The Predator franchise arrived in 1987 at a sci-fi action peak, pitting combat-skilled humans against a technologically advanced alien species with one goal: hunt and kill opponents worthy of being prey. Despite new characters, directors, cultural backdrops, settings, and studios during the nearly four decades since, the next five sequels leading up to Predator: Badlands honored those core themes while still feeling completely different from its predecessors.

A key facet of Predator has been for the next movie to feel entirely distinct from what came before, modernizing the story for cultural relevancy while still maintaining the throughline predator vs. prey underdog themes. That’s never been more true than with Disney’s Predator: Badlands, which takes the franchise into its most unexpected and bold direction yet as director Dan Trachtenberg turns the Predator into the protagonist and a Weyland-Yutani synth into his ally.

When I first arrived on the set of the film in New Zealand on August 30, 2024, I can genuinely say that a Yautja-focused Predator story was far from what I had imagined. Visiting on shooting day 40 of 57, Disney was still incredibly тιԍнт-lipped about any and all details regarding the film, with Elle Fanning’s Badlands casting having only been announced earlier that week.

The majority of our time was spent speaking with the producers, cast, crew, and director Dan Trachtenberg in trailers, getting an intimate look at their work and processes on the shoot’s final couple weeks. We also had the privilege of walking on interior sets constructed at the studio, including two ships and a rocky Yautja-world landscape. As Disney put it for us when we first walked in, the biggest takeaway is that Badlands is “unlike any Predator movie we’ve ever seen before.”

Predator: Badlands Flips the Franchise’s Premise After Nearly 40 Years

A young Predator named Dek takes center stage in a survival road-trip adventure that redefines the franchise.

The original Arnold Schwarzenegger-starring hit was a clear product of its time, combining Cold War tensions, fears around technological advancement, and an underdog action story much like contemporary sci-fi horrors The Terminator (1984) and Aliens (1986). With soldiers being hunted by a Yautja in the jungle, it’s difficult to ignore the themes related to American imperialism and the concept of dehumanizing enemies in battle.

However, the Predator franchise has since adapted with the times to apply those themes to the current political and cultural climate. For instance, Predator 2 brought the Yautja to the backdrop of 1990 gang warfare in Los Angeles, while the franchise’s fifth film, Prey (2022), followed an 18th century young Comanche woman defying gender norms to prove herself as a hunter.

As different as the backdrop may be for every Predator movie, they all continue to ask the same central questions: what does it mean to be human, and are the kill-focused Yautja really so different from ourselves? Dan Trachtenberg truly puts those core themes to the test in Predator: Badlands, humanizing the Predator more than ever before as we follow Dek (played by Dimitrius Schuster-Koloamatangi), a one-eyed runt in his Yautja family, on his risky mission to prove himself by killing the Kalisk, an “unkillable beast.”

In all previous main Predator movies, the premise has followed a human protagonist being hunted by a Yautja. This time, as producer Ben Rosenblatt explained to us, we follow the Predator far into the future as he’s simultaneously hunting an unkillable beast and being hunted by a crew of Weyland-Yutani synths, with an emotional journey underlined by his familial tragedies and unexpected bond with a legless rogue synth:

“The big idea is that we are trying to do a Predator movie where the Predator is the hero, the protagonist of the movie. So our story follows an undersized predator. It begins on Yautja Prime with this predator and his immediate family and through a series of both exciting and tragic events, he’s set off on a journey on a foreign planet, and that’s where most of the film is taking place.”

Though he’s both predator and prey in this story, the antagonistic role that Yautja have previously played in Predator movies doesn’t apply to Dek in Badlands. As Schuster-Koloamatangi explains, “It’s quite cool that we get to follow a Predator… someone from Yautja, and not just have them as the antagonist coming in and causing havoc. It’s cool to be able to follow one of the Predators that everyone is so scared of, and then have a deeper look into their culture, background, and what makes them them.”

Additionally, while Dek sets out on his journey upholding the Predators’ cultural code of hunting alone, Badlands also flips that premise by quickly giving him an ally in the synth Thia (Elle Fanning). This gives the characters themselves new challenges while genre-bending into a “road trip buddy movie” (as Rosenblatt called it), with the legless Thia bribing Dek to carry her across the planet, claiming she’ll show him the Kalisk if he returns her to her ship.

