🎧 Movie Wars Podcast: Prey — Can the Predator Franchise Still Hunt?

This week on Movie Wars, we’re diving deep into Prey — the surprise Predator prequel that dared to strip the franchise down to its primal roots. We break down why this one hit so differently: from its raw depiction of Comanche culture and authentic casting to the jaw-dropping cinematography that turned blood and wilderness into visual poetry.

Kyle, Seth, and comedian Peter Murphy (yes, that Peter Murphy) debate whether Prey actually out-hunts the 1987 classic — and the answers get heated. We talk creature-feature psychology, the decline of movie stars, the “masculine myth” of 80s action, and why representation done right feels so good on screen.

Expect plenty of film nerd tangents, behind-the-scenes trivia, and the usual Movie Wars blend of humor and obsession — from callbacks to Predator 2’s gun Easter egg, to the wild story of how Prey secretly began as an “R-rated Disney princess film.”

Stick around for the War Card, where we go rapid-fire on cast, writing, direction, and the all-important “Would Arnold approve?” question.

Takeaways:

• 
  
• 
  
• The most authentic and daring entry in the Predator series yet.
• 
  
• 
  
• 
  
• Deep dive into representation, casting, and language in Native storytelling.
• 
  
• 
  
• 
  
• Hot debate: Prey vs. the 1987 original — which really hunts harder?
• 
  
• 
  
• 
  
• Film lighting, creature effects, and where the franchise should go next (Samurai era?).
• 
  
• 
  
• 
  
• Peter Murphy brings the chaos, the laughs, and a few questionable bear facts.
• 
  
• 
  

Tags:

movie wars podcast, prey movie review, predator franchise, amber midthunder, native american representation, action movie analysis, film trivia, comedy podcast, arnold schwarzenegger, creature features, 80s action nostalgia, filmmaking craft, modern vs. classic cinema, cinematic storytelling, comedic debates

Foreign. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to a digital edition of the movie wars podcast. I'm so stoked.

We have an amazing guest with us today, and we'll introduce him here in a minute. Just a reminder of the format of the show, we're going to go through the history of the movie prey today. The late one of the latest interest.

I almost said the latest. They've since released an animated film in the past couple of months in the predator world.

But prey, we're going to go through the history of the film and then we're going to talk about rando. Some of the most interesting things we uncovered during research. These could be facts, trivia, all the amazing things that you find in research.

We're going to hit the questions, which are questions that I write to generate comedic discussion because 99% of the time, we have amazing standup comedians on this panel on the show.

And we wrap up with the war card, which some of our older listeners may not be used to it, but we have this new version of the war card, the war zone, where actually we go rapid fire. Each host one through four categories. Cast, writing, directing, and what's in front of us. And that's our score. That's how we feel about the movie.

Do we like. Do we pray? To pray? And then we'll wrap up and we want you to go out, watch our friend Peter Murphy, and he'll be giving his dates. What's up, dude?

What up?

How's it going, Kyle? That's everybody listening. How's it going? Happy to join y' all today. Yeah.

Tell us where you're joining us from.

So I'm joining you from sunny Los Angeles. Very hot. It was a very hot summer. Very happy that, you know, we're into the fall months now. Obviously, it's November, so what do you.

Define as hot for la? Because I was there two and a half weeks ago, and it was like, perfect. 75 during the day, 65 at night.

Yeah. So I grew up in Florida, and I'm used to, like, 80s and, like, muggy. So, like, hot in l. A is like anything you nailed.

Anything above 75 is, like, hot. No jeans today. Going to tear a hole with my thighs. In the jeans.

Yeah. Yeah. We're here in Nashville, and I was out there and there was no humidity, and I was like, oh, my God. I can breathe. It's so nice.

Yeah. Last time I was in L. A, there was a lot of people volunteering not to wear jeans or pants.

No pants at all. Oh, yeah. You know what style Is subjective.

And you know, I live, I live close to Echo park and Silver Lake and you know, they're too trendy over there for me. So. Yeah, not wear. I gotta wear pants. You know, call me, call me old fashioned.

The good news is they have no money. They spend all their money on clothes, but they're eating ramen that night.

Yeah.

So that's the LA way.

But you look nas x. You don't wear clothes.

Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Hey, that works too.

Well, we're so stoked to have Peter and go check him out. We're going to give out his socials at the end. One of the funniest dudes out there today doing it. So glad to have you, my friend.

Thank you for joining. Dude, it's gonna be like I do it. And you guys volunteered and Seth was already talking a little before I hit the record button.

I'm kind of, kind of heated right now. We're talking about Prey today.

And if you've been a Movie wars listener for the last five years, you know, not just my love of Arnold, but Predator is a top five movie for me and I have a very weird top five. It's got RoboCop, but it's got Taxi Driver and Good Fellas and no country for Old Men. And then we got Predator. I got a weird mix there. Right.

I appreciate all kinds of movies, but. Yeah, this movie. Yeah. Except for 10.

10 all kinds of movies that, that are just masculine, just incredibly like masculine movies and you know, you know, a little homoerotic, but you know, it's. It's here and there. It's here.

Yeah, well, you gotta, you gotta have a hobby. You gotta have a hobby and. But you know, so we're touching on a, on a movie, on a franchise that is.

Has been troubled, you know, and they've done a lot of different things to try to revive this franchise. They've had stars like Adrian Brody pop in. They've, you know, had new director, he was in Predators.

Oh, okay.

And, and I'm weird because I really like the sequel. I like the Danny Glover, Gary Busey sequel that came out and it's set in la.

It's not a great movie and it doesn't hold up to the first, but it's a lot of fun. But a lot of people kind of drag that one down with the rest. But, you know, I kind of have a working theory and I don't really think it's a theory.

I think it's true.

Creature features, Alien movies, dinosaur movies, you know, Jaws and all these Movies fall under this disguise that they're so predicated in the first entry that a lot of what's intriguing about the movies is predicated on the fact that you don't meet or see the monster until the halfway point around there somewhere.

Like Jaws.

Like Jaws, yeah. That's what makes it so great, why they struggle.

And the only reason James Cameron was able to keep Alien going with Aliens is he's like, we're going to shoot the. Out of those things. And he had 50 of them. And, like, they had Dill Paxton saying, corny.

The tone of the franchise at that point, too.

Yeah. And so, you know, I think that's one of the reasons Predator struggles. Because in the first one, one of the genius things that John McTiernan did.

And I consider John McTiernan to be one of the four, you know, the fathers of. Of modern action in a lot of ways with Die Hard and later things. But you.

You see, you actually, it's because the Predator has camouflage and he's invisible. You don't see him. You see his outline, but when you do see him, you're actually seeing through his eyes. You're seeing thermo vision.

And that was one of the genius things about it. The first thing you see is him looking at a scorpion in heat vision or whatever they call it. Is that what they call it?

Heat vision, but, like infrared? Yeah, Infrared.

Yeah.

Thermal vision.

I'm not saying they can't, because I have liked Prometheus and I've liked a lot of the entries in the Alien franchise, but it isn't really hard after you. After you show your cards and you finally reveal the Beast, you know, it's hard. It's. You know, it's hard to follow through.

What do you think about that?

I mean, the first. When you said that Predators with. Or that one movie with Danny Glover and Gary Busey. Gary Busey was filmed in la.

My first thought was, okay, they were like, all right, we need to make a sequel to this. How cheap can we make it? We're not going on location anywhere.

You're shooting in Los Angeles, you know, and I wish there was, like, a crossover, you know, Predator and Last Action Hero in Los Angeles, where, like, Arnold Schwarzenegger is coming out of the movies. I mean, I love. What I love more than, like, sequels is, like, spiritual sequels.

