Predator: Killer of Killers: That may be something of a misnomer

If this is the new direction for the Predator movies, sign me up.

Predator: Killer of Killers
Written by Micho Robert Rutare
Directed by Dan Trachtenberg and Joshua Wassung
2025
Streaming on Hulu

Is it premature to state that the Predator franchise is going through something of a renaissance? The series as a whole has been pretty hit and miss, with most of the entries failing to live up to the purity of the original, which sort of cut the big, muscular action movies of the 1980s off at the knees by having a bunch of tough-guy American soldier types get totally owned by an invisible alien hunter. Various attempts have been made to recapture the magic by upping the ante in terms of violence or even having the series cross over with the Alien movies, but diminishing returns set in long ago.

However, the most recent live-action entry in the series, Prey, breathed new life into the concept by pitting a young Native American woman in the 18th century against an alien killer and using her courage and smarts to prevail against impossible odds. It was not only refreshingly exciting in terms of action, but it opened the series up to new possibilities. How long have the alien hunters been coming to Earth? How many more times are they going to keep trying, when the puny humans somehow manage to keep prevailing against weapons and tactics that should be superior?

The latest movie in the series actually attempts to answer some of those questions, at least partially. It’s something of an anthology, with Predators (I kind of hate to call them that, but it seems like it’s unavoidable) attacking human warriors in different eras before bringing all the characters together for a big finale. And if you’re wondering how these aliens, who are meant to be highly advanced, with super-powerful weapons and incredible tactical skills, react when they keep getting bested by humans wielding what must seem like little more than clubs and sticks to them, well, that’s sort of where the movie ends up going. The current shepherds of the franchise seem to be in agreement with those of us who have joked about how the Predators must think Earth is a really dangerous planet since none of them ever manage to come back from their hunting trips alive, which is kind of refreshing and may point to interesting new directions in future installments.

But before we get there, the movie takes a trip throughout history, visiting people all over the world who manage to fend off Predator attacks. It’s pretty action-packed throughout, both when people are engaging in regular human warfare and when they’re going up against much more powerful beings, and it’s full of dynamic movement and characterization that gets established quickly in order to show how people manage to prevail when confronted with threats that seem unimaginable.

The animation is in one of the interesting styles that has gained favor recently, not seeming too cartoony but still being stylized rather than photorealistic (another example would be the series Blue Eye Samurai on Netflix). CGI technology has progressed to the point where animators can create 3D worlds and characters but layer them in textures that make them seem drawn or painted, and this movie makes great use of this style, providing plenty of lush visuals while also taking advantage of the ability to depict anything by cranking the level of violence well past the point where it would have seemed believable in live action.

The first sequence is a case in point, following a Viking woman who leads a pack of warriors to assault the stronghold of the man who killed her father. Her method of fighting is to use two shields that are apparently razor sharp (even though they just look like wood with some pointy bits where parts have broken off), since she slices people's arms and heads off with them pretty easily. While she and her men prevail, they are set upon by a Predator who kills most of them, forcing her to come up with some innovative fighting techniques, including a cool bit on and under the surface of a frozen lake.

Interestingly, the movie tailors its villains to the people they’re hunting. The Predator who hunts the Vikings is a hulking brute who initially sneaks up on them using the familiar invisibility technology featured in the series, but once it reveals itself, it just smashes all the humans using physical force. Its main weapon is a sort of shockwave pulse that gets sent out of a bludgeon that replaces one of its hands, with a convenient activation lever that is obviously going to get used against it.

The second sequence takes place in samurai-era Japan, providing the opportunity for lots of visuals of cherry blossoms and falling leaves as the characters engage in swordplay. There are a couple of brothers who are the sons of a cruel lord, with one of them having been cast out for his failure to measure up to his father’s expectations. When the father dies, the exiled brother uses the ninja skills he had developed to mount an assault on the family castle. But of course, he gets interrupted by a Predator who has decided to kill all swordsmen that it encounters.

This Predator takes a much more ninja-style approach, using its invisibility and hidden weapons to kill its victims. This means we get a pretty cool ninja duel, with lots of running across rooftops, hiding in shadows, and leaping out to make sudden strikes. It all leads up to one of those moments that occur so often in samurai movies and anime in which characters race toward each other to strike, and then they pause afterward, making us wait to see whose strike landed. This one gets a cool twist though, incorporating the sci-fi concepts underlying the series. It’s another example of the filmmakers using the medium of animation to maximum effect.

The third sequence jumps forward to World War II, with a young pilot who isn’t an especially good mechanic trying to fix up his plane in time to join his compatriots for an air battle that, yes, gets interrupted by a Predator. The villain this time is also a pilot, assaulting its victims with its spaceship and shooting down everyone it encounters, but of course, our hero manages to find a way to turn the tables and defeat it. It’s another pretty cool scene, with lots of exciting dogfighting and explosions.

These stories have all been leading up to a conclusion that ties them together. It seems that the Predators have been abducting humans who have defeated them and placing them in suspended animation, and they’ve decided to wake up these three and make them fight each other to the death so that their leader can have a battle against the survivor. It doesn’t go like the Predators plan, but it is yet another exciting action sequence that sees the human characters use their ingenuity to prevail against overwhelming odds.

However, as fun as this is, I’m almost more interested in the glimpse we get of Predator society, which makes them seem even dumber than we may have previously suspected. They tend to show up on Earth thinking that they’ll easily destroy humans using their superior technology, only to be bested when that same technology gets used against them or when humans find other ways to trick them into falling into unexpected traps. The epigraph that opens the movie states that Predators should “Go forth among the stars and seek only the strongest prey,” but time and again, they’ve been overconfident, leading to their inevitable downfall.

Maybe the Predators that keep coming to Earth aren’t among the top tier of galactic big game hunters, or maybe that’s just the way their species is. That certainly seems to be the case with the leader who has gathered a few humans in a gladiatorial arena with the intent of fighting the strongest among them, apparently without ever expecting that they could team up against it. All of the Predators cheering on the battle are caught flat-footed, completely unprepared for the humans’ ability to come up with new, innovative ways of fighting that don’t involve attacking the Predators head-on and immediately getting slaughtered.

I kind of love the idea of this advanced race of beings having spent hundreds of years gathering warriors who can be unfrozen to fight them whenever they want, only for their prey to immediately turn the tables on them. It’s a cynical approach to science fiction; while we’d like to think that aliens who travel the galaxy would be intelligent and enlightened, working together for the benefit of all, it’s much more likely that those who do get to go on interstellar adventures would be the equivalent of rich assholes who travel to Africa to shoot beloved lions or end up getting themselves killed on deep-sea voyages.

If this is going to be the new status quo for the Predator series, I’m here for it. Give me more depictions of bullying thugs who have lots of resources that they think make them superior to others, only to get bested because they haven’t bothered to pay attention to basic battle tactics. Show me more people from around the world who have compelling stories and reasons for fighting, who get pushed to their limit by events that they can barely comprehend, but who use their intelligence and survival instincts to come out on top. If we get more movies that continue in that vein, I’ll be pretty happy.