Media Essays: The Predator: The Past Trilogy

Written by The Wandering Fox

The Wandering Fox here, and this is quite the different talk I’d do for the website. Obviously I know many of our readers are not big horror fans and that’s okay, I was all for horror in my younger years, but now I only watch the one horror film now and then. But if there’s a horror franchise I like still to this day, it’s the Predator film franchise. The movies are the best mix of action, sci-fi and horror, with character growth for the heroes, a interesting development of how one tries to fight a alien, the Yutja society and honour, it’s interesting.

The Predator franchise has had it crossover with Alien, Batman, Superman, Marvel, Tarzan, and had many comics and video games over the years, giving us more of the Yutja and the manner they behave. It hasn’t always been a easy hunt for the Yutja though, with the Aliens vs Predator movies being a bit of a continuity fart, Predators was a okay movie but wasted a couple of actors, The Predator was a cringe comedy which angered me more on its handling of autism and insulting the Yutja. FYI, I’m autistic, and the movie’s handling of autism was insulting. It wasn’t until Prey that the franchise finally found it’s mark again. It was a simple movie, in the 1700s, with Native Americans fighting the Predator and giving us a female character who was quite a good character.

Yet if there’s something Prey began, it was fans wanting movies to be about a different group of people from a different moment in humanity to fight the Predator. I thought of many different cultures or different historical societies fighting the Predator, either Medieval knights, Vikings, romans, Feudal Japanese, pirates. After some thinking, I thought I’d do my own trilogy called Predator: The Past. The moments i gone for are Medieval Knights, Pirates, and the SAS. It should be worth adding that I will include a female Predator in one of the movies as from the Aliens vs Predator comics, we have Dachande, the Predator of the comic, take in how the male Predators are unwise compared to the females in a hunt, with females lacking the drive and the aggression.

With it done, here are the trilogy movies.

Predator Past: Knight.

In Medieval England, a castle squire has ran all the way to the king, telling him of a monster which has killed all of the people inside the castle. The king, thinking it’s a demon of sorts, ends up sending his best knight and a few others and a priest to the castle to kill the demon. The knights think it’s some rubbish but they are willing to go and earn the king’s finest gold. They take the boy with them to go back, the boy bonding with the knight, who begins to teach him how to fight with a sword. As they travel they go through a village, finding most of the men are gone, the women telling them of how one man disappeared, they gone looking for him and they didn’t come back. They explore the woods then find most of the men skinned, with one man having hidden himself in mud, traumatised by the experience. The boy realises the mud is what helped keep him alive. The priest agrees to cover himself in mud if he’s to stop the demon, though the knights don’t as they find it a bit silly. They reach the castle and one of the knights ends up in a trap, being decapitated by a spear. The knights then scale the wall, though one of them is killed by a plasma gun. In the courtyard, they gather, with the priest trying to do a ritual only for the Predator to kill one of the knights, forcing them into the castle, finding the skinned bodies. The boy and the priest are taken to a cellar while the archers try to fend off the Predator but are easily killed. The priest does the ritual, at first they think it’s done, but the Predator then kills one of the knights, coming into the cellar, yet it becomes confused by the torches. The priest realises the Predator isn’t killing him because he’s not got a sword, so he grabs the boy and they run to one of the rooms explaining to him they have to fight dirty. The lead knight and the last ones trap the Predator in the cellar and they form a plan with the priest and the boy.

Escaping from the cellar, the Predator goes into the courtyard to find all the hay is on fire. Blinded, it is then slashed a bit by the lead knight, then shot by a archer, the survivors covered in mud. The Predator, injured, escapes to high ground, killing the archer and then finds the heat of the survivors thanks to the mud beginning to come off. The Predator then murders the last knight and it’s only it fighting both the knight and squire, with it easily beating up the squire. The priest goes in and is stabbed in the stomach by the Predator, though this gives the knight a chance to stab it in the back. The Predator though turns and stabs the knight through the chest. The knight and the priest tell the squire to go, which he does, the Predator going after him in the very woods. The boy, covering himself in mud, waits and then stabs the Predator through the head, killing it. Dragging the Predator’s body back to the castle, the squire is tearful as the knight is dying, the priest has survived. In his death, the knight tells the squire he was brave. The Predators then come and take the body of the dead Predator, with the clan leader taking a sword and gives the boy a Viking axe.

