Amph In Town With a Few Days to Kill: The Prey-dator Discussion Thread

Saw it for a 2nd time, I still love this movie, it's so crazy.

 

hahaha one of my favourite lines in the movie involves that
"No, I just need a sample!"
"It's a %^$@in space dog!!"

 

I think that the bulk of the reason these films aren't all war films, is that primary it was about cost, but also about changing things up. That's why there was the shift to the city, fighting xenomorphs in different locations, going to an alien world and now this.

 

I would like to see a film based on the Steve Perry book Predator: Turnabout. It's a three way dance between Predators, a Marine Scout Sniper, and a poacher who is a super-tracker. If they capture the suspense in that book it'd be memorable.

 

I don't have any desire to see this new one, but the hype surrounding it nevertheless made me want to revisit 2010's Predators, and it's not too bad. It doesn't really bring much new to the table, but somehow it manages to be engaging. I think it comes down to the team dynamic. The character interplay; the fact that none of them know or trust each other; is what keeps it engaging more than the hunt itself, to me. Although, certainly, the lingering menace is what drives the plot forward. I also like that the title of the movie is revealed to be in reference to the protagonists as much as their enemies. On earth, they are all killers from different walks of life.

Laurence Fishburne looks like he's eating way too well, though. He's supposed to be a guy who has managed to stay alive for years by scavenging in hiding. What were they thinking? Still, it doesn't hold a candle to the original, simply because we the audience know what we're dealing with at this point, while in the first movie we didn't.

That's also what makes me thoroughly apathetic towards the future of this franchise. At this point I know what they are, but I don't want to know more about them either, because their mystery is the entire reason why the first movie works, and what is compelling in the first place. You don't know what it is, what it wants or why it's hunting them. Of course, by the end you do.

So if I'm not interested in knowing more about them, then that means that any future movies similarly have to be variations on the same concept, which I have no need or desire to see either.

 

What hype? I haven’t seen a lick of hype for this film.

 

Eh... the talk surrounding it. Better?

 

All I've heard about this film since it came out is its questionable take on the autism spectrum.

Which makes me think about how much better Rain Man would be if they replaced Dustin Hoffman with the predator.

 

I think this just about sums it up. The first one, (like many first films in a franchise), was lightning in a bottle. You’ve got the mystery of the predator, what does he look like, why is he here and just generally how cool a premise it is as a character. Then you’ve got Arnie in his prime and you’ve got a great ensemble cast that work together perfectly.

There aren’t many places left to go after this because we know all about the star of the film (the predator), we know what he looks like and that hes the ultimate hunter. Its not like they can create a trilogy of Predator films that intertwine together in some sort of quest or narrative thread, it has to be standalones. So its just what situation you put him in to. The only place this franchise can go is to pick a location and make sure you have a human dynamic around him that works. Its essentially putting a different spin on the original and rehashing it. In that regard I quite enjoyed Predator 2 and Predators, buts its the law of diminished returns.

However, given the modern trend of film making to demystify everything, it wouldn’t surprise me if at some point they visit the world of the Predator and try and turn things on its head, by showing their culture with some kind of John McClane character stranded on their planet having to fight his way out.

Anyway I’m going to see the new one tonight at the cinema.

 

No, but the intent in each film was to change things up so as to not be just the Predator hunting soldiers. And given well their tech worked for them in a snowy environment in the first AVP film, I'd say that the desert wouldn't cause too many problems. As to the footprints issue, a smart writer would just have the Predator mostly on top of and inside buildings, where such issues wouldn't be noticed.

 

I posted this on the lastest movie thread in here, but have copied it here too.

So I saw the new one last night. It’s certainly a mixed bag. But I must admit to thinking that for the first half that there are some good ideas here. The Predator, as always, is the coolest thing about the film. But once the super Predator thing turned up that’s when it went over the line for me and I wasn’t a fan of that concept. The tone of it surprised me, there’s a lot more comedy in it than I thought, some of it worked for me, and some didn’t. But in a way that kind of undermined the peril that the group were in and when the deaths did come it didn’t have the same feeling as the original, where it seemed scarier. In the original there’s a definite line between the jokey group camaraderie and them being professional and taking care of business. But then again this latest group are bonkers and that factor also undermined it a bit for me when they were in danger.

The kid in it actually wasn’t anywhere near as annoying as he could have been. However it’s a familiar movie trope to use a kid with autism or similar to be the only one who can solve complex puzzles, and that’s what we see in this.

As some may not have seen it yet I’ll tag this in spoilers.

The good………….

Spoiler

The predator is pursued through space by another predator, his ship jumps through some kind of wormhole and escapes to earth where he crash lands.

The predator himself. Surely one of the best designs in cinema history and they don’t mess about as he’s in action in the opening ten minutes, it’s great to see them back.

