Movies & TV Predator: Badlands Predator: Badlands Gives Us a New Type of Predator Story A Predator makes a JOKE in this movie, people. By Leah Schnelbach | Published on November 10, 2025 Credit: 20th Century Studios Comment 0 Share New Share Credit: 20th Century Studios I never expected a Predator movie to be a buddy comedy? But to be fair, I also never expected a Predator movie to become a touching found family narrative. Predator: Badlands is both; the world is full of wonders. But before I frighten you away rest assured that Predator: Badlands is also a kick-ass action movie. The fight scenes are clever and fun, sometimes riffing on Predators past, other times striking off in their own directions, and while the story beats are a little familiar, I found myself surprisingly involved in this tale of a runt predator and his new bff, the top half of an android. Our main characters get just enough depth and backstory for us to care about them without the film bogging itself down in exposition. The film was written by Patrick Aison and directed by Dan Trachtenberg, who developed the story together as they did with Prey. Actually this film is a great companion piece to Prey, and much like that film, it makes me excited for where the Predator franchise might go next. I’ll stay spoiler-light, in case you haven’t seen it yet, but we open with a young Yautja (Predator) fighting his larger brother. We think this is just a sparring match, and eventually they fight to a standstill, and Kwei, the larger brother, says that Dek  needs to travel to choose a beast to hunt in order to prove himself to the family. Obviously this is analogous to Naru needing to do her hunting test in Prey—except where the rest of the village really wanted Naru to accept her role, train as a healer, and stop trying to fight all the time, here Dek has to fight, and win, if he’s going to be a true Yautja. As Kwei scrolls through planets and their biggest beasts, Dek notices the mighty Kalisk of the “death planet” Genna. He’ll do that one. But then Kwei tells him that it’s too big, and even their father fears it. Well then: “Father says I am the weakest, I will kill the strongest.” It seems like a good plan until Father arrives. Apparently Kwei was not sent to test his brother and send him off on his hunt. He was sent to kill him. As Kwei battles their dad to protect him, he manages to send a remote command to his ship, and sends Dek hurtling off toward Genna. And from there we’re in a very fast-paced Predator film, because Genna is a planet-sized Florida, and everything wants to kill you. Every plant, every animal, every bug. Caterpillars? Deadly! Adorable little ferret lizard things? Deadly! Cacti? Extra deadly. It’s while trying to survive the cacti that he meets Thia, an android—or at least, the head and torso of an android—who’s been abandoned in a vulture nest. Credit: 20th Century Studios She’s a relentless upbeat science nerd, part of an all-synth crew sent by… oh no… Weyland Yutani, on their usual mission: venture to the farthest reaches of space, find the most dangerous fucking creature you can, and bring it back to earth for no discernible fucking reason. Thia has been programmed to be sensitive to emotion (she thinks to make her a better scientist, but most likely to make her identify which animals W-Y can best exploit) so in Alien franchise terms she’s more Andy than David8. This was her first time in the field, until the Kalisk put an abrupt end to it. Dek grudgingly allows her to come with him, and they discover that she can be his backpack while he runs. Along the way they pick up another lone being, giant-eyed monkey creature that Thia names Bud, and they all head off, Dek wanting to hunt the Kalisk, Thia wanting to reunite with her android counterpart, Tessa (and, if at all possible, her legs). Obviously, anytime Weyland-Yutani is involved, things are going to get complicated, but I enjoyed the various reversals of fortune and betrayals even if they were a bit familiar. The things I really loved, however, was watching Dek learn to work with the planet of Genna and its flora and fauna, rather than seeing it as an adversary to conquer. Dimitrius Schuster-Koloamatangi is fantastic as Dek. He wrings a shocking amount of emotion out of a creature that pop culture has been telling us is an emotionless killing machine for four decades. And Elle Fanning is delightful in her dual role, just as bubbly and hilarious as Thia as she is chilling as Tessa. The film has a surprising amount of humor, but I never thought it got too quippy or light—the perils of Genna and the presence of Weyland Yutani fend that off. The Yautja language was created by Britton Watkins, a linguist who trained with Paul Frommer, the person responsible for Na’vi language. Credit: 20th Century Studios I’m pleased that they’ve expanded the Predator mythos enough that we can have so many different kinds of stories. We can watch ridiculous Alien versus Predator adventures, or throw Adrien Brody and Walton Goggins into a Predator game preserve; we can have a gorily animated battle royale, or dive into the story of a young woman creating her own role in a society that underestimates her. Now we have a Predator movie from a young Predator’s point of view—a Predator who is, by his people’s standards, a runt and a disappointment, but who still lives and acts as a Predator. If you dropped Dek into the original movie he’d probably still beat most of the humans. I’m hoping we get a musical next! And best of all: the movie doesn’t force Dek to change too much. He’s still a killing machine, he’s just a slightly less isolated killing machine. His values are still his values, but he learns to expand what he thinks of as an acceptable clan, and being flexible and learning from his environment make him an even better, and deadlier, Predator.[end-mark] The post <em>Predator: Badlands</em> Gives Us a New Type of Predator Story appeared first on Reactor.