The squire and the priest return with the dead, the priest and the squire traumatised from what they’ve gone through, the king asks them both what they want, the boy telling him he wants to have his own home, the priest telling him he will adopt him.

The Predator here is Crow Predator, having a crow skull on the shoulder and it’s bio mask has a bird skull theme to it with carvings of feathers on its helmet. It wears brown leather, including a chest guard, a belt and battle skirt, with gauntlets, one for the wrist knives, the other for dagger blades. It has a plasma canon, a double staff, and a trap which can decapitate someone and a ball which resembles a mace and shoots it’s spikes from.

Though the weather I imagine it to be raining, I imagine the story taking place during the summer, as the Predators often hunt in hotter climates, so it’s more of a summer rain.

The story the characters go through is basically questioning all they know, the knights being casual of their job has them become stunned at the bodies they find and fear overtakes them, they are basically like teens who didn’t have action until then, the lead knight being their father figure, trying to discipline the men. The boy grows up and is so traumatised from fighting the Predator he wants to live a more quiet life. The priest questions things of what he knows, though he holds onto his religion, he thinks there’s more demons out there than the ones he often thinks of.

I’m regards to casting, ideally I’d have Sean Bean play the lead knight because he always is a man in Medieval gear, with the priest played by David Tennant, though thinking about it, maybe Richard Armitage is a bit fitting as a fatherly knight. David Tennant as the priest as David is a sci-fi guy, and either voice he has for the role it’d make for a character who is more against violence.

The Predator: Gold

The sequel features the female Predator going up against pirates.

The movie begins with a pirate group on the coast of Brazil, they find a cave only for one of the pirates to be shot in the back, leaving his friends screaming. The movie then cuts to a Captain of a ship called the Shadow Sea, the Captain is called John Cornhill, a rough Liverpudlian pirate, he and his crew board a ship, killing the Captain and taking the gold. John offers the survivors a place on his crew, telling them he will be doubling the gold they will find and double the beer. They go with him back to Liverpool, where John goes to the cemetery to pay respects to his wife, is met by his son, who’s now grown up. The son wants to know why his dad has been living as a pirate, though John dodges the talk and takes his son to the inn, he and his friends are having drinks. There, a royal agent then goes to John and tells him there is legend of treasure in the South beyond the Atlantic, treasure which grants great power. The crew then go, with John’s son coming on with them, the son beginning to wonder what it is his dad did to quit the trading company. The crew is of men, one of them a African man who is a friend of John’s, the other is a man with a eyepatch, one has a a wooden leg, another is a drinker who tends to the food, the one in the crow nest, the other is the weapons man. The one with the eyepatch tells the story of how one man sailed the seas with his crew chasing a light in the sky, then the ship was burnt by a ball of light. They reach the shore and find many bodies skinned hanging from their ship, leaving them horrified. Thinking there’s natives, they bring as much of their guns and swords, leaving the watcher behind on the ship. They find the crew’s camp and find the woman from there, begging them to leave and to take her with them, saying there’s a monster in the cave. The royal agent tells John to bring her along as a guide, though John argues she should be taken back to the ship to have some food, but the agent tells him he’s in charge.

The Shadow Sea is then boarded by the Predator, who tricks the man on the lookout to thinking there’s a flock of birds coming, then slits his throat. With John, the crew reach the cave and find it’s not gold but the remains of a Yutja ship, with the remains of a plasma canon, and other traps left by the Predator before. They do find other things inside the ship which could be worth money, though before they can begin to bag it, the Predator returns and throws in a grenade, causing the crew to feel disorientated. The drinker thinks the woman has done something and shoves her in a wall, yet it’s then he is killed by the Predator. They begin retreating onto the ship with the Predator killing the weapons man. The woman helps them find another way out, with them running deeper in the woods but the Predator retreats after finding there’s a few soldiers waiting. The crew are caught by the soldiers, who are in league with the agent, who reveals the crew the woman was along with had another agent, they came to find what the treasure was and their agent, with the agent telling the soldiers he’s seen the treasure. He tells John he will be hung back at Liverpool for freeing slaves, with his son finally realising why he quitted the trading. They are to be taken to their ship, but John argues they will be killed by the Predator. The soldiers go towards the cave but are killed by traps. On the ship, the Predator appears and kills the rest of the soldiers, but John, his son, the woman and their friend escape, grabbing as many guns as they can and go back to the cave, but the agent grabs John’s son, a sword to his throat. He tells John he will leave them to die by the Predator, but then she cuts him up from behind. The Predator, finding there is a bond between John and his son, tells them to leave, she isn’t on a hunt, she’s here to blow up the ship. Understanding, John and the others escape once she blows the ship up, all watching as she then leaves in hers. It’s revealed though John’s son took a few skulls and gold in his bag. John tells him it’s best they go home and find a bit of land to call their own.

