Another day, another reboot of a B-movie from the ’80s that may or may not be a sequel but also they don’t want you to worry about it too much. This one, however, stands out by virtue of its director, Shane Black (“Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang,” “The Nice Guys.”), who has yet to make a bad movie — though I would personally argue that “Iron Man 3” is severely overrated — and thus deserves some level of trust, even as he’s unnecessarily breathing life into yet another dead franchise at the behest of 20th Century Fox.
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We still don’t know a whole lot about Black’s “The Predator,” but we do know this: the movie has been severely delayed and this trailer feels overdue.
But the writers, director, and cast have been dropping morsels of Predator info into interviews ever since the film was announced. Co-writer Fred Dekker told the Movie Crypt Podcast that “[i]f you think of the first ‘Predator’ as ‘Alien,’ ours is much more ‘Aliens.’ It’s not … ‘Let’s kill off all of our characters,’ because we have a lot of characters, from a lot of different worlds and ideologies. I don’t mean other planets. It’s a lot of people doing a lot of things in a lot of locations.” As an “Alien: Covenant” detractor myself — “Covenant” is very much Ridley Scott in “let’s kill off all of our characters” mode — this Dekker quote is heartening.
Another encouraging tidbit: Cast member (and recent Emmy winner) Sterling K. Brown told EW that “[‘The Predator’ has] got a really wicked sense of humor to it, which I love about it. And it’s got a real camaraderie amongst the main characters that I think folks will be attracted to.” Black is best known for his “wicked” humor and sharp, buddy-cop banter. It sounds like he’s been able to shape the blockbuster according to his own sensibilities. Good.
Not so encouraging, Keegan-Micheal Key recently said “three quarters” of the entire third act had to be reshot which a) doesn’t sound good and b) explains the long wait even for a trailer.
“The Predator” has a great cast, with Boyd Holbrook (“Narcos,” “Logan”), Olivia Munn, Trevante Rhodes (“Moonlight“), Keegan-Michael Key, Thomas Jane (“The Punisher”) and Jacob Tremblay (“Room”) starring alongside Brown. Sadly, it does not seem like a certain former Governor of California will be back, ahem, to fight aliens alongside them, but who knows, what with secret cameos and post-credit scenes these days. Take a peek below and let us know what you think.