Predator: Killer of Killers Review (2025)
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A Journey Through Time With alien bounty hunters
Those fiendish Predators are back again! Prey (2022) director Dan Trachtenberg has returned to the series with a new animated anthology installment, which begins its story centuries earlier than his previous film. How does it compare? Read my Predator: Killer of Killers review to find out!
The Predator franchise has sent its eponymous creatures to many different eras and settings. Prey is set in 1719 and features the extraterrestrial bounty hunters battling Native Americans and European colonists.
This franchise has virtually limitless options in terms of choosing different eras, places, and civilizations for the Predators to take on. How about Predators in Ancient Rome? The Middle Ages would be cool. What about the Aztecs? A Predator vs. Aztec movie would be badass for sure.
I’m just throwing out a few random suggestions, but you get idea. The latest installment, the first one to be animated instead of live action, takes advantage of this by featuring three eras of human history.
Predator: Killer of Killers is a trifecta of stories that are woven together at the end. We begin in Scandinavia 1200 years ago, where Ursa (voiced by Lindsay LaVanchy), a Viking warrior, seeks to avenge her father’s demise. Her feud with a rival Viking clan is disrupted by a strange monster armed with magical weapons.
The story then shifts to feudal Japan. Kenji (Louis Ozawa Changchien), a samurai warrior embroiled in a feud with his warlord brother, faces the same type of creature. The brothers must put aside their differences if they hope to survive.
The third segment launches us into a World War II ocean battle, where a Predator flying a UFO attempts to shoot down American pilots. A plucky young American soldier, John Torres (Rick Gonzalez) hatches a plan to stop him.
Finally, the movie closes with a clever segment that brings all three stories together for an epic final battle. I won’t say much about this to avoid major spoilers, but this storyline goes in many interesting directions.
A Worthy Addition to the Series
As with Prey, it takes suspension of disbelief to buy into the concept that humans, especially folks from long ago eras, can credibly fight intelligent humanoid extraterrestrials who have mastered interstellar travel.
The Predators do manage to kill most of the people they encounter, but some mighty warriors are able to find ingenious ways to defeat them, or at least to survive their attacks.
The movie features videogame-style animation, which seems appropriate for a carnage-packed action horror flick. I don’t typically review animated films. Frankly, I don’t feel qualified to judge whether the animation is “good” or not, but it seems aesthetically appropriate to me.
This isn’t the type of movie that requires beautiful artwork. It’s not an artsy film. Like the rest of the series, it’s a shallow but entertaining ride. Videogame graphics are fine – in fact, a Predator: Killer of Killers videogame could be great.
Trachtenberg loads this movie with action and gore. If anyone was thinking that an animated Predator would tone down the violence, that is not the case. This movie’s just as bloody as the rest.
Killer of Killers is a fast-paced ride that rarely slows down for exposition. Trachtenberg understands how to maximize the franchise formula. He is also directing the upcoming Predator: Badlands (watch the trailer here), so he’s really making this series his own.
The success of Prey spearheaded a major revival for this franchise, and this installment is plenty good enough to keep the momentum going. Hopefully Predator: Badlands will be just as successful. With Trachtenberg in charge, I have high hopes for it!
Rating
Predator: Killer of Killers puts this franchise on a winning streak, with two successful installments in a row.
Rating from 1 (avoid at all costs) to 10 (masterpiece): 7.5
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