The movie having a female Predator is to give you a different Predator who is less aggressive than the other Yutja, one who is there to understand, do more quick kills and has traps in wait. She is here to destroy the ship another Predator left behind, she isn’t on a hunt. She didn’t destroy the ship before as a lot of her tech was damaged in her arrival, hence killing a few pirates to steal their explosives to blow the ship up.

The theme of the movie is about compassion and freedom, for John became pirate to free slaves and to steal from other pirates. With this during the time of colonial America, and Europeans taking things for themselves, they were gonna want Yutja items. John is compassionate and is a fair pirate, he will only kill in battle, if the fight is over, he will have survivors join him or he leaves them. The son begins realising why his dad became a pirate, understanding him. The woman might seem cowardly, but she does kick ass, she survived by herself and cuts up a few soldiers.

For actors, I think I’d have Cillian Murphy as John, Paul Bettany as the agent, Karen Gillian as the woman.

The Predator: Who Dares?

The final movie in the trilogy, I think I’m having it be set in the Second World War, with the SAS going up against a father and a son duo, and Nazis. For where exactly the movie is in, it’s in Norway in 1942.

The movie begins with Nazi soldiers in Norway capturing a Predator after it killed a squad of theirs. Meanwhile the army calls in the SAS, told they are to take to Norway and destroy a factory which helps the Nazis. The SAS are led by a Captain called Geoff Earle. They leave for the mission and they parachute into the Norwegian forest, the men first figuring how to make their way to the harbour to steal a boat to go back home. They then go to the factory but find bodies everywhere, with only a few Nazis left, with the SAS killing them once they come out of hiding, though they find a female secretary in there, with her begging them to spare her. The SAS ask her who did the killing, with her explaining the Nazis came to the factory with a specimen, but then something came and killed her colleagues, telling them she thought it was them. The SAS then burn the factory, taking her as a prisoner. They don’t know they’re being followed by a Predator. The SAS are quite blunt towards the secretary, being a German they don’t like her, only for her to begin yelling how she only brings papers to her colleagues, she didn’t want to be fighting on either side. The Captain is sympathetic yet he isn’t going to give her a gun. Yet then the Predator comes and kills one of the men. Angered, they think the secretary is luring them into a trap, but because she didn’t move makes the Captain think she isn’t. They bury their friend and then go, but they come close to a village, with the Captain and the secretary caught by the Nazi guards. The rest of the SAS begin to plan to rescue their Captain, who is brought before the Nazi in charge, who reveals him to the Predator, asking him if this is a creature the Allies are using, Geoff is disgusted by the Predator, thus, the Nazis believe it’s best they make the most of the Predator. The secretary, who the Nazis think they’ve helped, frees Geoff and blow up a few of the tanks they have, then they flee into the forest, telling the SAS they have to, figuring the Nazis will be dead soon.

The Predator’s father comes and begins killing the Nazis, freeing his son, both killing as many as they can before fleeing, yet the Nazi boss survives, has the plasma canon, and calls in for reinforcements. The SAS, finding the job is done, leave, yet the Predators are going after them, with them bringing the body of their friend to them, the Predator’s father realising it killed a soldier who was fighting a eviler human. They also tell the SAS the Nazis have the plasma canon, to which the SAS know they have to stop them. the Nazis come, coming to look over the plasma canon, then the SAS and the Predators begin killing them . Geoff follows after the Nazi official, who shoots the predator’s father with it. The Predator’s son kills the Nazi official, tearing his skull. The Predator’s son leaves with his father’s body, giving Geoff a Egyptian sword. Geoff and the SAS retreat back to their home, and we flash forward to the present where Geoff, in his 90s, recalls the adventure.

The actor I imagine for this movie is Henry Cavill being Geoff, for it brings back the trope of a muscular human fighting a more stronger alien. The father and son duo makes for a different story in which we learn how the Yutja bond.