Our hero played by Boyd Holbrook, who’s a sniper on a secret mission sees the ship crash and takes down the predator using some of his technology from his downed escape pod. He steals the predator’s helmet and wrist gauntlet and sends it home to his son who has Asperger’s. He keeps his invisibility device and swallows it.

He's then captured by government officials and taken to a facility for questioning. A biologist played by Olivia Munn is taken to the same facility. This seems to be an extension of Keyes research team from Predator 2 (even featuring his son played by Jake Busey). They have some predator technology from previous visits and give some exposition about them. They have the predator there under sedation and she’s been brought in to study him. The predator escapes, wreaks havoc, and lets her live because she’s a woman. He puts on one of the old masks there, which somehow links to his and he sees where Holbrook’s son is and sets off to find him, the helmet and gauntlet (with contains his ship locator).

I loved the scene in the lab when he escapes and especially as he stalks the decontamination chamber. Some good predator action there.

Elsewhere Holbrook’s son somehow activates the ship locator device and seems to understand it as he plays with it, but its activation alerts the other hunter predator in space and he heads to Earth to find him.

Holbrook with new band of brothers on the prison bus see the predator escape, take over the bus and head off after him. Allowing Munn to tag along with them and they realise they’re after his stolen technology that his son now has.

Meanwhile as its Halloween his son is out wearing the predator mask as he goes trick or treating.

Hunter predator lands and sends some predator dogs off on the trail of the predator he’s hunting. That reminded me of Darth Maul sending the probes off on Tatooine.

So far it’s ok. Some decent ideas in there I think

· A predator traitor has stolen something

· A hunter predator is pursuing him to retrieve it

· Traitor predator crashes on earth, is captured by the government to be studied,, he then escapes to find his stolen equipment.

· A kid has the predators technology to find the item on his crashed ship. Activating it alerts the hunter to where he is.

· Traitor predator, hunter predator, the government and the kids army father with his new team all converge on the same place.

Sounds a simple premise with a potentially interesting macguffin end goal, but once they get to the town where his son lives it fell apart for me. .

The bad……………..

Spoiler

Olivia Munn turns from a biologist to a badass in the blink of an eye, wielding guns and running and jumping around everywhere.

The battle in the air with super predator seemed an unnecessary diversion as the regular predator escapes from the government research place. That scene had no point to me.

In the lab exposition scene they talk about them as being called predators, it felt a bit odd calling them what the film is called because they aren’t really predators, and indeed this forms the basis of a short lived joke.

The predator dogs, we saw them in Predators, I much preferred that design. In this one they even have dreadlocks! But they eventually track down the son before hes rescued. Indeed one of the dogs decides to follow the hero’s around, like a moody puppy and befriend and help them. I’m not sure what made it do that, maybe it was brain damaged after a fight.

Olivia Munn again, suddenly working out that they’re an evolving species. Sudden cleverness to solve problems and provide exposition in the absence of a half decent story seems to be the norm in some films, highlighted when she shouts to the group (really to the audience) about the super predator developing some kind of exo-skeleton as he was fighting.

The predators cannon. Turns out this one has it built into the helmet which the kid has. When he’s bullied during his trick or treating it just blows up the culprit and his house. They explain that it reacts to threats and fires itself. Surely that’s not a good thing as not everything is as threatening as it may seem.

Humans using predator weapons. I’m not a fan of this idea and it ends badly for most of them as they don’t know how to use them.

The government antagonist played by Sterling Brown. In a way hes similar to Keyes from Predator 2. I’m guessing their goal was that they were after predator technology. Indeed hes one of them running around with a shoulder mounted cannon at the end. He could have been good, but comes across as cartoon, in fact I’ve forgotten how he dies now.

The invisibility device. You just knew it was going to reappear later after he swallowed it. Sure enough after a close call with the government agents who were about to off the group our hero decides he needs to go for a **** and magically we have a solution to get him into the ship at the end without being noticed.

The story. It all seems a bit choppy to me. It starts off ok and I was invested at least for the first half. I could see where they are going with it, but I think once the super predator lands and he wants what the other predator has stolen, then it seems like it’s just one big scene after another put together with no real flow or narrative. Things happen conveniently, solutions are found quickly. It’s almost like things were cut out and it was reassembled without any real consideration for how the thing flows in the last act especially. The showdown in the forest at the end seems so rushed and could have been more tense before it seems to rush to final showdown with the super predator. I can’t believe that film makers don’t see this when they finish a film because it happens so often. It’s a shame because I liked the change in dynamic that he wanted a stolen item and not just human trophies, it all just fell apart and was disjointed.

The ugly mother*****r………….