Thia being on Dek’s back throughout much of the film and the two speaking different languages created complex challenges for the characters themselves, but provided exciting opportunities for Trachtenberg: “Part of the fun of it was that it was gonna be unusual and challenging, in concept. That was the fun being limited… being limited in language, and to have to communicate so much more visually, makes everything that we’re doing that much more charged.”

The internal тιтle for the movie on set was “BACKPACK,” highlighting just how crucial the concept of Dek carrying Thia is to the story, the external conflicts these characters face, and the trajectory of their bond. Of course, it isn’t a novel premise within the sci-fi realm, with Trachtenberg revealing he was inspired by The Empire Strikes Back: “My pitch was that it was like ‘Chewbacca and C-3PO: The Movie.’ And I was tantalized by the fun of that, but I did not foresee it being as complicated as it ended up.”

The Empire Strikes Back isn’t the only hit sci-fi movie from that era that finds its way into Predator: Badlands, of course, as the Disney ownership allowed Trachtenberg to integrate another long-connected property into the fray: Alien.

Weyland-Yutani Joins the Hunt (Without Making This AvP)

Elle Fanning’s dual synth roles, a newly created Yautja language, and far-future Weyland-Yutani ambitions expand the Alien connection without Xenomorphs.

Concept art on the conference room walls of what seemed to be a Weyland-Yutani ship and a synth already piqued our suspicions, with Rosenblatt soon confirming the inclusion of the infamous Alien corporation. The producer elaborated on how synths come into play in Dek’s story, with the two main representatives both being portrayed by Elle Fanning:

“On this journey, he meets… a Weyland-Yutani synth who has been severed in half and stuck in a nest on the planet waiting for some way to help get out of there. So the backstory on that is Weyland-Yutani has sent an all-synth mission onto this planet to pursue the very same beast for their own purposes.”

However, while Weyland-Yutani and their advanced synths are included, Rosenblatt reiterates that Badlands is not another Alien vs. Predator movie, following the divisive 2004 and 2007 crossover duology. Crucially, there are no Xenomorphs in Badlands.

Trachtenberg’s decision to include the more Alien-specific mythology ultimately stemmed from the desire to give Dek an interesting, nonhuman sidekick that wouldn’t “take the thunder away from” the Predator as the protagonist. After landing on that sidekick being a robot, his concept “blossomed into other grander ideas.” Enter Alien’s Weyland-Yutani synthetics.

The decades’ worth of expansion on Alien and Weyland-Yutani’s technological advancements also gave Badlands more to play with regarding Thia and Dek’s language predicament. “We hired someone to actually create the language of Yautja, Britton Watkins…. he came to us through a guy named Paul Frommer, who created Na’vi for Avatar. … We have Dex speaking in Yautja subтιтled, and we have Thia, Tessa, and the other synths speaking in English. The device that we’re using is a universal translator.”

In addition to Thia, Elle Fanning also plays her “sister” synth, Tessa, Weyland-Yutani’s latest model. Making the synths simultaneously heroes and villains, Tessa is among a group of militaristic synths and research synths sent to understand the planet and capture the Kalisk for themselves.

To distinguish Fanning’s characters, Trachtenberg had some clear goals set out for hair and makeup artist Susie Glᴀss: “They’re identical, but there has to be a point of difference. Thia has been on a real journey… Dan was very clear that he wanted to see some damage without it going down the whole big prosthetic route. … And then, of course, we had to find a Tessa who had to look the same but different.”

Inside the Predator’s Expanding World: New Planets, Cultures & Weapons

From Genna’s landscapes to the unkillable Kalisk, Squirt the creature, and improvised weaponry, Badlands unveils a richer Predator culture and arsenal.

Outside Weyland-Yutani’s synths, Badlands expands this world through new monsters, creatures, and tweaks to the Predators from creature designer Alec Gillis, who’s been with the franchise since the 1987 movie.

Despite the technological advances in filmmaking and creature creation since the original film, the process of making Badlands’ creatures was similar to the practical way Gillis approached them early on: “We’ll base things as much as we can in reality, in physical pieces, and then we use the CGI to augment and to build the world and the universe that they inhabit. Because you can’t make a modern movie without really beautiful digital effects.”

