**Contains spoilers for *Predator: Badlands***
After helming *Prey* and *Predator: Killer of Killers*, director Dan Trachtenberg returns to the *Predator* franchise once more with *Predator: Badlands*. This particular entry focuses on a Yautja warrior named Dek (Dimitrius Schuster-Koloamatangi), who struggles with being both the runt among his brethren and a disappointment in his father’s eyes. To prove his worth, he heads off to the deadly planet Genna to kill the legendary beast known as the Kalisk. While in this dangerous domain, he reluctantly works with the Weyland-Yutani synthetic human Thia (Elle Fanning).
Trachtenberg’s creative gumption and sense of showmanship helped *Prey* fix so many of the problems plaguing recent *Predator* films. While not as good as *Prey*, *Badlands* is still an entertaining ride that reflects Trachtenberg’s confidence and artistry within this strain of blockbuster action cinema. Like any movie, *Badlands* has its share of clumsy moments and filmmaking details. But the seven best (as well as the three worst) moments in the film really illustrate how far this franchise has come from the days of *Predator 2* and *The Predator*.
Dek’s odyssey is full of fantastic touches that make the proceedings emotionally absorbing and exciting, not to mention far more than just retreading the same thematic and storytelling ground of *Prey*. Forget about getting to the chopper. Instead, stay put and read on to discover the best and worst moments in *Predator: Badlands*, which make a vivid case for the *Predator* movies still having plenty of creative juice.
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### An Unorthodox 20th Century Studios Logo
Like every *Predator* film, *Predator: Badlands* hails from 20th Century Studios (formerly Fox) and features that familiar fanfare music composed by Alfred Newman—a grandiose way to start any movie and always a welcome presence. However, at the very end of the 20th Century Studios logo on *Badlands*, something unexpected happens. The fanfare’s usual final notes are exchanged for more intense, aggressive drum-centric harmonies. While the logo’s appearance remains the same, the music ends on noticeably different chords.
This immediately suggests how *Badlands* is immersed in the core mythology underpinning the entire *Alien* story. It harkens back to the famous *Alien 3* 20th Century Fox logo, which also featured the normal fanfare descending into an unexpected musical conclusion (though there, the last notes conveyed a horror-oriented mode rather than a propulsive action movie ambiance).
Conjuring up *Alien 3* memories before the film proper even begins is a shrewd way for *Predator: Badlands* to prepare audiences for further reliance on *Alien* material. Meanwhile, subverting expectations for how the 20th Century Studios logo is supposed to play out echoes how *Badlands* often discards norms for how standard *Predator* movies operate.
This entry is focused on a member of the Yautja species, for one thing, and does not feature Earth as a backdrop. The unorthodox 20th Century Studios logo tells audiences that all bets are off regarding what *Badlands* can be.
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### A Captivating Musical Score
The *Predator: Badlands* score is composed by Sarah Schachner and Benjamin Wallfisch, who previously scored *Prey* and *Killer of Killers*, respectively. The duo works well together, with this pairing dialing down Wallfisch’s more derivative musical impulses that capsized his previous franchise movie scores like *The Flash* and *Hellboy*.
Their compositions are especially impressive in the opening *Badlands* scene, which starts in an alien cave as the camera slowly pushes in on the desert landscape below. The track playing underneath these images is dominated by intense, low-pitched throat singing put through a digital filter. Both the timbre of these vocals and the post-production tweaks combine to create a distinctly otherworldly sound.
One truly feels like they’re witnessing images from another planet thanks to this score. It’s an evocative sonic landscape that also lends a sense of grandeur as audiences see a distant Dek zooming off to an important rendezvous. It’s an unabashedly theatrical musical cue that’ll make any movie theater auditorium (especially large-format ones like IMAX) rumble satisfyingly. Thanks to this, *Badlands* immediately plunges the viewer into a world of grandiose flair.
Compared to the very worst things about 2018’s *The Predator*, for instance, Schachner and Wallfisch’s first *Badlands* track instantly conjures a distinctive atmosphere and vigorous showmanship. These *Predator* music veterans provide a great way to kick off both the proceedings and a terrific orchestral soundtrack.