Like, the best example I can think of is Point Break to Fast and the Furious. To me, that's. That's like a spiritual, like, remake reimagining or whatever.

It really is.

And it's always so fascinating, you know, because you were saying, like, 87 is when the first Predator came out. To see, like, the physical effects and, like, how much that, like, works within this genre is, like, so fun and so fun and captivating.

So, like, you know, if you have, like, a cool looking, looking creature, then, like, yeah, let's see. Let's see more of them. But, yeah, that's kind of tricky to do when you're kind of trying to hide them initially. Right?

Yeah, exactly. What do you think, Seth?

My first experience with the Predator franchise was during a bachelor party where I was the only one drinking. So that was very fun. Yeah.

Oh, no.

Yeah. Great times. Very weird. Yeah.

The guy was in the military, and no one else wanted to drink, so I was like, okay, well, I didn't buy this bottle of bourbon for nothing, so, yeah, I didn't hate it the first time I saw it, and then I tried to watch it again and only got about halfway through before. I just. I don't know. I think kind of that idea of once you know what's happening, you kind of don't really care for it anymore.

It's not exciting anymore because you don't have questions. So I'm gonna go off my first full viewing of it and say that I definitely enjoyed it.

It's way campier than any of the other stuff that was coming out at the time. It's way campier than Alien. I would kind of put it in this.

In a similar genre as, like, First Blood, and I think First Blood has way more rewatch value than. Than maybe Predator does.

But for me, going into Prey and only having seen the first Predator movie, I was really excited about this one because it took such a different approach to the horror of it and the way that it let the story unfold.

Mm, yeah, that's interesting. And the fact that you watch Predator at a bachelor party. I don't care who is drinking or not. That sounds like the best bachelor party you could plan.

Really?

That's not. Yeah, that's not really, like, a thing that it's. It's usually on the itinerary.

Yeah, we got to squeeze in Predator in between strip club and comedy show, I guess. I don't know.

Yeah, Yeah. I wish.

I wish there's a strip club involved.

All you need is those Arnold guns. Yeah.

Yeah.

Well, and I've talked about this a ton on the podcast with. When we cover Arnold movies, I'm, you know, Arnold's my favorite.

And I think the thing you see in the 80s is, is people they weren't trying to go out and make specific types of movies. They were trying to make Arnold and Sly movies. And they were like, okay, we want Arnold and we want Sylvester Stallone.

It's like, what can we build around them? Oh, interesting. You know, and I actually asked this question because I had so many good questions for this one.

But one of the originals that I'd written down was. Was the original Predator an Arnold movie or was it an Alien movie with Arnold in it? You know, it's like.

Because so much of the original is contingent upon his. His, you know, an 87 is a big deal because, you know, at the beginning of the 80s, the guy barely spoke English.

Yeah.

He has 11 lines of dialogue in Terminator. And people tend to look back on him as the star of Terminator, which, you know, in a lot of ways, physically he is. But he says 11 lines. Wow.

Yeah, wow. I mean, I think T2 kind of helped push him into being the lead of the series. So that kind of makes sense looking back.

Mm.

Yeah. They don't really do that with stars. Do they really do that with stars anymore? Like, not really. Yeah, we gotta put this guy in a thing or.

But that's how people show up for movies, right? It's like, okay, I want to see Leonardo DiCaprio as, you know, get. Get beat to death by a bear. You know what I mean?

Or when he won in the Revenant for his Oscar. Right.

Well, I mean, that's been changing a lot, especially over the last decade. Like, I've actually been seeing article after article talking about how the last 10 years has kind of been the death of the movie star.

Like, you still have famous actors, but you don't have that tent pole person who's going to hold up the entire movie that everyone's going to flock to the theater to go see. People are actually now way more concerned with quality than they are with who's in the movie.

It's been Tom Cruise since the 80s, right? Like, he's the only guy that. He's like. He might be the last, like, movie star.

I think he's probably the last action star.

I would say he and DiCaprio and Brad Pitt might be the last of that generation of you go to go see, like you said, the DiCaprio movie or the Brad Pitt movie. But, yeah, it's just not even with people coming up like Zendaya or Timothy Chalamet, like, you're not seeing them.

It's become the ensemble that people want to go see, not just the One person.

Interesting. And people are like, they obsess with genre too. Like, if you love horror movies, you're gonna see every horror movie.

If you're a comic book nerd, maybe you're.

Maybe you're a little burnt out on superheroes, but you're gonna still, you know, follow along and, you know, get to, you know, Battle World or whatever.

Dan Trachtenberg, the director, had been shopping it around, and the way he was actually shopping it around was as a standalone R rated Disney princess tale.

Yes.

That was my, like a lot.

Yeah, that's awesome.

And that would have been so cool because as soon as I watch this, I'm like two minutes in and I'm like, okay, how closely is this going to be a spiritual remake of Mulan? Yeah. And that's. That I got. That was. Those are the vibes I got, especially from, like the main character.

Oh, totally. I totally agree. In fact, I was trying to figure out how to put words to that, but you saying that actually, like, that nailed it for me.

And they kicked it around for a while and it was kind of controversial because they wanted this to be a standalone entry. They wanted to be so standalone that that's why it's called Prey. They didn't even want to call it Predator.

And I don't know if it was as much the story they say it was the story and the idea. And I do believe that partially. But I do think also there were just so many bad entries. They had Predator. Predators. Predators was so incredibly bad.

Oh, boy.

If they remade it today, it would star Morgan Wallen and Kid Rock.

Yes. Yeah.

As.

As the Predator.

Yeah, they would just be hunting. They'd just be hunting down 18 packs of bud Light to shoot him.

Yeah.

Yeah, baby.

And whenever his plasma gun would shoot, it would say, ba. What's a ba? Is. Yeah, and. But. Yeah, so it was very secret. And.

But when they ended up picking this idea of entering and what actually ended up happening. And you're seeing it now because they're developing another movie I think that's going to be based in Japan during Samurai period.

It's coming out the week after this episode comes out.

Wow, that's amazing. Oh, that's probably why you picked it, because you're smart like that.

I do.

He keeps. He keeps me on track. I'm just glad that Arnold somehow snuck into an episode. Again.

Every time we say Arnold, you gotta drink. Yeah, yeah.

But the working title of the movie was skulls. That was kind of the working title for a while.

But what they ended up doing is that because they had picked this era, it ended up becoming a project where they really wanted to raise the bar for native American filmmaking because they wanted to hire real actors and actresses from, know, real tribes, real representatives of the community, which was fantastic. And I. They. They freaking nailed it, too. And some of these actors had never acted before.

The one that plays her oldest brother that spends the most time with her, Woods. His first film.

Oh, that's cool.

Yeah. So. And they really. They really wanted to do that, but they also.

And as much as I'll have some feedback about this movie later, but I will give it kudos. As much as I think some of the things in the movie factually don't make sense as of.

As a major consumer of the predator franchise, there are some things that they did, the callbacks that they made, and I have a rando for it, but they made some callbacks that did resonate with me, and they actually hit me pretty good. I was like, where I was kind of teetering on this movie.

I was like.

But they knew I was watching. The lifelong predator fan, and I was like, I did appreciate that. So. But yeah, so.

And they had people on set that were real representatives of the Comanche tribe helping with the language, helping with the. The scene and the set and the acting, just to make sure that it was as authentic as possible. And so that was actually what this project became.

As much as it's a predator movie, it's a movie about raising the bar for Native Americans, which I know there's a lot of people that talk about, you know, race and all these things in film and how certain people should only be portrayed by those people that have either that race or that affliction or that whatever. This movie actually put their money where their mouth is.

