Predator: Badlands (2025)

 

Predator: Badlands (2025)

7/10

Starring

Elle Fanning

Dimitrius Schuster-Koloamatangi

 

Directed by: Dan Trachtenberg

 

I liked Predator: Badlands, this movie changes the perspective of this franchise. Usually, we have seen it from the prey’s view, as they are being hunted by these alien predators, now we are seeing it from the alien predator view.

This movie has some good fight scenes, and the main character is not a human, but a synthetic being, played by Elle Fanning.

The movie shows us that the Predator clan is very focused on strength, and we see there are some emotional arcs to them, it is not just hunting. Elle Fanning in this movie is amazing in her dual roles as Thia and Tessa, making up for the lack of humans in the movie with her performance.

The way she balances her emotions with the pure focus of this Predator alien is what drives this movie. I will let you know, this movie does drag in places, especially when Thia tries to connect with the Predator whose name is Dek. All that talk about the wolf pack and trying to make him form a family unit made me tired sometimes.

The plot starts on the planet Yautja, where we see Dek, a runt Predator, trying to best his brother Kwei. Since he is smaller than all the other Predators in his clan, he is considered weak. Kwei was sent by their father, the leader of the clan, to kill Dek. But Kwei did not want to, so he told Dek to go hunting to prove himself. Dek then chose to hunt the Kalisk, an unkillable apex predator on the lethal planet Genna.

Before he went on his hunt, their father showed up and killed Kwei for his disobedience, with Dek heading off to the planet hoping to kill the creature and gain respect.

On the planet is where he meets Thia, a synthetic who lost her legs to the Kalisk and is separated from her friend and companion, Tessa, another synthetic.

In the end, this was a good ride for a movie, looking at things from another perspective. You can also see where it crosses paths with the Alien franchise, when we discover the Weyland-Yutani team arriving to capture what they believe is theirs to experiment on.

It was a nice time at the cinemas with this movie, and I recommend you take the time to go see it, it is fun. You can see where this movie is heading, probably a crossover later on in the future, but the short runtime makes it an easy watch in the cinema.