Predator: Badlands: The Comic Book Adventures: The Motion Picture
I was surprised to find a nearly full theater on a Friday night for a screening of Predator. If you think about it, it’s so bizarre that this franchise is still going nearly 40 years after what very much could have been a one-off Arnold Schwarzenegger movie.
But sci-fi sells, and there’s plenty of lore to be created and told.
Predator Badlands very much exists in a post-Disney acquisition 20th Century Studios world where the Predator and Alien universes coexist. While there are no xenomorphs here, there’s plenty of The Company.
This movie is rather tricky to discuss without spoilers so there will be. Predator Badlands opens on the Yautja home planet, where young Dek is training with his brother Kwei. At first, I wasn’t too into hearing about the familial relationships of the Yautja, I liked Predator being what it was in the first movie. But whatever.
Some craziness ensues, Kwei is killed by their father, and Dek is sent on “the Death Planet.” Seriously, “the Death Planet?” Whatever again.
Upon crashing on the Genna Dek quickly finds out why it’s called the Death Planet and is saved by Thia, a damaged Weyland-Yutani Corporation synthetic who is cut in half. Ok, ok Predator Badlands…
The two get to know each other, and after Dek determines Thia is a tool, not a helper, they set off to find and kill the unkillable Kalisk. Along the way, they pick up the monkey thing from the Lost in Space movie (whatever), which bonds with Dek and mimics his moves. Cute, but I think the Predator from Predator would have killed both of these hangers-on.
Our trio heads off and we soon learn that the presence of Weyland-Yutani is far larger than we thought. We also find out the Kalisk is actually unkillable. This leads to some cool fights and some cool throwbacks to Alien lore.
Eventually, we find Thia’s evil sister, Tessa, who was also here to capture the Kalisk. Lost in Space money turns out to be the Kalisk’s kid so now the hunt becomes a rescue mission. There are some funny scenes with Thia’s two body parts, her legs walking around, kicking some ass, which is pretty funny. That’s the point, I realized we were watching a high-budget live-action comic book. All of the whatever became ok, this is fine.
Eventually, Dek saves the day, forms a new clan with Thia and Lost in Space Monkey Kalisk Jr., and cuts his dad’s head off. The trio then embarks on adventures around the galaxy, I assume—adventures I’d probably like to read.
