In the wake of Prey and Killer Of Killers, and with Predator: Badlands coming up, director Dan Trachtenberg teases another secret sequel project.
When Prey arrived in 2022, we (along with plenty of others) hailed it as “a legacy sequel done right” giving us the things we wanted and expected from a Predator movie, but doing that in ways that were surprising and often wholly uinexpected. Given the near-universal acclaim for the film, director Dan Trachtenberg was quickly invited back to 20th Century Studios and presumably asked if he any ideas for a follow-up.
His answer, it seems, was a whole list of ideas. First there’s the recently released Predator: Killer Of Killers, a feature-length animation on Disney+ that’s essentially a playground debate turned into a movie. Who would win in a fight: a Predator or a WWII pilot? Yeah, but would a Viking be a match for a Predator? What about a ninja?
It’s the kind of fantasy fight booking that makes for some entertaining showdowns, but Trachtenberg isn’t done there. Predator: Badlands releases in cinemas in November and looks to once again reframe our expectations of a Predator film. Check out our analysis of the trailer right here if you don’t believe us.
Read more: Prey | A few thoughts on a legacy sequel done right
According to Trachtenberg though, the resurrection of the Predator series isn’t stopping there, because the filmmaker has another project up his sleeve. In an interview with SFX Magazine, Trachtenberg said: “After Prey came out, and I started thinking about sequel stuff, there were three ideas that I had. Killers is one, Badlands is two and the third one is something else.The reason why I felt possessed to make them and sort of why I rushed – I did two at once because I could do, I could multitask with animation – was because I was so eager to get to the third thing.”
Given how cool-looking the first two projects are, it’s rather enticing to wonder what this mystery third project could be, especially given that it’s so appealing to Trachtenberg that he’s ‘rushed’ through multiple projects so he can get to it. Rumours of a new Alien Vs Predator project refuse to go away, while stories circulated a while ago suggesting Prey 2 was in the works.
Trachtenberg didn’t give much away in the interview though, only adding an assertion that he’s not blasting through these projects to meet some sort of corporate-mandated timeline. “There’s a lot of cool ideas out there and none of them are just like, ‘Oh, we have to say the next part of this story because it was successful.’ All of it is like, ‘Whoa, no one has done that in sci-fi. No one has done that in Predator, No one’s done that with the creature’. All of those ideas are generated from that instinct. So, yeah, there is definitely a third thing that I’d love to get to when Badlands is finished.”
Yes please. It’s a great time to be a Predator fan, and when we do hear more about this mystery third project, you can be sure we’ll let you know.