To highlight this, Gillis pᴀssed around a silicone model of Predator: Badlands’ lovable yet ᴅᴇᴀᴅly new monster sidekick, Squirt. “So one of the ideas we had was, what if [Dek]… finds a life form that is this sort of snake-like character that he can coax, somehow train, that sits on his shoulder, and it has this ability to spit two chemicals that when they combine in the air, they become explosive and fiery. So that’s what got him nicknamed Squirt.”

In addition to expanding the world through new monsters like Squirt and the Kalisk, Gillis was tasked with designing Dek’s appearance to be more humanized than past Predators. “You now for the first time have a Predator that is a protagonist. And that’s something to be executed carefully… Dek has to be more expressive than predators have been in the past.”

To contextualize Dek’s Predator upbringing, culture, and status as the underdog, Badlands also goes deeper than ever before into the details of their weapons, clothing, environment, and even fighting styles.

“Particularly with Dek, things that Dan and I always talked about was he ended up with the sh***iest bit of armor because he was not a fully formed Predator, and basically his father thought he was a waste of time and space,” Costume Designer Ngila Dickson told us about how the armor and costumes reflect the hierarchy of Predators: “And so with Kwei (Dek’s brother) and Dad, the level of it grows.”

That hierarchy is also reflected in their weapons, which require a wide variety of technologically advanced and more scrappy, naturally acquired tools. Props Master Matt Cornelius called the glowing red sword “clearly the weapon of choice.” Here are some of the weapons and gadgets we were able to see on set:

• The Predators’ glowing red sword
• The Predators’ glowing red bow and arrow
• Predator sniper rifle
• Thia’s earpiece to download information, a tool to heal herself, and a syringe to extract Yautja blood
• Plasma caster
• Bandoliers with Cryo Grenades

However, we’ll also see the Predators’ ability to improvise and adapt the world around them into weapons of destruction. At one point, “[Dek] comes across a vulture and he cuts the beak off… and then uses that, cuts it down, and he puts it onto his gauntlet. … He’s starting to introduce some of the natural fauna into his weapons.” Dek may be small, but he’s smart, and that’s one way he’s greatly underestimated.

It isn’t just nearby animals and objects that Dek and Thia unconventionally use in battle. Stunt Coordinator Jacob Tomuri described a scene in which Thia uses various parts of her severed body in battle: “There’s a sequence where Thia’s legs make her way back to the Thia torso… and they come across the synths. So the legs and the torso work together like a buddy fight. … I can’t say I’ve ever seen this before in anything.”

The Predators’ improvisational skills are also a great ᴀsset when it comes to navigating the franchise’s new terrain, with Genna’s landscape making Dek and Thia’s response to threats (and the crew’s coordination) all the more challenging. “Because we are working in these unworldly locations, what comes with that is limited access… we had to span slack lines between trees and we had to build truss towers in amongst the location. … Lots of pre-planning and lots of team members running around in trees.”

There will, of course, be some familiar objects in Badlands, including the Predators’ iconic ships. We got to watch Elle Fanning film a brief scene as Tessa climbing onto Dek’s crashed ship, at which point she investigates one of his “toys” left onboard.

After Fanning finished, we got to climb aboard the ship and analyze the intricate details on every wall and crevice, including the trophy room filled with skulls of the Predators’ past kills. In addition to a dinosaur skull, Ben Rosenblatt told me his favorite Easter egg on the ship is the skull of an alien from the 1996 sci-fi movie Independence Day, begging the question of whether a crossover movie is in order.

The Most Human Predator Story Yet

Family conflict, being an outcast, and an unlikely bond with a synth make Dek’s journey the most emotionally resonant Predator tale so far.

Despite the high-tech Predator arsenal, futuristic Weyland-Yutani synth ᴀssets, and decision to put a Predator in the lead role, Badlands’ themes are just as intrinsically tied to the human experience as they were in the 1987 original. With no humans present in Badlands, it also requires more of the audience to test their empathy to connect to the alien Predator’s plight.

