'Predator: Badlands' director teases a 'spine rip in the movie that is one for the books'
Predator: Badlands is going to be a spine-rippin' good time.
Director Dan Trachtenberg tells Entertainment Weekly that his new entry into the Predator (and Alien) franchise features what he believes is the most epic act of violence against a back... ever.
"There is a spine rip in the movie that is one for the books," the filmmaker says in EW's Comic-Con studio on Friday. "I think it rivals any from the other entries in the franchise."
Predator: Badlands centers on Dek (Dimitrius Schuster-Koloamatangi), a young-and-hungry Yautja warrior who is the runt of the litter in his clan and has a whole lot to prove. He teams up with an unlikely ally: Thia (Elle Fanning), a synthetic made by the Weyland-Yutani company (from the Alien franchise).
The director reveals that both characters get in on the action in this movie.
"The combat — she kicks some butt in this movie, and Dimitri kicks some butt," Trachtenberg says.
Fanning reveals that the action is a big part of why she wanted to join this film.
"I'd never done a role that required this much physicality and fight training and learning fight choreography," she says. "That was new territory for me."
Her costar, Schuster-Koloamatangi, had a much different kind of challenge when it came to portraying a young Predator — not with the fighting, but with the way the Yautja speaks.
"The language, if I'm honest, that was one of the most challenging things but also the most rewarding," the actor says. "The whole [time] filming, I was learning every day. A few good months of just repetition."
What the actors can't wait for audiences to see is the chemistry and relationship between their characters.
"It's a very unlikely duo," Schuster-Koloamatangi says. "They are very different in terms of where they come from and pretty much everything about them. But throughout the film, they find the similarities they share. And they work together to take down some bad guys."
Fanning loves how "unprecedented" this movie is for the Predator franchise, particularly because of the relationship at its center."It has heart and emotion and there's humanity to it," she says. "But there's only synthetic creatures and androids. What Dan has thought up is quite genius."
As for who would win in a fight between a Predator and a synthetic android, the director promises fans will soon find out.
"The movie answers that question — to an exponential degree," Trachtenberg teases.
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