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### The Cave Duel: A Missed Opportunity
Before Dek heads off to Genna in *Predator: Badlands*, he has a sparring match with his older brother, Kwei (Mike Homik), in a gargantuan cave on their home planet. This duel is an important one on multiple levels—establishing how lethal these particular aliens are, Dek’s troubles in combat, and the bond shared between these siblings.
But despite the scene containing so much important material, Dan Trachtenberg and cinematographer Jeff Cutter drop the ball in properly lighting this sequence. Taking place inside a cave with minimal sources of lighting, this initial skirmish is often very difficult to see.
However, it isn’t just the lack of light hindering the visibility of this segment. Despite Trachtenberg showing a deft hand at staging hand-to-hand combat in *Prey*, the editing and fight choreography for this sequence is quite clumsy and way too cramped for its own good. Instead of crisply witnessing two peak warriors duking it out and bringing out the best in each other, audiences often only see blurry pieces of Dek and Kwei’s fighting.
The lack of visual clarity makes the camera suddenly cutting away from the cave to a new scene particularly jarring. It’s hard to tell that the fight is even winding down, let alone that Dek and Kwei have finished. All of these flaws combine to make this easily the most disappointing *Badlands* set piece and a bizarre betrayal of Trachtenberg’s otherwise strong visual instincts.
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### Bud: The Digital Alien Critter with Heart
Early on in *Predator: Badlands*, audiences are introduced to the entirely digital alien critter Bud. She calls Genna home and can make her skin so tough that it cuts through a field of knife grass with ease.
On the surface, Bud looks like a calculated way to ensure this PG-13 *Predator* installment can produce some cuddly merchandise. Perhaps certain fans will even see her as a sign of Disney “ruining” this saga. In the film itself, though, Bud is an endearing and adorable presence that the script shrewdly doesn’t overindulge on. She vanishes for long stretches of the runtime, so it’s not like the plot is constantly derailed by Bud shenanigans.
More importantly, she serves an immediate narrative function in one of the most exciting *Predator: Badlands* moments. While trying to evade a horde of gigantic ground-based beasties, Thia and Dek find themselves caught in the clutches of a treebound alien, bringing the duo closer and closer to its mouth.
Just in the nick of time, Bud leaps into the monster’s maw and unleashes her hard skin, stopping the organism from biting down on Thia and Dek. Howling in pain, the brute’s tentacles release Thia and Dek while Bud bounces to safety nearby.
In an instant, Bud proves herself not just a cutie who can deliver amusing physical comedy, but also a fighter who can save even a Yautja warrior. What a delightful moment for an equally lovable character.
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### The Problem with CG Body Doubles
Though the opening duel between Dek and Kwei is often hard to see, one visual flaw is unfortunately apparent in this sequence: lackluster CG body doubles. As the two cosmic critters bounce across various rock formations, obviously digital versions of the characters replace their flesh-and-blood performers. Suddenly, these Predator warriors are frustratingly weightless rather than impressively agile.
This becomes a recurring problem throughout *Badlands*, particularly in its first act, as Dek keeps falling from great heights and leaping all over Genna. A later scene where Dek tosses Thia up into the air so she can get onto a rocky structure also makes use of a very fake-looking CG body double for Elle Fanning, with its artificiality made extra apparent by this scene taking place in broad daylight.
The emphasis on practical backdrops in *Badlands* is a wise move on many fronts, lending immediate tactility to Genna’s various domains. However, they do have the unfortunate side effect of hammering home whenever those digital body doubles materialize on-screen. Dek and Thia are quite engaging characters that shouldn’t have their journeys disrupted by these visual effects shortcomings.
*Predator: Badlands* is far from the first big-budget blockbuster to suffer from rubbery and distracting CG body doubles. However, this particular film’s emphasis on practical wizardry in so many respects makes this flaw especially jarring.
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### The Unlikely Duo: Dek and Thia’s Dynamic
With Thia missing the bottom half of her body and Dek totally ignorant of how to handle Genna’s various dangers, this odd pair is forced to work together for much of *Predator: Badlands*. Dek hates the idea of having any kind of companion and refers to the mechanical Thia as a “tool” to justify why he keeps her around.