And I think you could argue that in a lot of ways, when you look at the history of film, it's kind of hard to argue that maybe Native Americans are the most cartoonishly depicted, the most probably horribly treated by film, I think, personally, you know, and maybe that's an exaggeration. I know a lot of people have been mistreated by film, but Native Americans have been portrayed mostly in a cartoonish way throughout history.

Quick side note, if you want to go look at some great discussions on Native Americans and filmmaking, go check out our two episodes with Mozart Gabriel, before the devil knows you're dead. And Brazil had some great conversations with him about that.

Yeah, yeah. Good call out. Yeah.

He's our amazing Native American friend who taught us all about his culture and about how it, you know, it influences his art as well. So that's a really good call out.

Yeah.

But what do you think? Am I over exaggerating or have Native Americans got quite the short end of the stick in film?

Oh, absolutely. Every time I see random old cartoons pop up on, like, my Instagram reels that just show, like, how crazy over the top. And like you said, it is.

It is a lot of different races that were just completely come at by. By white filmmakers. But I definitely see, like an era where most Native Americans were just treated as the savage.

Or you had the one, like the one helpful savage who joined the white man. And yeah, it very much took away the fact that they had so much culture before we ever got here.

Yeah. And it's kind of shown in the film how those, like, where are those hunters from? Were they from France? Were they speaking Spanish or something? Yeah.

And like, how they treat them.

Yeah, I forget exactly that one guy speaks a bunch of languages, he said or whatever, but, like, yeah, that, like, just tried trying to get her on their side, but, like, you know, that. That pretty much was accurate in the way that, like, those people were looked at.

And then, you know, you look at like, yeah, like the cartoonish versions of Native Americans. It's cool that they had, like an authenticity. Like, they made a point to make it authentic.

Because in the same way that you were talking about Kyle, you're talking about looking at the film and like, oh, they put some things in here, some little moments and Easter eggs.

For me, as a Predator fan, it's good, you know, to see, you know, people that are making films also, you know, be not just historically accurate, but, like, you know, pay proper respects to certain people. And, you know, it kind of reminds me that, like, everybody watches a film for a different reason. The same way we listen to music.

Like, if you listen to music, some people are listening to the drum, some people listen to guitar, some people are listening to the lyrics.

But like, in a film, you know, you know, some movies, I think are just made because there's an awesome soundtrack like Drive or, you know, there's a great story to tell. Not that Drive is the best movie of all time or, like, you know.

I love it so much.

It's not that it's great or not, but it's like, you know, to me, that was, you know, awesome. Like, you know, better example might be House of Gucci. That movie was basically like, A music video for just like, for wealth.

It could have been that.

Yeah.

Or like, or the way that like Saltburn was like to show how sexy Jacob Elardi is and how like a bit of weasel Barry Keoghan is. But, but yeah, it was.

It's fun to see how other people watch movies and, you know, to be authentic and, and like, you know, pay respects to, you know, Native Americans as they've kind of been depicted over years. Yeah, that was so cool. I didn't even realize that until. So you mentioned that. But yeah, it's pretty, pretty cool.

Yeah.

My only thing that I kind of wish they'd leaned into more is with these types of films, I much prefer when everyone's speaking their native language. I just, it helps immerse me in the product a little bit more.

And I understand, like, I understand why they went with the English because they did start with a few sentences in the native language and then kind of transition into English and yeah, it makes it easier to pay less attention necessarily while you're watching the movie. You can listen and not necessarily have to watch, but with those movies when those languages are so beautiful.

And I would just love to have heard that the whole movie.

Yeah, that did seem a little jarring.

I was like, okay, I'm totally expecting a full on subtitle movie which, like, you know, I think American moviegoers, we have patience for that now with, with the popularity of, you know, anime films or like, you know, like people will, will, you know, have no problem with that. We're a long way from crafting Tiger, Hidden Dragon being like, so like, oh my gosh, what do you mean they don't speak English? You know.

Well, There's a reason Godzilla -1 is one of the highest rated Godzilla movies ever made. Like it. And it's completely in Japanese, it's all subtitles.

And it was, but it was still just such an engaging story to watch that it's like, no, we, we, we have the, the patience for it now. I think you're right.

And I think they knew what kind of crowd they were bringing. Right? Like, they were already pushing the boundaries by making this a, primarily a Native American film in a new setting and a new time period.

They were like, are we also going to go the route of Mel Gibson? When he was like, I remember reading about how Mel Gibson took a risk with Apocalypto. He was like, people want to read subtitles.

And people like, no, no one wants to read subtitles. And then people go, apocalypto is Amazing.

Everyone was so passion the Christ. Passion the Christ was entirely in Latin and Arabic.

Yeah.

Wow. I forgot about that. Yeah. But, like, that's like, what's the entry point for this movie?

Like, people are going to see it if they're interested in Native Americans being depicted on film or maybe going to police it. Like, oh, well, I got to see this so I can, like, you know, blast it online. Or, you know, you're, you know, hey, you're a Predator fan. You.

You love creatures.

Or, you know, I was just, like, really excited to watch this film because I was like, there's going to be so many interesting, like, on screen combat scenes and like, crazy, which.

Oh, my God, the moments where they were fighting, like, so good.

Yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Maybe your ancestors were chased by invisible creature through the woods.

They're always so jarring.

Could have been. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, I'm Puerto Rican and Irish, so the Irish side of me was chased out by snakes. Snakes. And the Puerto Ricans, you know, we get.

We get hurricanes every year.

So your ancestors.

I'm running from something. Exactly.

They need the movie wars. If they had movie wars, we wouldn't be talking about that today. They would have been living in castles, drinking infinite amounts of milk, and just.

It would have been beautiful here.

I am allergic to dairy. What a. What an embarrassment I am to my ancestors.

It makes my tummy hurt.

They needed movie war. Share with your friends, please. We love you.

Share, people.

Share. Peter Murphy with your friends. He's hilarious. Randos.

Randos.

Randos. All right, these are the most interesting facts I uncovered during my research. We ready some of those. Some of those callbacks that I said.

Again, I've got my own thoughts in this movie, but the callbacks were pretty legit because they. They could have picked thousands of things. They could have picked thousands of things.

And they picked some really interesting ones because they also gave an Easter egg for Predator 2. Believe it. Which was the gun.

These went over my head, by the way, so I'm so stoked about this.

So you'll want to go back and re. Watch again because I think now you'll. It'll like, kind of be like a light bulb. A Predator. Yeah. I'm down. Even the bad ones. Let's watch them.

Came out in the early 90s, so if you haven't seen it yet, but at the end of Predator 2, Danny Glover's character is on the Predator ship and there's an aged predator.

And what's funny is people don't love the Predator 2 movie, but the end is so cool because the ship has the skulls from all the planets that the predators have gone to and hunted. And his gift to Danny Glover for defeating the predator in L. A was that gun.

So the assumption is, is that the predators took the gun during this movie at some point and put it back on their ship and took it with them when they came back after they collected the corpse of their hunter.

Whoa. Yeah. So the gun at the end where she's like. She's like, we need to move. And she presents the gun with, like, the head.

That's it.

That's. Oh, wow. Danny Glover is presented that from an old predator, like a Yoda predator.

Gray haired, dreadlocked alien. Yeah. And he speaks. The earlier predators, you know, they. They are able to mimic a little bit of English at a time with their technology. And he goes.

He says something in English and he's like, old and. But it's so cool. There's like a giant skull of a creature that you're just like, what the hell was that? It's like a rhino, but it's like.

But it has, like an octopus head. You're like, what was that thing? That's really cool.

Peak.

That's peak. Practical effects. They must have so much fun trying to make that happen.

So cool. Another one is. Go ahead.

Oh, no, that's a really neat fact. The gun thing. That's awesome. That's awesome.

