The Predator franchise is one of the most rebooted in modern movie history. The series has bled, but they can't kill it. It started off great (Predator), hit a brick wall (Alien vs. Predator), rebounded well (Predators), and then back to the brick wall (The Predator). Well, it’s that time again when Hollywood takes another crack at bringing the 7-foot mandible-faced hunter back to the screen. And this time, they made their most ambitious attempt yet.
Prey, now streaming on Hulu, takes place in the 1719 Great Plains and the Comanche nation. Warriors rove the woods for the hunt and for the tribe’s sustenance, while the rest of the group stays back and attends to the camp. Among the fighters is Naru, a highly skilled but slightly green female warrior. The story revolves around her struggle to be considered an equal to the male warriors of the tribe. She’s bullied, mansplained, and hindered at every turn by her male counterparts as she pursues her ever elusive big hunt.
This setting alone sets Prey miles apart from the rest of the Predator series. The duds of the franchise relied on cheap blood and guts scares, while the successful swings were testosterone-charged romps through jungles both green and urban. Prey offers a mostly calming and serene setting that just so happens to get splattered with a whole lot of red and green blood. So how does Prey measure up against the rest of the Predator films?
Predator vs. Prey: The Story
There’s beauty in the simplicity of the original 1987 Predator. A team of muscle-bound special forces meets their match in the daunting alien hunter in a jungle bloodbath. The same formula applied to its sequel Predator 2, only this time it was Danny Glover stomping through the pavement of LA instead of the dirt of Guatemala.
The Predator hunts the biggest and most dangerous game. The bigger the challenge and the bigger the guns, the better. And it doesn’t get bigger than Schwarzenegger, and the underappreciated out-of-type hothead cop turn from Glover. 2010’s Predators does the same for Adrian Brody and another gang of hardened killers.
Predator is great, and Predator 2 and Predators are solid sequels, but something was missing. Prey supplies that absent element generously; heart. Sure, we rooted for Arnie to take down the big bug and for Glover to do the same. We had their back but weren’t terribly invested in their mission as a whole. Lead Amber Midthunder offers a more realized character in Naru, and since the story revolves around her, Prey is a more realized movie. This deeper purpose helps Prey wins this category, hands down.
The Main Cast of Characters
Predator saw Arnold Schwarzenegger at the peak of his burly powers and leading man charisma. Predator 2 gave us a dark side of Danny Glover we didn’t know he had. Even Predators gave us an armed to the teeth, not to be messed with Adrian Brody. Who would have thought the scrawny kid from the Pianist could be a lethal tough guy? And even though the movie is barely worthy of acknowledgment, Boyd Holbrook holds his own against a weak script and weaker finished product in The Predator.
All of these performances are good, but Midthunder comes out on top. Her motives are deeper than purely killing and surviving. She’s out to show the cocky men of the tribe what she can do, as well as prove it to herself. She’s performing a massive balancing act of staying true to herself while also fighting to be taken seriously. The boys club of the Predator franchise just point and shoot, while Naru is truly the soul of her movie.
The Surrounding Cast
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The past Predator installments were ensemble efforts. They boasted a charismatic leading man, heading up a gang of unique characters charging into the fight. Predator had Jesse the Body Ventura as Blain, the tobacco chomping mini gun touting sexual Tyrannosaurus (his words, not ours). Carl Weathers excelled as a shady CIA bogeyman Dillon and Sonny Landham put in an eerie performance as the silent but highly perceptive soldier Billy.
Predator 2 gave us a brilliantly over-the-top Bill Paxton as ambitious detective Jerry Lambert. Speaking of over the top, it has Gary Busey. What more needs to be said there? Predators strung together a nice mix of diverse soldiers who sidestepped the 2010s trap of a cookie-cutter cardboard ensemble.
Prey belongs to Naru, along with the Predator itself. But aside from Taabe (Dakota Beavers), Naru’s overbearing warrior brother, there isn’t much that makes the rest of the cast all that unique. To be fair, the bulk of the screen time goes to Naru and the big bad, but a Predator movie without a quirky motley crew of secondary players feels a little empty.
Action and the Predator
There are lots of guns with lots of shooting and explosions in the Predator series. It doesn’t get terribly creative with the action. Prey is in a unique position to offer mostly hand-to-hand combat with the occasional projectile for its action sequences. That said, the action of Prey trounces its predecessors. The fights and kills are bloody and brilliant, taking advantage of the Predator’s highly advanced arsenal in an up close and personal setting as opposed to just shooting guys from the trees and rooftops.
This isn’t to say the action of Predator is some kind of snooze fest; it still gets the adrenaline flooding along with the dread of its thriller and horror elements. But the challenger took the title in the action category of the Predator franchise. And let’s not forget that ultimately, Prey is a creature feature at its core, as were its predecessors.
The Predator design has seen both subtle and drastic changes from 1987 to 2018, when the Predator first screened. The design originally cooked up by Stan Winston gets its scariest look yet in Prey. This alien is lean and animalistic, all rage and cunning. It relies less on plasma rifles and more on brute strength.
Prey is by no means the best entry in this line of films. It lags behind the original Predator by half a step but taps its wrist gizmo and blows away the rest on originality and spirit.