“Holy shit!” I screamed when the final image of Predator: Killer of Killers came onto the screen. After a movie that was already incredibly awesome and enticing, the film’s final image adds a whole new dimension. One that we just had to talk to the filmmakers about.
This, of course, will require us getting into major spoilers, so if you haven’t seen the film, go watch it right here and come back after.
It’s seeded pretty early on that Ursa, the Viking warrior voiced by Lindsay LaVanchy; Kenji, the feudal ninja voiced by Louis Ozawa; and Torres, the World War II pilot voiced by Rick Gonzalez, who have all killed a Predator, have been subsequently captured and brought to an alien planet. And to answer your first question, no, this did not involve time travel. Each character is frozen in their time and then awoken when they are needed. “That’s why we specifically put in the line that Torres says ‘I feel like I’ve been asleep forever,’ to try to help because I know it certainly could be misconstrued,” director Dan Trachtenberg told io9.
So they wake up, have to fight some Predator creatures, and each manages to escape in their own unique ways. For Torres and Kenji it’s a literal escape, at least for now. Don’t forget, they are on an alien planet, in a spaceship, and neither has been alive in an era where space travel has been a reality. So you can’t imagine even if they get off the planet, they’d have any idea get back to Earth. Plus, last we saw them, they were again being hunted by probably hundreds of Predators, so we have to assume they are going to get caught at some point.
As for Ursa, her sacrifice is the only thing that gives Torres and Kenji a fighting chance and, as a reward, she’s once again put into that frozen stasis. A tactic which, it’s revealed, the Predators have used a lot. Ursa is moved into an almost Raiders of the Lost Ark storage facility filled with pods. Pods as far as the eye can see. And, one of them, the last one we see, contains Naru, the star of the movie Prey played by Amber Midthunder. “Holy shit!”
Amber Midthunder in Prey – HuluThis reveal, of course, raises so many questions, one of which we can answer definitively. “I think now we can say people who defeat the Predator get captured and are frozen,” Trachtenberg told io9. Which indirectly implies that, yes, Mike Harrigan from Predator 2 might be there or even Dutch from Predator, played by Arnold Schwarzenegger. We don’t see them, of course, but they, and seemingly thousands of other species that have beaten a Predator, were then captured. (Another link: Torres is also given the gun Harrigan had in Predator 2. One we also saw in Prey.)
On a larger scale, this revelation gives us some fascinating insights into Predator culture. For one thing, they can be defeated and have been many times. And yet, they treat those defeats as lessons, taking the victors to their planet. But why? Do they all get to fight the Warlord Predator? Are they just there for entertainment? Are they studied? None of that is clear but, maybe, will become so in the future.
On a more specific scale, the tease raises some questions about a potential Prey 2. Is a second movie starring Naru about how she is captured? Or was she captured after the events in the film, and any future stories will now take place in the future? Plus, when is that future, specifically? Naru’s story, as well as Kenji’s and Ursa’s, all took place years before Torres’. So while this could all be happening in the 1940s on Earth, it could also be the 4040s or something. We don’t know for sure. Nevertheless, reintroducing Naru was a decision that was made early on, and with great anticipation.
“It was thrilling,” co-director Josh Wassung said about the Naru reveal. “We just knew it would be something that fans would get so excited for. And… Dan alluded to he just wanted to make sure the fans knew that he was still thinking about that character.”
So what are your thoughts here? Are we gearing up for an Avengers: Endgame mega-crossover event? Can the Predators ever truly be defeated? And how does the fact that the next movie, Predator: Badlands, stars a Predator as the hero, change things? All very, very fun to think about.
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