Yeah. And our protagonist, Naru. Right. Is that the correct way to say it? She says two lines that Arnold says in the original. Do it, do it.

Which, you know, do it, do it in the original.

And the second one. I know this one. It's get to the choppa. Yeah, yeah.

She said. She said.

She says, get to the choppa in like a perfect. Arnold.

That was my favorite moment.

And then she said, are we getting Chinese tonight?

Yeah.

And then something about shawarma. I don't know.

Yeah, yeah. She meets up with Thor and. Yeah. And Iron Man.

And then she said, if we can kill it. If you can. Or if you can make. If it bleeds, you can kill it. That's another Arnold line.

Okay.

That's right. Yes, yes, yes.

Really good.

Oh, sorry. That line reminded me of Batman, Superman, where Ben Affleck's like, do you bleed? You know, And I'm like, all right, you know, cool.

You know, I Don't know. I, I. But the fact that it's from an even earlier reference and in this, like, franchise, that makes more sense. I mean.

Yeah. And the last one is. And this was my favorite one because my. One of my favorite characters from the original. There's. Let's just be real. There's not a.

There's not one character from the original Predator I don't love. I love them all.

But Billy, the Native American trapper, who was played by Sonny Landham, who was a handful on set, they had to take out an insurance policy on sonny Landham in 87 because they were afraid he was going to kill somebody because he was such a, like, ruffian, violent guy. So he had his own insurance policy in case he punched Arnold in the jaw. But he played Billy Soule.

And they don't really announce it or do anything in the movie other than a couple of insinuations, but they wrote him to be the spiritual reincarnation of Naru's older brother, Tobacco. So, yeah, so when they cut him across the chest, that was what Billy did, remember, to attract the predator to let the others escape.

So he cut himself across the chest to draw the predator. So, yeah, that. That was how they wrote him.

And they don't really say it, but there's a couple things in there that say, yeah, he's the spiritual reincarnation of, Of Tob. So.

Whoa.

That is cool. Cool imagery.

Clearly, a lot of thought was put into this prequel.

Yeah, it's funny. I kind of came in this, like, I hated this movie, but I'm saying these randoms. Like, that's really cool that they did.

That, like, going back on it, like, okay, we're saying they're French. These French guys trap the main protagonist and her older brother, and they, like, cut him across, like, for what? Like, like, what did they.

What did they. Why did they get, like, cut him across the chest? Like, what was their reason? Talk.

And to make him bait.

It's like a torture thing.

Yeah, they made him bait, too. She says that after they strap him to the tree, they caught him and then strapped and they. She says they made us bait.

And that's what Billy did in 87, was he made himself bait.

Right, right, right, right, right, right. But the Predator doesn't. Doesn't go for that. He wants to. He wants a challenge.

He wants the Frenchies.

Yeah.

Yes.

Yeah, he does.

Better food, so they taste better.

Oh, my gosh.

They made him look really puff pastry.

You talk about Bo. These, these Frenchmen here in this Movie that was. That was maybe the biggest threat in the movie. It wasn't the Predator.

It was the stench of these Frenchmen.

Yeah. Oh, it was coming right off the screen. You could see it.

Oh, yeah.

This is a major first. This is crazy.

So leaning back into what I said earlier with the history of the movie where they really wanted to raise the bar with Native American film making. First feature film of all time to feature the option to have a full Comanche overdub so that you could turn on.

You could turn on the full Comanche overdub. So they did make that option kind of halfway to what you said earlier. You wish they had the native language. They don't have it.

But if you choose to, you can have a Comanche overdub.

Oh, okay.

That.

Honestly, I probably would have preferred that. It is funny because there are some series and movies that I've seen that instead of opting to overdub, they will actually shoot it twice.

The TV show Versailles is famously, at the time the most expensive TV show that was made because every time they finished a take in English, they would then have all the actors do the exact same thing in French.

Whoa. Yeah, I think Eminem did that too. With Eminem. Doesn't he do that with his records? Like, he has like a. A clean ver. Like a dirty version with like.

With like, foul language or, you know, curse words. And then he, like, replaces. It doesn't just, like, bleep it. He'll, like, do something else.

Oh, that's cool.

I'm pretty sure he did that last rando. So this is incredible. The audition for Amber mid Mid Hunter, Mid Oh, Mid Thunder. Sorry, I said. Almost said it looks like Mindhunter.

Amber Mindhunter who studied Charles Manson? No, but director Dan Trachtenberg said they had her audition in three different ways.

The first way is they had her using verbal, so they wanted her to speak Comanche and speak English. But then they had her doing things completely non verbally. So her maybe acting out scenes without saying anything at all.

And then basically kind of sending her through, like an obstacle course, making her audition physically.

But they told her, we want you to tell a story with your physicality while you're going through these obstacles and you're running and you're doing these things. Tell us a story with your body and how you do that. She didn't know it was a Predator movie at the time.

When they brought her in, they didn't tell her it was a Predator movie. They just told her it was like you're escaping. You Know, it's kind of a female centric Native American story, but you're. You're just running.

That's it. They don't tell her. And then she finds out she's in a Predator movie.

That's awesome.

Do you think she was excited? How old she. How old is she at filming? Like, she. Is she. She. Is she supposed to be, like, 14 or older?

That's a good question. She looks in real life, like, she's probably like, 28, 27.

Yeah. Like, you know, she's supposed to be young. Young. Yeah. Yeah. Sister trying to, you know, be a hunter.

Yeah, I. I was reading, like, 14, like, middle school or something like that. I was like, oh, if she's not here, she's at a Claire's getting her ears pierced or something.

That's Claire's.

Yeah.

Oh, my gosh. And getting an infection and then.

Exactly.

And then growing a black long sleeve shirt that you wear for the rest of your life.

Yes, yes.

Whole personality. Yeah. I thought she was like, 14 or middle school or.

It's a good question.

Maybe.

Yeah. I would have guessed, like, somewhere in that 14 to 16 range. The vibe I kind of got was just that.

That coming of age age where it's like that, you know, I guess the traditional stories would usually be a boy coming of age, but that kind of transition from childhood into adulthood through this traumatic experience.

I mean, their life expectancy is probably 35, so, yeah. You know, she's almost an elder statesman.

I think it's pre Revolutionary War, but yeah, obviously after the colonizers started showing up.

Okay.

And spreading their love diseases.

Yeah, exactly.

Gross Italians.

The questions, the questions. Questions. Yeah, there you go.

He joined.

That a boy. All right.

We never instruct the guests to join in on the chance, but when they do, it's a special time.

All right, Seth, I'm going to pick up where you and I left off before we hit record.

Let's do this.

I got a.

To reiterate for the camera, what I said was, after watching this movie, it sort of makes the original look like shit. I didn't say I didn't like the original, but, like, this one was so high quality for me that it. It just. Yeah, it made. It made the OG one feel so bad.

Here's a visual representation of my reaction to what you just said. If you were the stock market. We are in the greatest depression since the Great Depression. You.

You can't afford aluminum cans in this economy of what Seth just said about one of the dearest things, not just movies, but one of the dearest things I've ever experienced in my life. Like, I have four kids. I love them all. But Predator is more important. Okay, yeah, not really, but.

Right.

Peter, you're with me, right? You're.

Yeah, exactly. Seth, you're saying that this movie, Prey, is better than the original Predator?

Absolutely. Hands down. On. On. On every possible technical and spiritual reasoning.

Let's get to the question. Let's get to the question. And then. Peter, please respond. Is this one better than the original? Was the question. But here is what the. Here's what the.

The.

The.

The Rotten Tomatoes score say. And this is where I actually think. Seth, you still have to reflect on what you just said. Oh, Rotten Tomatoes gave this movie a 94%.

