A young Predator outcast from his clan finds an unlikely ally on his journey in search of the ultimate adversary. (from IMDb)

When I first saw trailers for Predator: Badlands, I was certain I was looking at the advertisements for an R-rated movie. So imagine my surprise when I heard it was officially rated PG-13 by the MPAA. Now, I know some are reading this and thinking "So what if it's rated R? It'd be better if it were!" And I get it; to each their own, I suppose. But, for me personally, I don't handle overly graphic violence well. And it's for that main reason that I've never seen any of the previous Predator or Alien films (Save for the cheesy PG-13-rated Alien vs Predator from 2004). So, with the concept of a predator trying to survive being prey on a foreign planet being the gist of this film, I definitely became intrigued by Predator: Badlands.

Let's be clear here, Predator: Badlands is not a pretty movie. A predator - or more specifically, the species called the Yautja - is pretty ugly to look at. They're humanoid in form, but in addition to their main sharp teeth, they have four fangs with webbing surrounding their mouth. Then there's their eyes - piercing yellow eyes. The Yautja aren't winning any beauty contests anytime soon.

The only main human character in the story is actually a synthetic - an android - played by Elle Fanning. She has scars on her face and is missing her lower legs, so we sometimes see her android insides, especially its metal spine. This android is named Thia and our hero - a Yautja named Dek - stumbles upon her while trying to navigate an especially dangerous field of lethal plants. Thia convinces Dek to see her as merely a tool to help him and he ends up strapping her torso to his back for much of the journey. Fanning is excellent as a chatty, bubbly android, which is a stark contrast to the much more serious Yautja.

But the story of Predator: Badlands is surprisingly emotional. The film opens with Dek and his brother Kwei sparring on their home planet. But when their father shows up, he commands Kwei to kill Dek because he's seen as weak and just a runt of their clan. Kwei instead spares his brother and sends him in a ship to a planet where Dek can defeat a mighty beast, called the Kalisk, and prove his worth. But it turns out Dek isn't the only outside hunter on this planet. The organization that made Thia - Weyland-Yutani Corporation (a nod to the Alien franchise) - is also on the planet, and this throws a bit of a wrench into Dek's journey.

It's amazing how much heart is actually in Predator: Badlands. You go into it basically expecting some kind of testosterone fest - and sure, that's definitely there - but it becomes a story very much about clans, family, and belonging. Dek, who's young and naive in a lot of ways, wants to be the best hunter to have ever lived, but he just doesn't have the skills. Part of seeing Dek struggling on the planet to best the creatures native to the planet is part of what makes his character endearing. And knowing some of his backstory makes him a much more sympathetic character. In the end, Predator: Badlands proves to be a truly solid survival action film that is easy to get wrapped up in.

It doesn't hurt either that the score from Sarah Schachner and Benjamin Wallfisch is really strong, too. It's got a tribal flair to it, but with a kiss of industrial flourishes and some vocal chants (apparently in the Yautja language). It becomes the perfect soundtrack to what we're watching unfold on screen, and it only adds to the power of the film.

But, as you can guess, it's a very violent film. Dek slices open beasts with his sword and takes a few battle wounds himself -- not to mention we see some gruesome results from the Yautja fighting each other. Then there's the synthetics. Thia isn't the only android on the planet, and there's an extended sequence of Dek fighting the androids, decapitating and dismembering them and just tearing them to shreds. The fact that they look like real humans can appear disturbing to some viewers, especially when one character crushes a lifelike android skull under its boot, cracking it open like an egg. In previous Predator films, humans have been skinned and defeated in gory ways, but you'll see none of that here. We do see a human-looking android that has been severely damaged with pieces of skin torn from its face and its eyes turned white or damaged. There's also several views of a needle of sorts being inserted into the ear canal of the androids. Then the beast gore also includes a creature getting its tail cut off and then decapitated, with it regenerating its limbs (or reconnecting them) in both occasions. Put it to you this way -- it's not a movie for the squeamish.

Violence is really the only deterrent here, too, as only one "S" word is said as the lone cuss word in the entire film. It's completely unnecessary, but clearly said (by Thia) for a bit of comic relief.

I'm really surprised by how good Predator: Badlands turned out to be. We caught it in IMAX, so the big screen format definitely leant to the experience. I'm also curious to see how repeat viewings might hold up. But after one viewing, my family and I all were really pleasantly surprised by Predator: Badlands. (If you're wondering about bonus scenes, there is a brief one right after the credits start, but there's nothing after the credits.)

