Predator: Badlands is breaking the mold for this franchise in several ways — the protagonist is a Predator, there are no human characters in the story at all, and the crossover with the Alien franchise is now officially canon. Many of these revelations came with the trailer back in May, but director and co-writer Dan Trachtenberg just shed some new light on these changes in an interview with Empire Magazine. He said that the basic idea he began with was to make a Predator movie with no humans in it at all. From there, it wasn’t much of a leap in logic to get Weyland-Yutani involved. This doesn’t make the Alien vs. Predator movies canon, but it does confirm that these franchises are set in the same universe.
“I always wanted no humans in this movie, so I thought it might be fun to have the Predator with a robot,” Trachtenberg explained. “Then I thought, ‘I know a company that makes robots…’” Fans have been speculating about a potential reboot of the AvP series for years, and many suspect that Trachtenberg is setting one up here. We may not find out exactly what he’s doing until Predator: Badlands premieres on November 7th.
The Badlands trailer introduces us to our hero, Dek (Dimitrius Schuster-Koloamatangi), a Predator — or “Yautja” — who was cast out of his clan at a young age for being small. Despite that, we see him take on some major threats in the trailer alone, including giant alien monsters and others of his own kind. We also see Elle Fanning as a Weyland-Yutani android named Thia, who appears to be on his side.
According to Empire, Fanning actually has two roles in this movie, and the other one hasn’t been revealed yet. If she’s playing a human, it means that Trachtenberg didn’t get his wish for a human-free sci-fi epic. However, she could be playing another android with the same design, just like Michael Fassbender in Prometheus and Alien: Covenant.
Either way, some of the biggest world-building questions are still hanging over this story. So far, most Predator movies have been set in roughly contemporary times, from the 1980s through the 2020s. The exception is the latest movie, Prey, which takes us back to a Predator encounter in the 1800s. However, if Weyland-Yutani has reached the point of not only manufacturing advanced androids, but sending them out among the stars, we are likely at least a few centuries into the future — especially if this movie needs to be consistent with the Alien series.
There will undoubtedly be more hints in the months to come, but most of the big questions will likely be left for the movie itself to answer. Predator: Badlands premieres on November 7th in theaters.
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