Yes, it did.

Whether or not it's better. 94%. Predator 87 got an 80, which honestly, pretty high. They were not giving out high movie or they weren't giving Arnold movies high ratings.

And a lot of these are retroactive. If people don't know, people still can add Rotten Tomatoes scores to old movies.

So people come up with their modern bullshit and say, this is why it's bad because I didn't uphold my. My ideals 50 years later.

Well, they do have the professional and the audience critique. So it is. They do have two different scores.

These are the professional ones. The professional predators got a 65. That is generous. That is generous. And then the Predator. I said Predators earlier. Sorry, that was a mistake.

They gave that one a 34%. That is generous. Predator 2 got a 30. And it's less than these other ones. Predator 2 fucking rules. Okay, go ahead, Peter.

I just wanted to put the numbers out there.

I mean, I. You know, it's hard to. Yeah, it's hard to look retroactively at things. But, like, when I see.

When I think of Predator, I'm like, yeah, that was an 80s movie. We're loving 80s movies. And you know that. Not at the time, but it's become like a genre. Like, 80s is clearly a genre.

You know, it's like, oh, yeah, it's Arnold, it's Stallone, it's Gremlins, it's, you know, Van Damme. Exactly. Yeah, exactly. Oh, man. Bloodsport. But, like, that's the.

I mean, I thought it was really impressive what they were able to do with, like, the practical effects there and, like, the technology then. I mean, and I don't know, what, do you go to Arnold Schwarzenegger movie looking for the Acting.

The guy just learned English, you know, last week, Carl Weathers, who has proven.

Himself time and time again to be an incredible actor.

And Bill.

Legend, rip. Oh, yeah.

Bill Duke was a legendary actor too.

Yeah.

So I don't know. I don't know about comparing them. I will say if I'm being critical about this movie, what they could use is a flashlight.

It was a dark, like, dark movie. It was like the last biggest critique.

And it's one of my biggest critique with most modern movies is they don't know how to properly light nighttime scenes.

Yeah. I was like, oh, man. You know, I wish I'd seen this in theaters, but it wasn't even in theaters.

It wasn't Hulu.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Right before COVID I don't know. I'm pretty.

Right. I'm pretty easy going with. With ratings. So it's like, I like it. I don't like it. And like, I like this, but I don't know. I was like, yeah, 94.

That's like toy Story level, you know.

They gave There Will Be Blood. I think they gave There Will Be Blood. Doesn't it have an 87 or a 92 or some shit?

Those.

These are all fixed. Dude, there's. You gotta be telling. There's no amount of money that wouldn't sway Rotten Tomato people to like, you know, certified fresh. Yeah.

Give me a break.

Predator 80. Go ahead, Seth. Go ahead.

Here. Here is where I'm coming from. This came out the same decade as the first Terminator and a decade after the first Alien movie.

That is what I am comparing the original Predator to.

And compared to those two movies which are genuinely terrifying in the exact same, same genre of Hunter versus Prey, the original Predator movie takes on such a over the top, campy vibe that, sure, it's a fun watch. And. And. And for people who grew up with it, it's 80s that makes it 80s. Yeah, but so was Terminator. Terminator was 80s. And. And it.

It was this movie, but serious. And so that's where I'm like, for me, I prefer the more serious tones of those other movies.

And Prey, to me, perfectly encapsulated those movies of the 70s and 80s that were genuinely terrifying but also a fun action romp.

People who grew up with it was that. That was coded language, whatever racism is to this. This discussion. That's what you just did to me. That was coded language.

You said people who grew up. You just basically called me a racist term.

Yes. You know, I, I see your point, and I don't disagree with you. But I will just say that I value a little bit more being the first through the wall.

Meaning establish that original film establishing this, you know, this. This movie franchise that's more impressive to me than what they did with it here.

Which is why I never said, you know, Predator is a bad movie. All I said was watching that and then coming and watching this. This makes that look like shit. This is.

Yeah.

So, yeah, I mean, there's. Yeah, that's great too, you know, that's. That's cool too.

I just give more credit to the original film for establishing that because, you know, pitching. Okay, we have this, you know, this IP of Predator and we're going to put it in a Native American setting. You know, it's like, oh, great. Yeah, great.

Diversity is this and that. But, like, starting up with that movie in the 80s, it's like, yeah, we're going to have like this crazy Predator come down, like.

And like, is that, like, was there precedent for that before that? I don't know, necessarily. Not in the way that they did it.

I don't disagree with you, but I'm also of the opinion that A New Hope is the worst Star wars movie ever made. And I give it credit for launching the franchise and for what it did, special effects wise. But it's terribly acted, terribly directed.

Was only saved because George Lucas's wife came in and re edited it to the most generic version of the hero's journey. And that's the only reason why Star wars made sense when it first came out. But like you said, it launched so much other great stuff.

And so I give the original Predator, like, that respect. But, yeah, I don't know, it just never took itself seriously enough for me.

And this, I think, balanced the tone of seriousness and the humor that was in there.

Oh, yes, absolutely. Yeah. There were some funny moments too. But also, I totally agree with you, Seth. Like, Phantom Menace is the best Star wars movie.

Justice for Jar Jar Binks 100% without. With, you know, no, no, no disagreement for me here.

I agree. Finally says something. Says something sensible today that Star Wars New Hope sucks.

The first thing I've heard is the Phantom Menace. Yeah, Jar Jar is the Phantom Menace.

He's so nice to not be vomiting in my mouth right now.

I think Palpatine's Just a puppet.

All right.

Yeah, exactly. Yeah. If Lucas had his way, you know, we would have got a better sequel to that one. Yeah, absolutely.

Next question. Hopefully we can get down on this. Is this the worst CGI ever? This is some of the CGI that bear. That CGI bear is some of the worst CGI I've ever seen.

It's a bad bear.

I would like to point you back to everything we saw after the first Crow movie.

I know, but you can't.

It's.

You can't just keep going back to the Crow sequels that went.

I can't absolutely bear. This is not that bad at all.

Oh, no. It's the. Some of the stabbings, the wounds, the blades going in was so incredibly cheese and badly done.

Huh.

The budget.

Because, look, for me, the. The animation. I. I. No, I didn't think the bear looked like King Kong from Peter Jackson's King Kong.

Like, obviously, it didn't look $65 million. Yeah.

That's a really low budget for a movie like this.

No.

Was it. Was it the greatest CG that's ever existed? No. Was it perfectly acceptable to compare to a dude wearing a rubber suit in the 80s? Absolutely.

Yeah. See, that's the thing. For me, it's like, man, this movie should have been shot for imax. That's.

You know, my entry point is like, I want to see some interesting deaths and some fun cinematography, which was what we got. But I would have loved if this was shot for imax. You see it in theaters then, you know, then obviously the budget's more.

But, like, that is part of this genre to me.

I mean, the cgi, in my opinion, is all forgiven because you get that moment where the predator puts the bear over his head and is just, like, showering in its blood. I'm like, oh, my God. Like, and I look at my watch, I'm like, how far in are we? Like, insane. I was like, wow, what could happen next? And, like.

Like, does he draw power from that? I don't. I honestly don't know the franchise enough. Like, does.

He was cool. Yeah.

The moment where he, like, cut the head off the wolf, but then drew his claws down its spine and just pulled it up by the entire spine. Like, so brutal. So good.

He does that in every movie. He did that to. To Willie, the. The voodoo gang leader and 2. Talk about racism. They had the mystical Jamaican voodoo gang leader. That was the.

You know, that was prevalent, too. So they just couldn't.

They just.

Maybe that's why they made this one. It's like, we got to make up for Voodoo Willie.

