Predator: Badlands Trailer Teases Yet Another Zombie Franchise
Hollywood is nothing if not persistent, especially when a franchise has only been beaten three-quarters of the way into the ground, and the next one it’s swinging its hammer at is Predator. This time, the movie is Predator: Badlands, the new entry from director Dan Trachtenberg and writer Patrick Aison, the team behind the last Predator movie, Prey. Predator: Badlands follows a Predator outcast who must team up with a human to hunt and fight “the ultimate adversary.” Dimitrius Schuster-Koloamatangi stars as the Predator, with Elle Fanning as his human companion. Predator: Badlands will arrive in theaters on November 7, 2025, and you can see the trailer below:
Predator is one of the many franchises that I wish would go away. The movies following Predator 2 aren’t good (with the caveat that I haven’t seen Prey because The Predator was so awful that it killed any interest I had in seeing more of these films; it’s the only Shane Black film I don’t like), and I know they’ll never give it up because it’s a recognizable name, but sooner or later, at least a few of these IPs are going to have to be allowed to fade away. They keep resorting to the gimmick of redesigning the Predator to jazz up the formula, and that’s a mistake because the original design is one of the coolest movie monsters ever. The worst had to have been in Predators, where they used awful CGI to make the new Predator’s face look more grotesque, but it just came off as silly. (What was even worse was that there was an original Predator in the movie, tied up by the new Super Predators; I was waiting for him to get loose and kick the newbies’ asses, but nope, they just killed him.) Predator: Badlands appears to be doing the same thing, with the main Predator getting a new hairdo with the sides shaved off, and it looks dumb. I also don’t care for the CGI in the trailer; the Predator’s face looks off, like it’s clearly a special effect and not a real creature, which the first one pulled off so well with practical effects. Sometimes, you don’t mess with what works, and if you can’t help yourself, then maybe you should just do something entirely new.
That being said, if more Predator movies must be made, I like that Predator: Badlands is trying a new setup and heading to another world with new prey for the galaxy’s greatest hunters. I don’t like the Prey method of going back in time to see Predators on Earth in the past because it diminishes Arnold’s victory in the first one if they came to Earth a bunch of times previously and were conquered every time. Predators brought a bunch of humans to a different planet, but it was just the same jungle as Predator, so it may as well have been Earth. It’s hard to get a good sense of the terrain on whatever planet this movie is set on, but hopefully, they change it up a little bit; switching from a South American jungle to Los Angeles in Predator 2 was a great idea that allowed the movie to be different enough from its predecessor to feel like a new experience. I’m also not thrilled with having the Predator team up with Elle Fanning; it’d be great if a movie that was making the Predator the protagonist went the whole nine yards and didn’t throw in a human in a misguided attempt to give us someone to relate to. Why not do the hard work and have us sympathize with and root for the monster? It can be done, and it’d make for a more compelling movie. It’s going to take a lot to get me excited for another Predator movie, and so far, Predator: Badlands hasn’t done it.
Let us know what you think of the Predator: Badlands trailer in the comments!
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Comments (2)
Well, we don’t know what that target they’re teasing is. It could be Jack Black in alien makeup, which would probably just be a different ill-fitting t-shirt.
But yeah, most of these interminable franchises need to end. Predator, Alien, Terminator, Ghostbusters, Star Wars (which could have been different, but at this point, it just needs to go away), probably a half dozen I’m not thinking of. And as for Arnold and the others, what was great about them was that they were the star, so you didn’t have to have a thousand sequels; just put them in a new movie with new villains and a new story, and let them do their thing. Arnold was actually offered sequels to a bunch of his movies, but he turned them all down except for Terminator because he didn’t see the need for them.
Zombie franchise is the perfect term. I stopped watching movies during most of the franchise. The first 2 were both classic movies, really. Just had no interest in the others. I did watch Prey and liked it, even though it was woke, but it was an entirely different movie in that there were lots of human characters and kind of a girl boss, girl power vs tribal structure thing, in addition to being a Predator movie. In that way, it was just a well shot and well edited movie and I am more into the structure and craftsmanship of movies. It is just a franchise, like you said, and just a brand. People know it. I think they just capitalize on point of reference and things people know. I miss the days of American muscle with Arnold and Stallone and Van Damme. Let me just say that, for once, I’m just grateful not to see that fat slob Jack Black in it.