Predator: Badlands director teases "Conan the Barbarian" style hero

Soon, the Predator will finally be the hero of its own film, rather than the vicious adversary its human quarry must overcome. Prey director Dan Trachtenberg has been on a roll with the long-running sci-fi horror franchise, first with the acclaimed movie Prey (2022) followed by the recent animated film Predator: Killer of Killers (2025). This fall he's back for another round with Predator: Badlands, and this one promises to be like nothing else in the series.

Excepting the first maligned Alien vs Predator film, every time the iconic alien shows up onscreen, it's to hunt down our human protagonists. But Predator: Badlands flips the script, taking viewers into the future where they'll follow the journey of an outcast Yautja named Dek seeking to prove himself, played by Dimitrius Schuster-Koloamatangi.

Empire spoke with Trachtenberg about Predator: Badlands, and the director dropped a few juicy hints about what we can expect. Dek may be a Predator, but by the standards of his people, he's the "runt of the litter." You can bet he's still plenty formidable though; the director compared Dek to quiet heroes like Conan the Barbarian and Mad Max, both of whom waste little time on talk when a well-placed sword or fist could do the trick instead. “He’s a thing of few words, pretty blunt,” Trachtenberg said. “He cuts straight to the point. Literally and figuratively.”

Empire also has an exclusive new image from Predator: Badlands, which you can see above. That's Dek, kneeling on the right side. As for the big, ominous Predator standing over him with a sword, that's Dek's father. So it sounds like we're going to see an intense family dynamic as part of Dek's backstory, leading up to his quest to prove himself to his fellow Yautja. Interestingly, while Prey protagonist Naru (Amber Midthunder) had a very healthy family dynamic, she was also on a journey to prove herself to her people as a capable hunter, despite being an underdog. I'm seeing a common thread here.

Dan Trachtenberg has at least one more wild Predator idea up his sleeve

Putting the Predator front and center for its own movie is definitely a daring choice, since it means asking audiences to relate to an alien creature that's usually portrayed as a mysterious antagonist. But that's part of what drew Trachtenberg to the idea in the first place. “That feels like a big idea, not just within Predator, but in sci-fi generally,” he explained. “In most sci-fi universes, the ‘creatures’ are either bad guys or sidekicks. In [Badlands] it’s: ‘What if you were with the creature on this crazy mission to prove itself, seeing everything through its eyes?’”

This reasoning calls to mind how Trachtenberg previously explained that the decision to have Prey follow a Comanche warrior in the 1700s was a response to the original movie's half-Sioux tracker Billy, who was a supporting character. “I wanted to shift the focus to someone who would normally be a sidekick,” he said. “In Predator, Billy was just one of the men on the team. In Prey, we’re watching someone lead this movie that has never led this type of movie before.”

In general, I really like the thoughtful way Trachtenberg has approached the Predator franchise, and the results have spoken for themselves; Prey was a huge hit with critics and audiences, nabbing the franchise its first Emmy award, and Predator: Killer of Killers has also been well-received. With Predator: Badlands on the horizon, Trachtenberg has now burned through a few of his ideas for the franchise — but not all of them. “After Prey, I had three ideas,” he told Empire. “One was Killer Of Killers, one was Badlands and one... I haven’t done yet. So, there are other awesome ideas and time periods it’d be exciting to explore, and all that’s been part of our discussion for [what’s next].”

Given how inventive each of Trachtenberg's Predator movies has been so far, I'd bet that whatever that third idea he pitched to 20th Century was, it's going to be something outside the box. Maybe it could even bring back Naru, after the mind-bending ending of Predator: Killer of Killers revealed her fate?

The hunt begins in Predator: Badlands, debuting in theaters on November 7, 2025.

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