Yeah.

His name was Voodoo Willie.

Oh, yeah. That sounds like a slur.

Haitian drug.

Jim from Huckleberry Finn.

Okay.

Radley is like, what's going on here? What the.

Right, right. Remake that. Remake that.

Yeah.

Right. In the Predator universe with Gary Busey. Yes.

All right. Little fantasizing time.

They're.

They're doing these movies. They're doing this whole thing right. They're going to start just dropping the Predator into random worlds, random, you know, times in history.

What time or region in history would. You two will have to see the Predator come in and slice it up a little bit.

I would love to see him against some samurai.

That's gonna happen. That's what's next. Yeah.

So it's not modern Japan, it's old Japan.

Yep. Ghost of Tsushima style, then.

Then. Okay, we'll. We'll forget that. I would love to see a western involving the Predator. Okay.

Wasn't there a movie called Cowboys vs Aliens?

Yes, and it's incredible, but it's definitely different.

Yeah. Who's in that one?

That's Harrison, Daniel Craig and Olivia Wilde. Paul Dano's in there too.

Oh, I said Tommy Lee Jones. He's not in it.

He's not in it.

But here's. Yeah.

What would I like to see?

I'd like to see it dropped in like the French Revolution. And then, you know, you find, like, history, like, you find that, like, you know, how did the uprising really happen? It's like the predators joined.

Yeah. Hugh Jackman singing.

Yeah.

And that's how they. And that's how they won. And they.

Whoa.

The barricade. One day more than the predators up.

Yeah. Oh, man. Yeah. That's how it happened.

I want Vikings.

Oh, yeah. Vikings.

Because of the movie. Imagine them just getting on that hallucinogenic mead and just go into town.

Yeah.

I think they win. I think the Predator doesn't stand a chance. It's not against the Vikings specifically, but a drunk high on hallucinogens. Vikings.

Yes. Absolutely.

Yeah.

Totally butt naked. Painted blue. Berserker on mushrooms. Let's go.

They wouldn't be freaked out at all.

Yeah. Well, that's one of those things. It's like, okay, a predator could beat one or two Vikings, but is it beating a village of Vikings?

Yeah.

You know, like.

Yeah.

Can you fight two third graders? Sure. But can you. Can you win a fight with a hundred third graders? You know what I mean?

Can it beat a female Viking? I mean, that's the Question. I mean, they were. Those were some tough. Some tough ladies.

Oh, it's true. Yeah. I mean, yeah. Oh, the whole village of Vikings. Yeah. They're not giving up any, any ground right there at all. So. Yeah, that'd be funny.

The Northman with a predator. I would be so down.

I would love it. We still got to get Willem Dafoe in there.

Yes.

Two more questions. You guys are crushing these questions, by the way. I love this little spirited debate. All right, who would win? We called them the feral predator.

And this didn't really pop up until research.

I had a feeling they were going for this during the movie, but they really did want to make this seem like a rustic predator, like a pre modern predator. Some, you know, still technologically, not technologically advanced because he's an alien and all that stuff.

But this, this predator is still in every way more advanced than 87's predator. He's got more tools, more fancy tools, like the discs that fly.

Yes, they're, they're, they're, you know, it's not just lasers or arrows and stuff, but there's, if you look at them side by side, and I'm not going to say it's filmmaking, because, yes, in 87, the vision was probably a little smaller. You were probably a little more blown away by just a few gadgets on the alien, but they really did.

And this was in interviews, they said we really wanted a, you know, an outdated, a pre modern alien that would predate 87s. In no way does it do that. So, yeah, you're saying this as updated.

Tech, like better tech than 87.

Exactly. Yes.

I will defer to you guys because it's been a solid 10 years since I've seen the OG.

I just feel like the original Predator was, like, more like aggressive and ruthless and like, you know, it's not about, you know, as we saw in Prey, it's not about the weapons you have. It's about your keen sense of survival.

And I feel like the original Predator was a little less forgiving, I guess, even though this one, you know, is shaking a bear above its head, you know, showering in blood, which, you know, something I'll, I'll reference for forever.

I feel like the original Predator was just, like, tearing through things without, like, he wasn't going to spare some girl Just after he killed a bear, you know, I mean, or like, he wouldn't have let. The original Predator wouldn't have let her get slip through his fingers so many times.

And also, like, there was a time where I was like, are these two gonna team up and just like go back to back? Like the original Predator, he's not. I don't think he's teaming up with anybody really. He's just like. He's a. He's a force of death plot twist.

The French were. They were the antagonist the whole time.

Yeah, those dirty French, stinky French.

They wanted to invent the Michelin star. This whole movie is a metaphor for the Michelin star.

It is.

It's like, we just want better bread.

I think the original Predator was more ruthless. Am I. Am I wrong about that?

You're right. I'll take it from there. You. You nailed it. And even. Even though I've got this. No. Peter said no. You set it up so well. No, I'm just. You laid it up.

I'm knocking it down, baby. This is my franchise.

Lob city.

Yeah. No, you. You lobbed it up nice. Kobe, the Shack here.

Yeah, this will be me if we ever do Lord of the Rings.

Yeah, this will be. Yeah, I will be completely.

What?

You know. But here's the thing. You were so right. Like, I couldn't really think of the words, but you nailed it. Ruthless.

Also, the opposition was so this predator is actually more. He's stronger. The actor himself is actually taller. So I think the actor who played the original predator was 6, 7. This guy was 6, 9.

He was a profess European basketball player. He's more menacing. He's got more gadgets than the original Predator. But dude, the, The.

The military grade, everyone's carrying a 50 cal because they're jacked and they can carry around a minigun and they, you know, they had their own weapons.

One thing I think the predator in 87 did better is that because the competition was stiffer, they had to get more creative from a filmmaking perspective with how he hunted. He was actually more methodical. Remember the net, Peter? You seem to have more memory of it.

The net that he laid under the ground and they're walking through the grass and all of a sudden the. The net pops up.

Yeah.

And yeah, he was setting traps and.

Right.

Just a lot more creative stuff. And he was hanging the bodies in the trees. So. Because he wanted to. Actually, he didn't want to be. He didn't want to be spotted. So he actually.

He would kill someone and he would hang. And that's how they find Hopper, the guy they're looking for, the guy that went down in the chopper.

In the first one he skinned, his blood is just dripping down a tree, and they find him hanging like a Christmas ornament in a tree. He's actually hiding the body so he doesn't. So they don't trail him. And he's using other words.

What you're saying is prey succeeded in. In creating a formerly evolved predator.

Yeah, maybe. Maybe in their mind, like, he had.

Too many tools to the 87:1.

Now that you bring up the skinning. He did skin a bull or something right in this one. In prey. Then, like, they skin. He. She comes across a.

She comes across like an animal who looks like a deer. I don't know if it was a deer. It had a huge horn, so I thought it was like, a bull or something.

Buffalo, maybe.

We don't. Yeah, maybe buffalo. That's probably it. And we. But we. I don't know if we saw. I don't know if we saw that necessarily, but it did that. And like.

Yeah, going up against, you know, 80s, you know, movie stars with, like, massive, like, machine guns, that's kind of tougher, right? I mean. Yeah. Then, you know what. What this guy was going up against here.

I mean, don't. Don't mess with the. You know, this was a.

That was a mercenary group doing a CIA government overthrow, you know, a regime change where you don't mess with the US During a regime change. That's when we're like, I'm hungry. Give me a new country. Give me a new leader to. To control. Don't mess with me. Yeah, that's.

Guns aside, I guess my question is.

There'S so many of these aliens. Why haven't they just taken over the Earth already? Why do they keep sending one at a time?

