When Dan Trachtenberg’s Predator prequel was announced, fans of the franchise hoped that they might finally get another good movie in this franchise after the disappointment of Predator 2, Predators, and The Predator. But they ended up getting a lot more than just a good movie. It’s a breathtaking viewing experience that creates tension around the alien hunter and, more importantly, focuses on the unbreakable spirit of its plucky protagonist. Prey has been met with overwhelmingly positive reactions from critics and audiences alike. Its Rotten Tomatoes score is even higher than the classic 1987 original. The only regret is that the movie was released on Hulu as opposed to getting a theatrical release.
It makes sense that Disney wanted to play it safe with a movie that went into development before they acquired 20th Century Fox. The Predator series has never been a huge moneymaker, even going back to the Arnold Schwarzenegger vehicle that started it all. The franchise didn’t crack the $100 million threshold at the worldwide box office until its third entry, and the last movie – 2018’s The Predator – was considered a commercial disappointment.
There was no guarantee that a new Predator movie would be a box office hit if it was released in theaters, especially in the precarious post-pandemic climate. But Prey is crying out to be seen on a big screen. The scares are effective on a small screen at home, but they would’ve been much more effective projected onto a giant silver screen with Sarah Schachner’s musical score blaring out of an industrial speaker system.
It’s impossible to replicate the big-screen experience at home. Even the largest TV screens pale in comparison to the wall-sized screens in movie theaters. Theaters manage to block out all the noises outside the building, and even the noises outside the screening room, but most residences don’t have that luxury. With the lights out and the blinds closed, a given living room still doesn’t have the pitch-blackness of a movie theater. Home viewing is a disservice to the atmosphere that Trachtenberg crafted so carefully from start to finish in Prey.
Amber Midthunder anchors the movie with real star power. She commands the screen with a captivating performance as Naru. Naru is a fierce heroine in the mold of Ellen Ripley or Sarah Connor. Like Ripley or Sarah, she undergoes a transformative character arc in the midst of all the sci-fi spectacle. From the offset, she’s desperate to prove herself as a competent hunter. Naru is initially terrified of the Predator, but that terror turns to vengeful rage in time for the thrilling final reel. The nuances of Midthunder’s performance would’ve shone even brighter on the big screen.
Prey doesn’t have any of the usual drawbacks of straight-to-streaming movie releases. The visual palette doesn’t adhere to a bland TV-friendly house style. Instead, Prey’s visuals are deeply cinematic, from a silhouetted Predator stalking its victims through a misty jungle to the iconic three-dotted targeting system being used as an ominous source of light. A lot of steaming movies have bloated runtimes. Filmmakers assume that the majority of audiences will be watching their work in the background while scrolling through social media, so they don’t bother to painstakingly shave away unnecessary minutes in the cutting room. But Prey is tightly edited. It clocks in at a nice, lean 100 minutes and doesn’t waste a second.
The strength of Patrick Aison’s script is its no-nonsense storytelling. The movie succinctly sets up Naru and her goal as she pledges to complete the hunting ritual that will earn her the respect of her tribe: hunting something that can hunt her back. Within the first few minutes, the Predator has landed on Earth and started relentlessly looking for food. Before long, the two cross paths and the movie becomes a nonstop blood-soaked thrill-ride.
From Morbius to Firestarter, a bunch of horror movies that did get a theatrical release this year didn’t have any sequences nearly as exhilarating as Naru’s first encounter with the Predator. The sequence starts off as a Predator-free bear chase. A hungry bear chases Naru down a river and she takes shelter inside a dam. As the bear is clawing at her from outside the dam, it’s suddenly dragged around and decimated by an unseen threat. When the bear’s corpse is slumped down into the dam, the threat reveals itself: a Predator in all its extra-terrestrial glory. Shot entirely from Naru’s petrified perspective on shaky handheld cameras, this set-piece is visceral and intense on any screen. But no screen is more engaging than the big screen. Movie theaters were invented to exhibit this kind of scene.
The success of Prey has fans calling for more Predator movies with inventive historical settings. In future movies, the Predator could stalk Vikings on the high seas or cowboys in the Wild West or soldiers in the war-torn jungles of Vietnam. It’s a shame that audiences didn’t get to see Prey in theaters, but maybe the Mouse House will take a chance on theatrical releases for any subsequent history-hopping Predator prequels.