Despite his repulsion at the mere concept of friendship, these two characters end up having an enjoyable dynamic throughout the movie. Initially, much of this entertainment comes from juxtaposing Thia’s boisterous enthusiasm for murderous plants and animals against Dek’s grim, reserved demeanor.
However, some of the most effective *Badlands* moments are quieter scenes where the two talk next to a crackling campfire or alongside a waterfall about their existences. Against all odds, these wildly divergent souls bring out crucial qualities in each other, such as Dek inspiring Thia to call her robot partner Tessa her “sister,” or Thia imparting a story about wolfpacks that changes Dek’s entire worldview.
Despite Dek’s initial hatred for her presence, it’s clear he needs Thia—and *Predator: Badlands* as a film certainly benefits mightily from their unity. It may sound simple to execute such a rapport, but buddy comedy failures like *Wild Wild West* can attest that it isn’t. Thia and Dek’s friendship works because of very careful screenwriting, and it informs some of the most memorable and intimate *Badlands* moments.
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### A PG-13 *Predator* That Packs a Punch
One chief concern many fans likely have about *Predator: Badlands* is its rating. With this entry, *Predator* joins the pantheon of R-rated movies with PG-13 sequels. Following the unabashedly gruesome carnage in the R-rated *Prey*, would *Badlands* feel like a step down in terms of action?
Happily, this new sequel delivers a steady stream of brutal skirmishes and memorable demises even within the confines of a PG-13 film. Turns out you can get away with a lot in terms of violence when said mayhem is dished out against androids and alien critters.
*Badlands* even has Dek carry on the tradition of Yautjas triumphantly displaying the spines of their defeated prey despite this being a PG-13 film. That moment comes midway through the movie, when Dek dispatches a rhino-like creature with his spear. This weapon slices the beast in half right down the middle and leaves a gigantic pool of purple blood and two spines behind.
After the spear divides the creature, Dek plucks the spines up and roars as he waves his trophy around. It’s a fresh reinterpretation of a trademark *Predator* moment, with the vividly colorful blood and presence of two spines making this franchise staple even more distinct.
With Dek’s battlefield triumph, *Badlands* puts to rest any concerns audiences may have had about this PG-13 film skimping on the *Predator* goods.
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### The Villainous Tessa: Overreliance on Dialogue
Just as it looks like Dek will perish at the hands of the Kalisk, synthetic adversary Tessa shows up and dispatches the creature using some stolen technology from Dek’s ship. From here, the Yautja fighter is locked up, and a damaged Thia is brought aboard Tessa’s transport.
Thia is powered back on and expresses excitement to share all she’s learned about Genna’s wildlife with her “sibling.” But it becomes increasingly clear to Thia that Tessa is malicious and untrustworthy, as indicated by her torture of Dek.
Their reunion suffers from major, inescapable flaws, including its heavy reliance on dialogue. Up to this point, *Badlands* eschews verbal communication for silent scenes of Dek navigating Genna. Suddenly, though, the screen is filled with two Elle Fannings both delivering exposition.
The other problem is that audiences have already been clearly told that Tessa is a villain, even seeing her receive orders from “Mother,” the A.I. first made famous in *Alien*, to enact evil plans for the Weyland-Yutani corporation. Audiences are waiting for Thia to catch up to her counterpart’s obvious moral allegiances, which robs this moment of its dramatic tension.
Having to cram such drastic character transformations for Thia into a single scene also gives this sequence a unnecessarily hurried pace. *Predator: Badlands* often excels thanks to its streamlined nature, but here, the excess reliance on dialogue is more lethal than any Yautja weapon.
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### Elle Fanning’s Unlikely Action Star: Thia’s Legs
Both the worst and best installments in the *Predator* franchise often deploy unexpected choices for action movie stars, such as Adrien Brody as a beefy headliner in *Predators* or Keegan-Michael Key as a supporting player in *The Predator*.
However, *Predator: Badlands* really takes the cake in delivering an unanticipated action star in the form of Elle Fanning’s legs.