Well, they go to all kinds of planets. So the in predator predators, you see the Adrian Brody one, they're actually on a prison planet. So they actually. In that world, they had set up a.

They found a planet out in space where they send all the prisoners. Now, that's what the premise of that was. So they actually go to planets all over the place. So they're like intergalactic hunters.

They have their own planet somewhere.

I think in the animated movie, I couldn't really get into it for some reason, because I don't like animation that much, but I think they actually show the. The predator planet where they live and where they're from.

Interesting.

But they. They're just hunters. They don't. I don't know if they have culture, if they have, you know, great restaurants. You know, it's like, I like stuff.

French were in this one for culture.

Yeah, yeah, exactly.

I brought back a skull and a beignet. Watch your hands.

I think their strategy is flawed. Like, why not send everyone there, take over one planet at a time? They're, like, in a hurry for some reason, right? Like.

Like, oh, we're gonna send one here to this planet. One here to this planet. It's like, all right, well, suicide mission. Unless.

Unless we find out, like, that Predator was, like, you know, a prisoner or, like, you know, sent off to, like, do, like, his birthright type of, like, coming of age. Maybe the Predator is really coming of age. Yeah, yeah.

This is a prepubescent predator.

It could have been. I mean, we don't know Predator age or height or, you know, whatever. We know. Yeah, exactly. He's emo predator. Oh, man. He's got.

He's got the dreads, but they're, like swooping bangs in front.

Your hair was everywhere.

Jonathan Davis of Predators.

My boy from corn. All right, the final question.

Peter, the guy jerking it at the corn concert.

Oh, I heard about that. Yeah. Jerking his own corn cob.

Concerts.

Corn concerts. CEOs are cheating on their wives. Coldplay's calling out everybody. Yeah, yeah. What the heck?

It's a really expensive way to ruin your life.

Maybe he heard all the TikTok people referring to porn as corn and then went to the show like, this is what I'm supposed to do?

Yes.

Yeah.

Oh, I thought it was. I thought this was a theater. All right, Peter, we end every. Every question. Every question section with the same one. You ready?

Yes.

What won the war for me? Yeah, Seth, go ahead, please.

I'll go ahead and start. And you can think on that, because the thing that the. The thing that won this whole movie for me was the general tone of it. Like, the. The.

Like I said, with. With the 80s one being so much more campy than the other movies of this genre at the time. This one finally gave me a Predator movie that.

That felt serious enough. So that's definitely what won it for me. There wasn't a lot that lost it for me. I think it literally was just the. The nighttime scenes.

And by the end of the movie, it got lit better, but, yeah, it was. Especially watching it during the day was very hard to see most of what was going on at night. So, yeah, that's really it for me.

Boom. Peter.

What won the war for me was the well choreographed combat scenes and the way that they were shown. You know, I loved. I really enjoyed Superman this year only because, you know, Gun loves to go right in the middle of a fight scene.

You know, he's like, you're in the middle of it and then there's some music playing and, you know, it's like a fun little. Little amusement park ride. But for this, the cinematography in the fight scenes I thought was great and the choreography was great.

What lost it for me was like, you know, let's get a couple flashlights in there or some, like, torches or some fire. We need some more light.

And what lost it for me even more than that is like, this genre of movie, as I said before, is meant to be seen on the biggest possible screen. And so I wish they would have shot for imax. I wish it had been released in theaters because it would have been a more fun event than.

I'm gonna watch this, you know, at one o' clock on a Sunday while, you know, the sun's coming in and I can. I have to squint through my window. I have to squint at the screen, you know, to see what's happening.

Yeah, yeah, Good stuff. What lost it for me was mostly the fact that the Predator is technically more advanced in a lot of ways than the 87 predator. I think the.

The way that they tried to do it was using a. Like a. Like a pube loincloth on its head instead of the metal helmet. And that was like, the only thing.

Like, what if we just make it look like a groin? Yeah, it looks kind of like a bone, but, yeah, at first I thought it was like a cloth or something. I was like, what are you doing with that? I think.

I think the. The. The competition was interesting. The Frenchman offered absolutely zero resistance.

And as much as I love and support the Comanche message, I mean, they were overpowered.

Do you ever play Assassin's Creed and try to take on a boss when they're like, you know, they're an 80 and the red skulls next to their head and you're like a 40 level. That's what this should have been? I mean, yes, I. I know they're. They're one with, you know, with nature and they have battle and they're.

They're just. They're fantastic warriors. I just still am not buying the super leveled up. You know, Naru versus the Predator thing. It was never believable.

Any other tribe and I might agree with you, but the Comanches were especially known for being some of the most brutal of the Native American tribes.

If a tribe was going to do it, it's going to be the Comanches.

Yeah, for sure. They were the ones that were pretty, pretty much on, on a like 90% meat diet. Like they were jacked compared to the rest of the Native Americans.

Yeah.

And I read Empire of the Summer Moon. It's brutal. Yeah, absolutely brutal. And. But what won it for me? I love the callbacks.

I think as much as I struggled with, you know, as much as I didn't like the CGI and there was a lot of stuff I picked apart about this movie, there was two things I loved. I love the callbacks. I actually felt like, I feel like one problem with remakes today is like the Point Break remake was a good example.

One of my other favorite all time movies. I just didn't feel like they even were trying to, to, to make me feel like a Die Hard fan.

Someone that would love to see the Johnny Utah story expanded. I feel like they didn't even think about me here at least. Yes, they're doing something really different.

It's kind of weird for me as a Die Hard fan, but I'm like, I like those callbacks. Those were cool. So I did appreciate that. I felt loved. And I don't hate everything about this movie.

I just think there's some weird logical things with the Predator that kind of annoy me. But you know, and I will say one more thing. I did have a question about this. I struck it because we're out of time.

But it did feel like a straight to streaming movie. And there is to me these days there is a flavor, there is a taste of what we used to call straight to dvd. It's now straight to streaming.

And this did, if I'm looking at all the Predators combined, it just lacked a little bit of the sheen of what I would expect from a movie in this franchise.

Yeah, that's, that's a good point. I mean it was awarded with what, six Emmy nominations?

Yeah.

And you know, it was it, it, it. I think it's at the top of a genre for what you just said there, Kyle.

Like Yeah, yeah, I would 100 agree with that.

Yes.

When you know, give me how many ever more million dollars and put it in theaters, Let me see it in imax. That's that's what, that's what these, this, you know, creature films are for, in my opinion.

It's definitely on the, it's definitely on the outer edge of that. There were higher budget movies that, that did go to the theater that were produced during COVID that had more flaws than this.

I think the Batman has more flaws than this movie.

I agree with that.

Oh, interesting.

Yeah, yeah. That was a Covid production, and I think you could point to several flaws where this movie actually trounces it.

So you just actually kind of flipped me a little bit on. I was just remembering what it was like watching high budget Covid produced movies.

Yeah, they spent all the budget on that one. Nirvana song.

Yeah, I know. Something in the way.

Emo Batman.

All right, you want to wrap it up Rapid fire with the War Zone. Seth, you want to start us off? Cast.

So, Cat? I mean, yeah, we're doing all of them at the same time. So for me, cast, I, I think everybody delivered so well.

The writing, I, you know, it felt kind of simplistic, but I feel like that's kind of what a stripped down version of a Predator movie needs, is to kind of just get back to the root of the emotions of the characters that are going through it. Directing, I, I, I don't know.

I don't, I didn't recognize the guy who directed it, but I think he did a very solid job at, like I said, doing a more stripped down version of what the Predator could be. I do think where it lacks the most is in kind of the composition of the film. The lighting could have been a lot better in a lot of it.

The cinematography, some of it was fantastic. Other parts I like. Okay. It's just kind of there.