Spoiler

In the originals, it was always thought the spine and skull were trophies. In this they retcon it to say they are using the spinal fluid to genetically engineer their own species and take the best of the universes lifeforms to change their own. In fact Oliva Munn says something like ‘remember earlier when you said they took skulls and spines as trophies, they’re using the spinal fluid’. I didn’t actually remember anyone mentioning it earlier in the film.

The kid is the target of the super predator too, he wants to take him to their home world and use his genetic make-up.

On the subject of genetic engineering, for some reason the stolen predator mask that the kid has suddenly activates and for exposition reasons he sees predators injecting other predators when he puts it on, just to reinforce that aspect of the story. I guess they must want us to think that all masks are linked somehow. It just seemed like an after-thought to me.

The super predator, once he turns up and kills the regular predator it was game over for me. At least the regular predator, a man in a very convincing suit, looks like he’s real and you can touch him and he’s in the scene. The super predator looked like CGI rubbish, a cross between Iron Maidens Eddie on the Final Frontier album cover and some kind of Frankenstein thing like Oddbod from Carry on Screaming. Hess 11 feet tall and so big that any kind of vulnerability or semblance of a chance of defeating him seems to be gone, don’t get me wrong I liked the idea of a hunter predator tracking down another predator, just that when we see him I thought the design of the super predator was over the top.

If the traitor was sharing something with Earth why did he start killing everyone instead of saying he comes in peace and just hand it over?

A CGI fest on top of a ship as it tried to escape at the end seemed unnecessary to me. It’s a trait of a super hero film to show something like this.

We can translate their language now.

The predator killer weapon. So traitor predator was sharing something with Earth, something to help us the final scene is the revealing of what it was. It’s a gauntlet that when on the wearer suddenly turns in to mechanical suit of armour with shoulder weapons and a robo-predator kind of design. It looked like the maid on wheels from Attack of the Clones with Tweekie;s face from Buck Rogers. A predator has shared armour that can defend against and kill a predator. Does that mean they want to set up a war movie with them? It was an awful way to end the film IMO.

Again after an ending like that where does the franchise go?

I didn't think Predators was set on their homeworld. I was thinking more of them ruining it even more by showing their society, their kids, their customs, their training, their initiations (maybe this was covered a bit in the first AVP if thats still canon), their cities, their technology. Its hard to see where this goes and now having seen the latest one it really wouldn't surprise me if they somehow go to their homewolrd as they....

Spoiler

have a predator killer suit and can translate their language

 

In the trash.

 

I'll probably wind up watching the new Predator movie eventually when it comes on one of the Premium movie channels (except if it's on EPIX, which I don't subscribe to). I can't imagine any of them topping the first one. The cast itself was memorable and highly quotable.
"I'm scared, Poncho"
"BS. You ain't afraid of no man"
"There's something out there waiting for us, and it ain't no man. We're all gonna die."

 

I'm pretty sure when Keys is giving the tour of the Predator facility, one of the weapons he shows her is actually the Alien tail spear from AvP, which is odd that he's showing off Predator gear and it's an Alien tail spear but I doubt they would know what it is. Have to wait until I have it on home media and pause to be sure.

As for the intentions of the 1st Predator in this film

Spoiler

Honestly, the most we get on him is the big guy calls him a "Traitor" and I don't think the 1st one really cared all that much about saving humans considering how many humans it kills when it lands. Honestly, I think the 1st one was just an *****le who gave the humans anti-Predator technology out of spite. Which, oddly, does work with the theme of the crew in this film. Sometimes the biggest mess ups and jerks can make a difference.

 

So I finally got to see The Predator this weekend. Predator is my 4th favorite movie, so I was excited when this film was announced, but the excitement turned to apprehension as production details trickled out. I'm actually glad I had to wait a few weeks to see it, as all the poor reviews tempered my expectation for this movie, so I was not disappointed with what I saw. Basically the only truly enjoyable scenes for me was the 40 seconds of the Predator escaping from the facility. There was a ton of forced dialogue from the first movie that didn't come off very well. I don't think I need to ever see this movie again.

So to me the best place to take this franchise would have been (after Predator 2) to have a Predator who doesn't obey the classic Predator hunting rules we see applied in the first two movies come down and start just murdering everything in sight. This could be set in a small southern town involving the sheriff solving the murders and a federal government team coming in to help. Or set in a Middle-East town where the locals suspect the American soldiers of killing the civilians. Anyways, another Predator would come down and hunt the rogue Predator because that's not how things are done in Predator society. I don't think the different clans or DNA sampling that we've seen in the last two movies was necessary. The studios are trying to up the wow factor instead of coming up with a truly interesting plot.

Spoiler

I totally thought a T-800 Terminator model, created by the Predators from Dutch would come out of that pod at the end of the movie. Ha!

 

@JABoomer

Spoiler

ha ha I was waiting for Dutch to come out of the pod too and for them to say at some point he was captured by a predator in the intervening years.

 

Why do we still love Predator?