Movie Review - Yautja Hunt Vikings, Samurai, and World War II Pilots in Hulu's Impressive "Predator: Killer of Killers"
Tomorrow will see the release of the new made-for-Hulu animated anthology film Predator: Killer of Killers, and Laughing Place was provided with an advance screener of this feature. Below are my mostly spoiler-free thoughts.
The Predator franchise kicked off nearly 40 years ago with director John McTiernan’s original 1987 film, and its most recent entry– 2022’s also-straight-to-Hulu Prey– has undeniably revitalized the franchise thanks to inventive filmmaker Dan Trachtenberg (10 Cloverfield Lane). And now Trachtenberg is back with two additional entries in the series this year, the first being Predator: Killer of Killers. As advertised in the trailer, Killer of Killers sees the titular trophy-hunting alien species (also called Yautja) facing off against quarries across a few different time periods on Earth, including a family of vikings, two samurai brothers, and a scrappy squadron of U.S. pilots during World War II.
Killer of Killers is animated in the faux-stop-motion CG style that’s become quite popular lately, and visually it reminded me a bit of the Spider-Verse movies or the Oscar-winning animated feature Flow. But unlike either of those two examples, this movie is also incredibly violent, in keeping with the Predator tradition of showing just about as much gore as one might be able to get away with. Each of the segments included here feature numerous deaths, and highlight some very creative ways that human beings could theoretically kill each other, be killed by the Predator, and then (minor spoiler alert, but only if you are completely unfamiliar with this franchise) kill the Predators themselves. The action scenes in Killer of Killers that incorporate all this violence are quite impressively choreographed, to the point where by the end I was ready to rewatch the whole thing again just to relive the sheer visceral thrill. And the engaging voice acting from stars Lindsay LaVanchy (Initiation), Louis Ozawa (Pachinko), Rick Gonzalez (Old School), and Michael Biehn (Aliens) is top-notch as well.
I also want to point out that as an anthology, the roughly 90-minute Predator: Killer of Killers is broken up into four individual segments– with the first three being set in the time periods I listed above, and the fourth… well, double-checking the recently released final trailer, the fourth segment hasn’t really been given away by the marketing yet, so I’ll leave its contents for you to discover on your own. Suffice it to say that there’s a big payoff, and even (what I believe to be) a tease for what’s to come in this fall’s Predator: Badlands live-action theatrical movie, which is also being directed by Dan Trachtenberg. And if you weren’t excited for that follow-up after having seen Prey, you will be once you get the chance to experience Killer of Killers.
I consider myself a casual fan of the Predator movies. I think I’ve seen them all and enjoyed them at varying levels, with the original (starring Arnold Schwarzenegger, of course) still easily topping the heap for me after 38 years. That is, until I saw Predator: Killer of Killers, which– if it holds up after repeat viewings– might rank among my favorites, if not at the very top of the list. There really isn’t much to complain about here, except for maybe some suspension of disbelief that viewers are going to have to bring along with them into that final segment. But if you find yourself willing to go with the outlandish (in the most fun, hyper-kinetic, and thrilling way possible) flow, this animated outing supplies more than enough human-on-Yautja bloodshed– of both the red and green varieties– to keep even the most hardcore fans satisfied.
Predator: Killer of Killers will be released tomorrow, June 6th, exclusively via Hulu.
My grade: 4 ½ out of 5 electronic collars.