The sound design, though, I will say, was some of the best sound design I've seen on a movie like this in a very long time. So overall, you know, I'd probably give this like a, a seven and a half out of 10. But yeah, I absolutely loved it.

Boom. Peter.

Okay. Cast. Yeah, I mean, great.

I, I think, you know, the lead of this film, she totally carried it and, you know, you, you could see what the story was going to be right from the beginning, just through her eyes and very well cast and, you know, also, you know, her family members. Yeah, great. Like, you know, these guys were like, these guys could have been ancestors of Cobra Kai.

They were such assholes to her you know, and then as far as the writing goes. Writing? Yeah.

I mean, it's not one of those things where I go, this is a 90 minute movie written in 60 minutes though, you know, you've got a lot already established there in the Predator universe. I thought it was.

I thought the writing I loved because of what you said, Kyle, about them paying homage to the first one without hitting you over the head with it. That's very clever and very difficult to do, especially.

Especially, you know, in a contemporary world where everybody, you know, everything feels like cameo central or, you know, whatever. I mean, cinematography wise for me. Yeah. I mean, it was just like a little dark.

Especially for a, you know, visually, especially for like a streaming movie is a bummer.

But I don't know, if I, if I didn't watch this on a Sunday at 1 o', clock, I would have for sure, you know, in the evening, enjoyed it a little bit better. What category am I missing?

Directing.

Directing. Ooh, directing. Yeah. I mean, those combat scenes, what a challenge. Capturing.

Looking at what to capture in, you know, with so much going on is very challenging, I imagine. And then, you know, directing, like so many night shoots like that. That's, that's. That's an own. That's your own kind of marathon right there.

So in Alberta.

In Alberta, Canada. That's right. I saw at the. In the credits, it was shot now in Canada, or at least parts of it were. Was the whole thing shot in Canada?

For the most part, yeah. They had a couple sets in, in like Ontario, but most of it was Alberta.

I was really impressed by that. Usually, I mean, overall rating, I usually go by like the pizza scale, meaning, like, pizza, you love it or you don't love it.

It's like, I like, you know, it's usually a 10 or a 1 or 10 or 0. Like, so it's a big binary thing. But I, I'll, you know, I'll. I'll play game and I'll play ball here.

And I think for me, if I'm going to rate it out of 10, I'm going to rate it 6.9.

Boom. That's a very specific number. I like it.

Yeah, it's not quite 7, I think. 7.5 and over. I'd be like, hey, you guys got to see this move movie, right? I'm like, all right.

You know, if, if you, you know, if you love the Predator franchise. Yeah. You got, I mean, it's. Yeah, it's got to be in your library, you know.

Yeah, it's a sexy rating.

Yeah. So I'll go straight up on the scorecard here. Cast. I'm gonna give it a yes. I think.

I love that we're trying to get, you know, authentic actors and actresses here. I don't always think that's a great argument for casting people. I think people are a little gung ho on that.

I think they're robbing some actors of their ability to portray, you know, other folks. But I also see the argument for getting authentic people to play authentic roles. I think there's. I think there's two sides to that.

But here I think they just did it so well, and they kind of just did it with. With zero effort, honestly. They went out and found some fantastic actors who've had little experience, and they crushed it. I like it.

And as far as the writing goes, it's a big no. I think one of my problems with the dialogue in this is I think some of it's overwrought, and I don't feel like.

It's kind of surprising to me that they had Comanche language coaches on set because I think some of the interaction and dialogue didn't feel authentic.

Now, maybe it's because they were trying to kowtow to the action crowd by having her kind of do the self talk and she was saying things, kind of pumping herself up and, you know, but a lot of the realization she had a lot of this. The observations she made about the Predator, I don't feel like. And this is not a. An insult to those people. It's just. It was a pre.

It was a pre modern time, and I just don't think she would have been armed with the language or the. The skills to say the things she was saying. Like, she was like, he's not after me, you know, when she finally realized. But I'm just kind of like.

I mean, do you know that in this era, during this. In this year, in this century, is that. Are you really realizing that during this time? I mean, even the Frenchmen don't know what's going on.

And they're like, quote, unquote, modern society during this time. Like, they don't even know what the hell's going on. So, you know, I just think.

I just think it's kind of interesting because I really think actually Seth was totally right with this. I think. I wish I either would have watched it with the Comanche version on, or they should have just done it. Comanche.

I think there's some fun stuff. I think there's stuff I like that when you talk about. I didn't like the CGI bear, but the blood thing, that was super cool.

What a way to reveal the shape of the predator, who we haven't seen yet. But I just think, again, the dialogue choices go back to directing as well. I just don't know who's coaching that. Who's saying this is.

I've seen him direct actors. I've seen him do a good job here. But I think there's. It's not as much as it's bad as there was a huge missed opportunity.

Like, this could have been elevated from the action genre if they would have added the language and made those choices. I think this actually could have been much. Much like an actual, like, movie.

One or two choices away from being a theatrical quality movie.

Yes, exactly. And, yeah, that's where some of that streaming quality comes in as far as cinematography and stuff. I'm really divided on that one.

I'm going to go with Scotch. Yes. It's going to be a. Like a mini squeak. Yes. Because as much as I hate the cgi, Peter, you nailed this. Some really good fight sequences.

I hate how overpowered he is. Like, these Frenchmen are just like, just pieces of meat. I mean, they don't stand a chance. And I know he's.

He's an advanced alien from another planet, but. And they're French. They're just like, I'm hungry.

And we hate the French here. Let's get one thing clear. We hate the French.

As a Filipino. Yes.

Except the one French artist I met in Berlin. He was cool.

Yeah.

But I just.

There's just, you know, they're just overpowered. But there's also some great combat. And, you know, there were some really cool callbacks.

One thing, it's not a very long movie, but one thing they did really well, and as comedians, I think we can all respect this is that there's a couple of callbacks from earlier in the movie. Like, with the pit. What is it called? Like, the Quicksand pit or whatever. The mud at the end. The dog was the dog.

Maybe one of the unspoken stars of the movie. They were doing some pretty cool callbacks. So I think there was some creativity and how they edited the movie and how they arranged it.

So I do go a scotch up because I think there was enough here to where I was like, I. I didn't mind a re. Watch. I didn't love it. It's not 87 to me, but, you know, I was like, it's a Predator movie, and I like Predator. So it's like, let's go. So I go, two.

Two. I'm tied up on that one. So can I. Can I recommend or not? Not. I don't know. Not really. But, Peter, it was great to have you, my friend.

How can people go see you? Where can they find you online? And where can they see you in November?

Fellas, thank you so much for having me on here.

I am not a big horror or, like, creature film guy, so to have an assignment to watch this was out of my comfort zone, but I really appreciate it, so I was happy to be here. If you're in Florida in November, you can see me in Gainesville.

And for updated stuff, you can check me out on YouTube.com PeterMurphy YouTube, that's fun. Fun URL. And then on Instagram, it's Peter Underscore Murphy. And yeah, you know, you'll see some fun stuff there. And you can check out my podcast.

It's called Funniest people you've never heard of, and it's on YouTube. Just give it. Give it a quick search.

Follow this man. He's hilarious.

He's hilarious. We were shocked when you reached out to us, man.

We're so. Yeah, follow me back here. Yeah, yeah, I'm in la. People don't wear pants, but, you know, we're. It's. It's too hot for pants right now. Too hot.

You need a predator out there. That's what you need.

Yes.

I'll call Morgan Wallen.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yes, exactly. He's. He's deep in God's country, wherever that is.

Well, it's been a blast, man. I'm Kyle.

I'm Seth.

I'm Peter.

You're Peter. Love y'.

All.

Movie Wars.

It.