In 1990, a simple easter egg tied two iconic monster movie franchises together in the mainstream. As Danny Glover’s Mike Harrigan aimlessly wandered an alien ship, eagle-eyed viewers noticed a familiar elongated skull on the Predator’s wall of trophies.
Predator and Alien have a lot in common, with both franchises often consisting of slimy creatures dripping bodily fluids stalking a crew of humans (and sometimes synthetics) in a unique environment. In the real world, both made a cultural splash in their genesis, but public opinion slowly waned with each successive installment.
But the 2020s have seen a positive uptick in excitement. The respective releases of Prey and Alien: Romulus seemingly injected a new energy into these monsters’ neon green bloodstreams. With Predator: Killer of Killers out now as well (read our full review here) as Predator: Badlands and Alien: Earth on the way, what have audiences come to expect from these two franchises?
The world of Alien is linear. There is a single timeline, and each film in the franchise (minus the non-canon Alien vs. Predator films) fits neatly into a cohesive narrative despite directorial differences. There is the Ellen Ripley saga, which began with Ridley Scott’s visually striking but terrifying taste of isolation. From there, there was James Cameron’s militaristic war film, David Fincher’s controversial freshman foray, and Resurrection which cut back on horror for something akin to ‘90s action schlock.
When Scott returned to the franchise with Prometheus, no one could have anticipated the film to be almost unrecognizable next to the rest of the series. The two-hour meditation on the existence of God and the reconciliation of faith and science came out of left field. That's without even mentioning the lack of any discernible “Xenomorph” until its final minutes. Alien: Covenant would be closer in spirit to the original while blending the overt thematic richness Scott aimed to cover in the last installment.
The beauty of the original Alien films was their air of mystery. H.R. Giger’s designs merely alluded to a greater world, leaving the audience’s collective imagination running wild into their darkest corners. With each new installment revealing something new to the world, it could be that the magic of the unknown is lost.
This is perhaps why Alien: Romulus was a palate cleanser for many longtime fans. While sometimes slipping into the trap of becoming overly reverent to its source material, it feels like a return to form. Those dark, gorgeous hallways full of flashing lights return and there is unexplained horror born from the visceral synthesis of Xenomorph and humans. While action-packed, it evoked memories of a time when audiences felt scared to be alone.
But in doing so, there is also the question of whether it dilutes the scientific and philosophical intrigue of the franchise by attempting to be “safe.” The original films juggled sexual, feminist, and capitalist themes portrayed through narrative and imagery. The prequels wrestled with the very idea of creation. Even Resurrection sought to portray Ripley and Call as natural foils to each other because of their lack of a formed identity.
That is all to say that the audience's relationship with Alien is a complex one. The Predator franchise is rather different.
The premise of 1987’s Predator is simple: drop a bunch of macho soldiers into the jungle and have them face off against an extraterrestrial game hunter. Predator 2 invites the beast into a dystopian Los Angeles, where it finds itself in the middle of a drug war in a city where even civilians are armed. Rather than merely survive, Harrigan works to hunt the Predator himself. The film flips the narrative on its head by utilizing an everyman as the protagonist.
In just two films, the Predator franchise established a solid formula: transplant the Predator into different time periods and locations while establishing a worthy warrior to face them one-on-one.
It would take time for the franchise to fully grasp this, however. Predators featured an A-list cast on an unknown planet fighting against a squad of Predators. Despite its melodramatic writing, it failed to capture the essence of the original Predator by adapting it to the 2010s blockbuster format. 2018’s The Predator would do the same, creating a Marvel-esque film that felt primed solely to set up future installments.
Director Dan Trachtenberg, however, might have cracked the code. 2022’s Prey is the story of a Comanche woman coming into her own as a warrior. A Predator just happens to be in it. Like Romulus, Prey takes audiences back to the basics while still taking a fresh step for the franchise. It ultimately highlights a defining feature of Predator — a hero.
Where lore typically takes a backseat, the Predator films engage in the classic tale of a human overcoming extraordinary odds. Even Paul W.S. Anderson’s Alien vs. Predator establishes Lex as this central hero to the extent that the end of the film mirrors that of Predator 2.
What Trachtenberg learned from the original two movies is the very idea that this premise is not exclusive to time and place. Where their Alien counterparts seem to work best in drifting ships or desolate planets, the Predator works well as a force of chaos in an otherwise ordinary genre film.
Predator: Killer of Killers is Trachtenberg’s latest experiment with the Prey formula, showcasing three animated vignettes in three distinct eras. A Viking leader on a quest for revenge battles a hulking Predator. In feudal Japan, a pair of estranged brothers settle a rivalry before coming face-to-face with a covert Predator. Meanwhile, a grounded World War II pilot takes on a Predator in a dogfight.
Although these sequences are far less deliberate than the mainline films due to their shorter runtime, they still offer just enough to establish the three leads’ motivation, ingenuity, and worthiness as warriors. The result is a feat of the franchise’s creativity, showing that there truly are a billion different ways humans and Predators alike can be slain.
What is interesting is that the key to Romulus and Trachtenberg’s Predator films’ success is actually nothing new at all. Rather, it’s going back to what made it work at the very beginning while adapting its taste to modern sensibilities. Romulus returns to Alien’s atmosphere and fear factor while mixing in the contemporary obsession with interconnectedness with a larger universe.
Prey and Killer of Killers call back to Dutch dueling with an intergalactic demon, but take those “what-if” pitches a fan would make over drinks and turns them into reality. In a world where the masses yearn for a constant stream of new content, what better place to draw from than thousands of years of human history?
Trachtenberg’s plans for the Predator franchise do seem to be more than just this, however. The ending of Killer of Killers reveals the three protagonists preserved in stasis as gladiators for the Predators’ entertainment. This glimpse at their alien homeworld looks to be a tease towards Badlands, where a young Predator will take the spotlight.
It looks like the upcoming installments are going to do far more to expand on Predator lore than anyone anticipated. While past attempts to dive deep into the history of the Predators were hit-or-miss, the question is whether Trachtenberg can succeed with his existing recipe.
A future crossover between Alien and Predator may also be back on the table, with Romulus director Fede Álvarez previously expressing interest in co-directing with Trachtenberg.
Time will tell if this new direction for both franchises can reach the height of their glory days, but at the very least, it is safe to say this new breed of Xenomorph and Predator are here to hunt for the near future.
Predator: Killer Of Killers is now streaming on Hulu. For more, check out our interview with director Dan Trachtenberg.
