Prey Director Ensured 'New' Predator Weapons Never Made Things Easier For Naru
Action franchises tend to go bigger with every new installment, and "Predator" is no exception. Where the original 1987 film pits a small group of sweat-soaked paramilitaries against a Predator (aka. Yautja) in a dense South American jungle, its first two sequels (for the sake of this discussion, we'll ignore the "Alien vs. Predator" crossovers) expand the setting to a dystopian version of Los Angeles circa 1997 and then an entire extraterrestrial planet. But while "The Predator" tried to dial things back to muddled results, director Dan Trachtenberg's prequel "Prey" is much more successful, with its story unfolding on the unconquered Great Plains in the early 18th century.
Winding the clock back simultaneously gives Trachtenberg an organic excuse to simplify the Predator's arsenal, which helps to level the playing field for the alien hunter and the film's human protagonist: the aspiring Comanche warrior Naru (Amber Midthunder). This approach of stripping "Predator" down to its basics also extends to the themes in "Prey." Much like Arnold Schwarzenegger's Dutch is forced to throw his gun away and try using that ol' noggin of his to outwit his opponent in the original film, Naru comes to realize that her knack for fighting craftily — the very thing her brother and his fellow male Comanche warriors regarded as her weakness — is actually what gives her an advantage in her own battle with a Predator.
Of course, one does not merely give the Predator "new" (er, rather, old) weapons without a little trepidation. In an interview with /Film's Ethan Anderton for his film's long-awaited home media release, Trachtenberg admitted, "Yes, there was freedom, but also the challenge was in making the weapon we feel a little bit earlier than what we've seen, which is scary in itself, just to point out."
Accounting for a passage of time
Have you ever noticed that technology doesn't seem to evolve anywhere near as much in many sci-fi franchises as it does in the real world over a similar period of time? It's certainly come to Trachtenberg's attention that "a passage of time is not really accounted for in the tech," which is very different than how things tend to work in our own lives (just ask anyone over a certain age who's struggled to use a Bluetooth device, or, alternatively, anyone below a certain age who's had to try and make sense of an analog appliance). As he put it:
"If you look at 'Star Wars,' blasters are blasters, lightsabers [are] lightsabers [...] There's no like, 'Oh, this is 100 years prior, so maybe their ships don't run as well.' Or 'Star Trek' too. It's in [the] visual design of things, and we start to show age, but not actually in the technology itself. And as we know on earth, 100 years ago, technology is very different."
Now, before any Trekkies or "Star Wars" enthusiasts lead a call to arms, I'm aware this isn't entirely accurate, but the general sentiment — the way technology develops isn't the focus of these properties — stands. More importantly, where it concerns "Prey," giving the Predator a less advanced toolkit to work with to reflect the film's period setting "emotionally, spiritually felt like that's what it wants to be, that we want to see something that is prior to what we've seen before," Trachtenberg added. The trick was not going so far as to make things too easy for Naru:
"But I never wanted to make it easier for Nadu, easier for our protagonist, to say, 'Oh, that's why she wins, because we've made the Predator easier.'"
A spear for a spear, a net for a net
As Trachtenberg saw it, the key was to avoid giving the Predator anything that wasn't the alien equivalent of what Naru would have at her disposal:
"So it was a real delicate balance to make sure it still felt very advanced and very beyond earthly capability, seemingly, but also feel prior to. A lot of the weaponry ideas came from the tit-for-tat, the rock paper, scissors of like, 'Okay, Comanche had spears. Predator has his combi stick. They might have a net. Predator's got his net. They have knives, and Predator's got his...' It's all of that kind of thinking are starting places. And then just making things just a little bit cooler than what I've seen before and wanted to iterate and work with the team, Alec Ellis and Tom over at ADI who had done all the prior 'Predator' movies and had all the things that were on the cutting room floor that didn't quite make it, but very much understand the design language of Predator stuff and honing in and figuring out exactly what we needed."
In addition to being strong world-building, this allows "Prey" to incorporate innovative action beats that differ from anything we've seen in the franchise before. This is also what makes the idea of future films pitting Predators against humans from different periods of history all the more appealing. What kind of tech would a Predator wield in a fight with a samurai? Or Roman soldiers? Or the Agojie? The possibilities are endless and Trachtenberg already knows where and when he'd like to see the Predator pop up next in history. Forget yet another "Pirates of the Caribbean" sequel, give us a "Predator: 1718" comic book adaptation.
"Prey" is streaming on Hulu and is now available on 4K UHD, Blu-ray, and DVD.