Today, Hulu dropped Predator: Killer of Killers, its new animated Predator movie from the mind of Prey director Dan Trachtenberg. Killer of Killers is an anthology film that explores three different time periods where a Predator came to Earth to hunt down the most dangerous humans it could find: the Viking age, feudal Japan, and World War II.
As with Prey, Trachtenberg knocked it out of the park. Killer of Killers is a fresh take on the Predator formula that not only leans on established ideas but introduces some serious twists and turns that change things up. At the end of the film, we get a shocking series of events that have major ramifications not just for Trachtenberg's next movie Predator: Badlands, but also for the ending of Prey.
FULL SPOILERS for Predator: Killer of Killers and Prey beyond this point.
Predator: Killer of Killers ending totally changes the movie
Predator: Killer of Killers tells the story of three humans who each killed a Predator: the Viking warrior Ursa (Lindsay LaVanchy), the Japanese ninja Kenji (Louis Ozawa), and the American fighter pilot and mechanic Torres (Rick Gonzalez). At the end of Torres' story, we see a Predator ship come for him when Torres is working in his garage following the end of World War II. The aliens capture him, and take him far from Earth.
It's here we get a better look at the big picture. After each of these humans killed a Predator, the aliens returned for them, took them prisoner, and cryogenically froze them for a long space voyage. As the ship nears a planet ruled by Predators, Torres, Kenji, and Ursa are all awakened. This is a wild way that the movie is able to justify having a Viking, ninja, and World War II pilot all alive and together in the same time period.
Our three heroes are put into an arena where a warlord leader of the Predators announces that they must fight to the death; whoever emerges victorious will face the warlord himself. Language barriers get in the way of communication, but ultimately the three humans end up banding together and fighting their way out of the arena. Torres manages to take control of a Predator ship to fly them to safety. Kenji's arm is cut off as the group attempts to flee, and Ursa ultimately sacrifices herself by jumping back off the ship to destroy a hook the Predators use to try and reel the ship back in after it takes off. It's epic.
The film ends with Torres and Kenji escaping aboard their ship, only for the Warlord Predator to order its followers to go hunt them down. A swarm of Predator ships take to the sky in pursuit. But Predator: Killer of Killers isn't done with the bombshells yet; there's one more revelation ahead that has major implications for Naru, the Comanche protagonist of Prey.
Predator: Killer of Killers ending confirms a dark fate for Naru after Prey
After the ending title screen, Predator: Killer of Killers breaks our brains one last time. In a final scene, we see that Ursa survived her encounter with the Warlord Predator. She is back in a cryosleep pod and being escorted by several Predator guards into a room filled with similar pods. Presumably, each of these cryo pods contains someone who killed a Predator, and whom the aliens then took captive.
The camera shows a few of these people as the Predators walk Ursa along the row, including a many-limbed alien creature, a light-skinned human with a buzzcut, and, finally, Naru. The camera zooms in on her frozen body as the musical theme from Prey plays.
Back when Prey came out, eagle-eyed viewers noticed that the end credits for the movie had paintings which depicted the Predators returning for Naru. It seemed to confirm that even though she defeated a Predator in the film, a darker fate awaited her. After all, she had the flintlock pistol engraved with Raphael Adolini's name, and we know that that pistol had to make its way to the Predators, since they one day gift it to Danny Glover's LAPD officer Mike Harrigan at the end of Predator 2. And indeed, we do see the pistol in Predator: Killer of Killers; it's the weapon that the Predators offer Torres in the arena, which he humorously has no idea how to use since flintlock guns are a thing of the past by World War II.
Predator: Killer of Killers confirms Naru's fate: she was abducted and taken to this Predator planet, which I'm guessing is going to be the main setting for Trachtenberg's next live-action Predator movie, Predator: Badlands.
On the one hand, this is a pretty bitter ending for Naru, who ends up a prisoner despite her triumph over a Predator. On the other, it gives the franchise a way to bring her back in an unexpected way, since she's still alive even though hundreds of years have passed since her deadly struggle against the galaxy's most dangerous hunter.
How will Predator: Killer of Killers tie into Predator: Badlands?
One of the biggest questions I was left with after Killer of Killers is how exactly this movie will tie into Predator: Badlands. It's hard to be certain that the planet we see at the end of Killer of Killers is the same one as Badlands, but I think it is. We see a culture of Predators on the Badlands planet, and since Killer of Killers just spent a bunch of time developing a Predator planet, it would make sense if this all wove together. Plus, the giant creature Torres, Ursa, and Kenji fight in the arena looks very similar to one we see in the Badlands trailer, and the small speeder hovercraft Torres commandeers to get out of the arena also shows up. Whether the arena planet is the main setting of Badlands or not, I bet we'll see it in the movie.
Something I can't stop wondering is whether we'll see any of the characters from Killer of Killers — or even Naru — in Badlands. The main character of the next movie is a young Predator who is outcast from his clan, and teams up with a human named Thia (Elle Fanning) on a "treacherous journey in search of the ultimate adversary."
What if that "ultimate adversary" is a human we've already met, who escapes the Predator's grasp? It may feel like a longshot theory, but given how well Predator: Killer of Killers hid its biggest plot twists, I'm inclined to think Trachtenberg has a few more tricks up his sleeve.
We'll find out later this year! For now, enjoy watching and rewatching Predator: Killer of Killers, out now on Hulu. Predator: Badlands will hit theaters on November 7, 2025.
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