Embodying the Predator (5:44) - Here they talk about the process of finding Dimitrius to play the central Predator, and how they hoped to find the actor in New Zealand where they would be filming. (Apparently, he exceeded their expectations, too.) Dimitrius wore a suit and cowl, with his face exposed so they could replace it digitally the the creature's eyes and mandibles. They used the nuances of his facial performance as a way for animating Dek's face with emotion.

Authentic Synthetic (6:42) is all about how they filmed actress Elle Fanning as a torso-only robot character. To make this work, they created wire rigs from scratch just for her so she could be picked up or strapped to Dimitrius's back. We see some great behind-the-scenes footage of how they did this (with Elle wearing blue-screen style pants over her whole lower half so they could remove them flawlessly in post). Director Dan Trachtenberg says that Elle was his only pick for Thia, and Elle reflects on the challenge of the role and what it was like playing two characters (and acting opposite herself in the same scene for her first time ever). (1 "bad*ss")

Building the Badlands (6:54) is about shooting on location in New Zealand and trying to shoot it like it's not only another planet altogether, but the most dangerous one in the galaxy. They focus on some of the different creatures here, how Dek forged his own weapons from things he found on the planet, and finally the kalisk design.

Dek of the Yautja (6:12) - Here, they talk about how the Yautja Prime planet had never been shown on screen before and they were excited to show us their home planet for the first time. They cover the weapons, wardrobe, Dek's father's design, the Yautja language, etc.

Deleted and Pre-Visualization Scenes (with Optional Commentary) - Play All (27:43)

1. Sand Trap (3:18) - This is an all pre-visualization animated sequence of when Dek meets Thia. We see her trapped from the waist down in a sand pit. The dialog is presented as text with no audio spoken, and in it, she asks Dek for help, but he doesn't want to. When spidery creatures entrap him, he loses his sword, which Thia is able to grab, and she cuts herself free and then frees him, too. In the commentary, the guys talk about how this was the originally-planned sequence, and the dialog featured was provided by the pre-vis artist as the movie had no script yet!
2. Squirt Canyon (3:09) - This is an extended version of Dek and Thia moving through the canyon. It has a mix of finished footage and some unfinished live action footage that shows Dimitrius's face exposed in the cowl. Thia talks more about surviving the planet, while Dek is fixated on being the alpha. The pair run from the spitting eels and she tries help by suggesting a solution (in this case, feeding the eels).
3. Tessa vs Abe (3:22) - While Tessa's investigating Dek's ship - which she does solo in the finished movie - in this cut, a squad of synthetics show up. Abe, their leader, questions her rogue behavior and she challenges his leadership. She ends up disarming him and impaling his throat with her hand, immobilizing him. In the commentary, they reveal that they thought the scene wasn't necessary and just slowed the movie down too much. But they liked how it established how Tessa went rogue to find Thia and then kills her superiror.
4. Razor Grass (6:12) - This is an alternste version of the scene where Thia and Dek find the razor grass and meet Bud. It's all presented in pre-vis, again with no audio dialog (just subtitles), and interestingly enough, Thia's name is shown as "SYNTH1A" (kinda on the nose, but interesting nonetheless). At one point, it looks like lots of blood rains down on them, and then they look up to see the huge monster towering above them in the woods. It chases them through the razor grass, then Dek and Thia slice the creature with Dek's sword and it's impaled on a large tree stump when it falls over.
5. The Outpost (9:29) - This one is really interesting. Presented entirely in Pre-vis animation, it's a long alternate scene where Dek and Thia go to a Weyland-Yutani compound to try to find her new legs. They’re quickly attacked by synths, and the robots use a device that impairs Dek's ability to see. It turns out, the filmmakers originally intended Dek to be blind throughout the movie, and he uses echolocation to "see." So a pretty brutal fight breaks out (like the one later in the finished movie), and at one point, he has to try to fight the synths while blind. Also, the kalisk shows up - which originally looked more t-rex like - and Dek and Thia start to see a connection there with Bud.
6. Super Power Loader Extended (2:16) - This takes the finished scene from the movie and inserts additional pre-vis animation to show its extended version. In this version, After the kalisk is impaled, it falls over and Tessa drives another large sawblade into the kalisk. The kalisk saves Dek, pulling him out of harm's way, and Dek fashions a shield -- mirroring what his brother did for him at the start of the film -- and he and the kalisk work together to fight Tessa. It's pretty cool and impactful, but the production team said they ran out of time and budget to finish the sequence.

Audio commentary
Finally, there's a feature-length commentary By director Dan Trachtenberg, producer Ben Rosenblatt, director of photography Jeff Cutter, and stunt coordinator Jacob Tomuri.

- John DiBiase, (reviewed: 1/7/26)