San Diego — A towering costumed hunter prowled Hall H on Friday before director Dan Trachtenberg rolled the first fifteen minutes of Predator: Badlands, the franchise’s seventh mainline film and the first told entirely from the Yautja point of view, scheduled for a November 7, 2025 theatrical release by 20th Century Studios.
The sequence opens with Dek, a slight‑built adolescent predator, locked in a ceremonial cave fight against his brother Kwei; when Dek falters, clan elders banish him to Kalisk, a death world teeming with gargantuan fauna.
His only companion is Thia, a mutilated Weyland‑Yutani android literally strapped to his back and played by Elle Fanning, whose facial capture rigs were modified so she could deliver dialogue in the growling Yautja dialect. Sweeping shots of apex beasts and Dek’s fluid staff work drew cheers, while a voice‑over warns that a predator is “friend to none, hunter to all,” signalling a shift from slasher thriller to survival myth.
Trachtenberg told the audience he was tired of seeing the species lose and wanted “to ask what winning means to a culture built on ritual combat,” noting that English appears only in the closing act. Star Dimitrius Schuster‑Koloamatangi spent three months mastering phonetic Yautja phrases, while stunt teams redesigned the creature’s movement to suggest adolescent uncertainty instead of veteran swagger.
You’re a Yautja, I’m a Yautja, we are all Yautja… Everyone in Hall H at the Predator: Badlands panel, all 6500 geeks, get a Predator mask. pic.twitter.com/GxbW4K0QYm
— Borys Kit (@Borys_Kit) July 26, 2025
Behind the camera, composer Bear McCreary layers taiko drums over throat‑singing, and cinematographer Jeff Cutter mixes infrared lenses with heavy fog to mimic predator vision; both previously collaborated with Trachtenberg on Prey. Filming wrapped last September around Rotorua and South Head, New Zealand, where geothermal steam doubled for alien mists during extensive night shoots.
Hall H energy peaked when a fully costumed predator scanned host Kevin Smith in mock thermal vision before yielding the stage to the cast, who confirmed that an extended cut of the animated short Predator: Killer of Killers drops on Hulu tonight as a narrative bridge. Fans online praised the franchise’s first non‑human lead yet questioned whether subtitles and absence of humans might limit box‑office reach.
The panel closed with Trachtenberg teasing that Badlands is “chapter two of a planned trilogy” and coyly responding “never say never” to a query about rekindling the Alien vs. Predator crossover, a hint analysts say could sustain momentum generated when 2022’s streaming hit Prey revived critical interest in the 38‑year‑old series.
