Dan Trachtenberg breathed new life into the Predator franchise after a number of disappointing entries with Prey, a back-to-basics sci-fi action thriller focusing on a lone Comanche warrior (with a little help from her dog) struggling to survive while being hunted by a ferocious Yautja. The movie was met with high praise from critics and fans, and the filmmaker hit another home run with this year's excellent animated anthology, Predator: Killer of Killers.
So, you might say that anticipation has been pretty high for Predator: Badlands, a new live-action adventure which marks the franchise's return to the big screen.
Badlands begins on Yautja Prime, where a young warrior, Dek (Dimitrius Schuster-Koloamatang), engages in combat with his older brother, Kwei, to determine if he is worthy enough to wear a camouflage cloak and become an official member of his clan. After holding his own in the fight, Dek is given the opportunity to choose which creature he wants to track on his first hunt, and decides to go to the perilous planet Genna to face a beast known as the Kallisk - which no other Yautja has been able to bring down.
Unbeknownst to Dek, Kwei had actually been instructed to kill his brother, as a clan is only as strong as its weakest link. Disobeying their father's orders, Kwei programmes his ship to take Dek to Genna, where he encounters a damaged Weyland-Yutani synthetic named Thia (Elle Fanning - impressive in a dual role). Dek reluctantly agrees to accept help from what he initially regards as a "tool," and the pair set out to hunt the Kallisk and retrieve Thia's legs.
A bond begins to form between these unlikely allies, but both are keeping secrets that could threaten to destroy any trust they have built.
Badlands is definitely not your typical Predator movie, and Trachtenberg wisely takes the franchise in a different direction by not only making a Yautja the hero, but exploring the notoriously ruthless alien species' culture to a degree we haven't seen in any previous film. We learn quite a bit about their way of life, and why they are, in general, so hostile and aggressive.
Predators have formed temporary alliances with humans in earlier movies, but the deepening relationship between Dek and Thia evolves into a classic buddy movie dynamic with a surprising amount of heart. Dek has been raised to view any bond of friendship as weakness, but he gradually begins to consider Thia - whose "sister" Tessa sees her as little more than a means to an end - a kindred spirit.
This movie also marks another first for the Predator franchise: a PG-13 rating. There's been some concern among fans that this would result in a watered down effort with minimal violence, but Badlands manages to side-step this potential issue by leaving human characters out of the movie altogether. Blood will usually result in an R-rating... but not it's pouring out of an alien (green) or an android (white), evidently. This allows for some pretty brutal scenes, and even though the gruesomeness is toned down to some extent, Badlands might be the most action-heavy Predator movie since the original.
While the family-friendly rating doesn't restrict the violence to any significant degree, Badlands is definitely geared towards a younger audience from a tonal standpoint, with mixed results. Thia - a far more ebullient synth than any we've encountered in the Alien franchise due to her empathy settings being turned up (there is a storyline reason for this) - is largely utilized as comic relief early on, and a cute animal sidekick even joins the fray at one point. A lot of the humor does land, but by the time Thia's robotic legs are taking down enemies during the climactic battle, you may find yourself recalling some of the sillier moments of droid slapstick from the Star Wars prequels.
This won't be an issue for everyone, but - as is so often the case with Marvel Studios releases - it can be hard to shake the notion that studio mandated ("can we maybe fit another joke in here?") humor had something to do with the movie's final act.
Dan Trachtenberg is 3-for-3 with Predator: Badlands, an action-packed crowd-pleaser with engaging leads and a strong emotional centre, which might be the most purely entertaining Predator movie yet. Some fans may balk at the shift away from sci-fi horror and the family-friendly tone, but Badlands deserves credit for delivering a much-needed shake-up to the usual cat-and-mouse formula.