elle Fanning), an android who was part of an all-android landing party financed by the Weyland-Yutani corporation. Of course if you recognize the name Weyland-Yutani you know it’s the evil corporation highlighted in all the Alien movies. The talkative and almost ditzy Thia is missing her legs and isolated in the jungle when Dek finds her. Thia’s android sensibilities start as curiosity and continue into constant yammering as she buffets Dek with questions upon questions much to Dek’s chagrin. He can understand her because she conveniently has a universal speech adapter at play and is helpful to him as a tool since she can access many facts about the dangerous environment. The back-and-forth between the two is nothing you haven’t seen before in a buddy cop movie but the constantly dangerous environment, plus discovering what actually goes through a Predator’s mind, makes for interesting viewing.

The Weyland-Yutani Corp has been on the planet to harvest a few of these dangerous beasts of prey, including the Kalisk, for nefarious means. Thia was a part of this plan until a Kalisk destroyed the base she and many other androids were stationed at. This includes her artificial “sister” Tessa (again played by Elle Fanning) in a very entertaining dual role of the innocent Thia and the manipulative Tessa. Tessa and the other surviving soldier-androids are friendly enough at the first encounter with Dek but soon true ambitions are shown and Thia must figure out who her true “family” really is. On his home planet Dek found out that family doesn’t always mean acceptance. In the same way Thia will find out some hard truths about her “sister” as well. Both of these characters will help each other grow and heal as Dek continues to pursue acceptance albeit not in ways he thought he would.

Disney enveloped 20th Century Fox into it’s ever-hungry maw in 2019 and that merger included both the Aliens and Predator franchises (previously owned by 20th Century). Predator: Badlands, when compared to the Arnold Schwarzenegger led original, is a very different animal that definitely has been “Disney-ized”: a family drama with a sinister family member, a young protagonist that has something to prove, funny quips with a wacky sidekick, cute animal tag-a-longs, and an obvious ending that points to more sequels. If you are a hardcore Predator fan from way back you may be insulted or offended by this latest softening of the franchise.

The director defended this idea by saying “In most sci-fi universes, the “creatures” are either bad guys or sidekicks. In [Badlands] it's: “What if you were with the creature on this crazy mission to prove itself, seeing everything through its eyes.’.” Depending on your feelings about a “pure” Predator experience you’ll have to make the call. However, based on the quality of the last couple of theatrical releases, this may be a logical progression to create a less bloody, more accessible path for this character.

Speaking of violence, the creators of Badlands are able to get away with a PG-13 because there is no “human violence” or human blood. All the violence propagated against any character results in green or white fluid that spatters and spurts all over the scenery. Also, we see animals and androids which are dispatched in various ways that could be seen as extreme if it were more based more in our world. This includes things being cut in two, cut lengthways, close up of crushing an android’s head, beheadings and chopping limbs off are all highlighted (sometimes in slow-mo) but, again, only to creatures and androids. If androids were replaced by humans this would be a hard R rating but because we have artificial lifeforms being abused it takes away most of the sting and shock.

It may be PG-13, but some of the kills have the force of an R rating which is probably the intension of the creators as they try to gain a younger audience while keeping the older fans happy. If I were in middle school or high school and saw this movie I would think it was one of the greatest action movies of all time because of all the artificial carnage swirling around the angsty, young Dek as he carves his way through all the dangers. Your tolerance for CGI violence may vary but if you don’t mind androids getting cut down in various ways you will probably enjoy this.

Amazingly, the bad language is almost non-existent with only one sh— and one or two d—m’s. There are no sexual situations.

Of course Dek’s father has it in for his son claiming he has no worth because he is smaller than the rest, is the runt of his clan, and brings shame to the rest of his people just by his appearance. His father sees mercy as weakness and is purposed to eliminate his son. Talk about daddy issues! Dek feels this rejection all through the movie and vows to prove how strong he is by killing an unkillable monster on Genna.

Thank goodness we do not have to worry about that kind of rejection by our heavenly Father. On the contrary, God loved us so much that He reached past our unworthiness and filled us with new life in Jesus Christ.

“But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved.” —Ephesians 2:4-5

Even when we were his enemies and were stuck in our sin, 11.8.2025 still loved us enough to come in the form of Christ to die for our sins so we could be at peace with Him.

“But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” —Romans 5:8

Dek’s father saw him as unworthy and wanted to kill him for it, but our Heavenly Father, even though we were unworthy, died in our place to bring us to fellowship with Him. What a loving Father we have!

As a hardcore sci-fi fan I welcome this new direction in the Predator franchise and hope that future films will be as engaging as this one was. I will, for now, relinquish my membership to the Predator bad franchise support group until I see what comes down the pike. But I still have plenty of bad franchise support groups to attend. Now if you will excuse me, I think the Ghostbusters meeting is starting in a few minutes…

• Violence: Heavy
• Vulgar/Crude language: Minor
• Profane language: None
• Nudity: None
• Sex: None
• Drugs/Alcohol: None
• Occult: None
• Wokeism: None

See list of Relevant Issues—questions-and-answers.