Predator Fans Mixed on Return of Dutch and Harrigan in Killer of Killers: ‘Harrigan and Dutch Had Good Endings. Zero Reason This Needed to Be Done'

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6 days ago

Arnold Schwarzenegger's Dutch is back in the world of Predator via an extended version of animated movie Killer of Killers — and it's sent fans of the long-running sci-fi franchise down a lore rabbit hole that calls into question the endings of the original movies and what was thought to be a canon Predator video game.
This week at San Diego Comic-Con 2025, current Predator custodian Dan Trachtenberg announced a surprise extended version of Killer of Killers that shows Dutch from the original Predator and Danny Glover's Mike Harrigan from Predator 2 captured and frozen by the Yautja. Trachtenberg said during a panel at Comic-Con that Schwarzenegger had given his blessing to use Dutch in future stories, leaving the door open to a Killer of Killers follow-up that would see Dutch and co revived and pitted against a Predator once again.
The extended version of Killer of Killers is out now, so fans are already analyzing it to within an inch of its life. Reaction appears to be mixed. While some are excited about the iconic characters' return, some are disappointed with the idea that the Yautja kidnap victorious humans in the first place. Let's remember the iconic scene at the end of Predator 2 where an elder Yautja rewards Harrigan with an antique flintlock pistol as a trophy. The suggestion now is Harrigan was later kidnapped and put in stasis, which some believe devalues the human victories seen in previous Predator movies.
'It just feels like shit knowing your favorite human survivors are just going to be kidnapped and probably killed in an arena by another human or by the Warlord,' said redditor Vector_Mortis.
'Why would the Yautja congratulate Harrigan, give him the pistol, and leave just to come back, take the pistol, and kidnap him?' wondered Slow_Obligation2286.
'I'm not a fan of this at all,' added Hanesman12. 'Harrigan and Dutch had good endings. Zero reason this needed to be done. Purely nostalgia bait.'
'This removes everything we previously knew about Dutch and Harrigan's timelines after the movies,' said Originalname888. 'This removes the honor code. This removes everything.'
Fans are now latching onto a potential explanation for what is going on here: that the whole kidnap human survivors thing is the work of the Yautja tribe we see in Killer of Killers, which does not represent the Yautja as a whole. Perhaps this particular tribe has gone rogue and will eventually be put in its place. On that we'll have to wait and see, but what is irrefutable is that it is now canon that Dutch and Harrigan were kidnapped soon after the events of their movies and remain in stasis at this undetermined point in the future.
But there's an additional tricky Predator lore question that revolves around Dutch. 2020's Predator: Hunting Grounds, developed by IllFonic, features Arnold Schwarzenegger reprising his role as Dutch. In the run up to the game's release, the developers talked about working with people at previous rights holder Fox (this is before Disney bought the company and its franchises) to cement Hunting Grounds' place within the official Predator lore.
This was exciting for fans as it meant Hunting Grounds officially revealed what happened to Dutch after the events of the first Predator movie — and there was no mention of being kidnapped by Yautja. Indeed, Hunting Grounds shows an older Dutch in the year 2025.
So, is Hunting Grounds no longer canon? Is Trachtenberg ignoring it? Is there another explanation? These are just some of the questions fans are trying to answer in the wake of Dutch's return in Killer of Killers.
Whatever Trachtenberg's master plan, there remains huge interest in the upcoming Predator: Badlands, the first 15 minutes of which were shown at Comic-Con. The Alien franchise links are clear, but will there be an AVP movie afterwards? We'll have to wait and see.
Wesley is Director, News at IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at [e-mail] or confidentially at [e-mail].