Dek’s tale is familiar to what we saw with Naru in Prey; rather than being a young woman in a culture where men are deemed the hunters, Dek is a runt in a family of the strongest, fiercest Yautja. Like most other Predator films, Badlands is about outcasts, and that pathos is what Dan Trachtenberg believes makes Dek so relatable:

“[Dek] is sort of the runt of the litter. He is the smallest of his clan and seen as the weakest. I’ve always had a deep affection for underdog stories. … From the jump, you are thrust into a really high intensity emotional situation with him that I think will really put you in his shoes.”

Not only does Dek’s size make him an underdog, but Badlands also gives him a disability that causes others to underestimate him. “Being one eye and smaller than the rest… He’s always thought of as less by his people and his culture, like he’s pretty much shunned.” However, Schuster-Koloamatangi also sees that as a source of strength for Dek, “Having less vision makes it more of a threat, because it’s like, I gotta push through this. … I’m gonna prove everyone wrong.”

The action may be what’s historically drawn audiences to the box office for Predator movies, but Trachtenberg highlights another strength in the franchise’s enduring popularity: “I really felt heartened that there is a way to continue doing these movies that can have a warmth at the center, but also still be incredibly ferocious and action oriented and all the things that you’d expect from the Predator franchise, but still be beautiful.”

Finding community, finding oneself, and seeing the underdog come out on top have been trademarks of Predator’s various narratives. Why do we kill? What does being a killer turn us into? Is it better to fight alone or on a team? How can I persevere when all the odds are stacked against me? These are questions that apply to humans throughout Predator, and also now to the Predators themselves.

After Prey: How Badlands Pushes Predator Into Its Boldest Future

Following Prey’s breakout success, Badlands raises the stakes with theatrical ambitions, daring genre shifts, and a broader vision for the franchise’s future.

Dan Trachtenberg revolutionized the Predator franchise with Prey, bringing the story to an unconventional setting, putting an unexpected protagonist in the lead, prioritizing an underrepresented culture and its relationship to battle, and adding substantial emotional depth. Trachtenberg took those successful changes and doubled down on them for Predator: Badlands.

Most would have been expecting the confirmed Prey 2 to be the next live-action Predator movie after the 2022 critically acclaimed streaming hit. However, Trachtenberg stayed authentic to his approach to the franchise by going the unconventional route.

“Prey is something we’re very proud of. We love it, we’re very happy other people loved it. It’s not something we’re abandoning, or certainly we don’t intend to… What was most important to Dan… is that it was something unexpected,” explains Rosenblatt. “So I think in thinking about what to do next, Dan was really set on, how do we do the next thing and not make it expected, how do we make a new unexpected thing?”

With Trachtenberg in charge, Predator continues to evolve in ways that push boundaries for the genre and expectations of the 38-year-old franchise. That doesn’t just apply to its story, however, but also ending a franchise-long ratings streak.

If all goes according to plan, Badlands will be the first Predator movie with a PG-13 rating rather than R. “Our hope for it is that it can be a PG-13 that feels like an R. That’s kind of our hope… being able to broaden out the audience for a movie like this.” With no human blood amid all the action, avoiding that R rating becomes more justified.

Badlands’ bold new path doesn’t just apply to getting the under-18 crowd into theaters, however. It goes deeper for Trachtenberg, who wanted to make an action movie his mom would enjoy:

“At the end of [Prey], I got really excited to show my mom the movie. … I got a flutter, a memory from my childhood of being really excited to show my mom Terminator 2. … That was like, how to get my mom to watch a cool action movie. … So I really felt heartened that there is a way to continue doing these movies that can have a warmth at the center but also still be incredibly ferocious and action oriented.”

Still, as different as Predator: Badlands may feel from the premise of John McTiernan’s 1987 film, Trachtenberg and Disney’s new era stays true to its origins. “It reminds me of the old days, back in the ‘80s,” noted original creature designer Alec Gillis. “It was like, everybody jumped in. You picked up a H๏τ glue gun… and I haven’t had that in a long time, and I feel it here, which I really love.”

As I left the set of Predator: Badlands, I was certain that there were no better hands for the future of the franchise to be in than Dan Trachtenberg. Every person on that set, from the props to hair and makeup, had a genuine love and excitement for the Predator world and the bizarre story of Dek and Thia.

Predator: Badlands is designed to be unlike anything we’ve seen from the franchise, with its revolutionary premise reviving the same intensity, ingenuity, and genre-bending originality that established the 1987 original as a timeless cult classic.