I’ve seen this movie three times (twice in theaters, writing this almost a year later in October of 2026) since its first weekend, mostly as a casual fan of the Predator movies and a big fan of Elle Fanning. But I cannot speak more highly of this as a jumping off point for new fans of the Predator movies or as folks who’ve been with the franchise since the very beginning. I liked it so much that I tried to do what Jessa Crispin did in her book What is Wrong with Men: Patriarchy, the Crisis of Masculinity, and How (Of Course) Michael Douglas Films Explain Everything back in July of 2025 but supply Predator for Douglas. I convinced some people to let me watch all the Predator movies for my job (which isn’t to watch Predator movies) and at this point its hard not to see it everywhere.
The Alamo preshow for this movie contains some of the most amazing gems of marketing I’ve ever seen, complete with yautjas’ synchronized dancing and a Japanese promo in which a yautja does an impression of The Office with a bunch of unwitting office workers. The love with which fans have inserted and reinserted Predator into the world over the past ten years is a testament to the everlasting, evergreen themes of the franchise: gay subtext, Adrian Brody, small non-white girls with guns, and franchise crossovers.
Elle Fanning doing an impression of a backpack yoda for the entirety of this movie, with a script which bravely fills its pages with basically just her and a bunch of subtitles and then more of her double cast as another character is about as absurd as you expect. The fight sequences are innovative and cartoony, replete with love letters from past movies, quips, and lines that are canonized and gilt with camp as they hit your ear. There are so many twists and so many expertly ambiguous moments from Fanning’s performance that just keep paying in spades on rewatches. One of the best movies of the year.