In this film’s third act, Dek and Bud rescue the bottom half of Thia’s body, with this piece of hardware charging ahead of them to reunite with its owner. While Dek and Bud opt for stealthy entrances into Tessa’s evil compound, Thia’s legs saunter onto the premises, clearly visible to anyone with eyes.
If any other synthetic humans try to stop their mission, these legs easily overwhelm their prey with their fighting prowess. Even with only two limbs to work with, Thia’s lower half is a force to be reckoned with.
Wide shots of the legs stumbling around enemy territory are amusing in their own right, but seeing them make Arnold Schwarzenegger proud in hand-to-hand combat is especially delightful. It’s an imaginative flight of fancy totally divorced from the iconography and action beats of previous *Predator* movies, capably demonstrating director Dan Trachtenberg’s willingness to breathe new life into this franchise rather than just playing familiar hits.
Plus, temporarily making these disembodied legs an action star is an inspired way to technically make Thia an active fight sequence participant even when she’s locked up.
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### Embracing Nature: Dek’s Growth Montage
One of the most satisfying *Predator: Badlands* sequences isn’t filled with punching or gratuitous callbacks to past installments. Instead, it centers on Dek deciding to fight to save the imprisoned Thia and the captured Kalisk by working in tandem with the flora and fauna on Genna.
So begins a montage where Dek returns to terrain he previously saw only as territory to conquer. But this time, he gently interacts with poisonous plants and fields of knife grass while using food to lure out space leeches who can aid him in battle.
Snapping necks and collecting spines isn’t the only way to solve problems. Dek comes to realize the value of that truth, and this memorable montage gets tremendous mileage out of showing his growth as a character.
There’s even a moving reunion between Dek and Bud, the latter of whom has a special, unexpected bond with the imprisoned Kalisk. Once Dek looks closer at Genna’s inhabitants, he sees more than just obstacles.
Not only is this sequence fun to watch as a pay-off to earlier set pieces, but it also makes one excited for what’s to come. What exactly is Dek planning to do with organisms like exploding grubs against Tessa’s army of robots? Once Dek embraces cooperating with nature, rather than just destroying it, anything’s on the table.
Limitless possibilities creatively fuel both the fun and the protagonist’s arc in this sequence.
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### A Streamlined, Character-Focused Finale
Plenty of smaller-scale action and sci-fi movies throw away their more thoughtful instincts in favor of generic, CG-filled finales. Just look at the frustrating ending of *The Wolverine* and its emphasis on a CG Silver Samurai duel rather than the more challenging, contemplative material in the script up to that point.
*Predator: Badlands*, with its very small cast of characters and more contained scope, totally could have succumbed to that as well. Instead, Patrick Aison and Brian Duffield’s screenplay provides a finale full of big crowd-pleasing action but not the kind of excessive spectacle that takes the focus off the characters.
On the contrary, the *Badlands* climax is fun because it transforms earlier obstacles in the script into allies in Dek’s quest to crush Tessa’s android forces. Killer vines that nearly slaughtered Dek when he first reached Genna, for instance, prove useful in gruesomely dispatching villains. Ditto the exploding grubs and thorns from poisonous plants that previously spelled doom for prior Yautja fighters.
Meanwhile, Thia gets a fun beat where she briefly tries imitating her doppelgänger “sister” before a helpful Bud disrupts that scheme.
*Badlands* totally could have piled on a deluge of new MacGuffins, allies, and enemies to balloon its finale up in size. Instead, its home stretch takes place in one compound and exclusively focuses on more intimate but highly impactful interactions and skirmishes.
In the process, *Badlands* ends on a high note and avoids a mistake plaguing even the most well-meaning blockbusters.
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*Predator: Badlands* shows that the *Predator* franchise still has plenty of creative vitality. While it’s imperfect, it delivers fresh ideas, solid character moments, and thrilling action — all within a world that honors both the *Predator* and *Alien* mythologies. Fans looking for a new take on this iconic universe will find plenty to enjoy here.
https://www.looper.com/2019354/predator-badlands-best-worst-moments/
