Summer is upon us, which means we’re in for another season of ever-intensifying heatwaves, forest fires, and the return of everyone’s favourite merciless hot-weather killer: the Predator. Predator: Killer of Killers is an upcoming animated action thriller and the second entry in the franchise to be helmed by director Dan Trachtenberg.
The film features an anthology-like structure, pitting some of history’s finest warriors against the Yautja (Predators). The story breaks into four acts: The Shield, The Sword, The Bullet, and a final, unnamed chapter that ties all three stories together in a battle royal.
The Shield is a revenge story following the exploits of a Viking-age shield maiden. The Sword sets up a samurai showdown between brothers in feudal Japan, while The Bullet takes the action to the skies with WWII-era dogfighting. All three stories showcase each warrior’s skills in a highly stylized celebration of graphic violence, where blood, guts, and severed heads rain down like confetti.
Even by Predator standards, the story is light, but Predator: Killer of Killers makes full use of its animated format to deliver intricate, high-concept fight scenes that aren’t just the best in the series—they’re masterful in their own right and among the most thrilling I’ve seen in years.
Each vignette is hyper-efficient, introducing a character, their skills, and motivations in under five minutes before descending into 20-minute-long martial ballets that pit a hero against their human foe—and, inevitably, a Predator. We’re given a surprising amount of insight into each character in the brief lead-ins, but not enough to elevate them beyond archetypes. Which, for a Predator movie, isn’t just acceptable—it’s encouraged.
“Even by Predator standards, the story is light, but Predator: Killer of Killers makes full use of its animated format to deliver intricate, high-concept fight scenes…”
What’s important is how they fight, how they think, and how their world shapes their honour—all of which we get. All three fights showcase our heroes’ toolbox of skills and weapons, demonstrating with bloody proof why they’d be considered worthy opponents by a Predator. In the ensuing one-on-ones, a Predator empties that toolbox onto the ground, forcing our heroes to rely on their wits and cunning—lest an alien rip out their spine.
The battles are tightly choreographed games of cat and mouse where no movement is wasted. Every sidestep and sword swipe sets up the next elaborate attack, with feints and mistakes revealing themselves as pieces of a trap laid earlier in the fight. There’s never a moment where a character gaining the upper hand feels unearned, and each reversal of fortune is just as satisfying.
The stepped animation style intensifies the fight scenes, sharing the almost stop-motion aesthetic of Into the Spider-Verse. With missing frames between actions, strikes feel heavier, blood spatters and explosions become more unpredictable—and, most importantly, the style just looks cool.
The animation style also pairs perfectly with the Arcane-like art direction, which employs a painterly approach to seamlessly blend 3D and 2D elements. The entire film feels like a living comic, with the direction leveraging the graphic style and its break from reality to deliver bolder, more exaggerated action. Not every franchise could pull off a shift to animated action with anime-level intensity, but the Predator series makes it look effortless. It’s a perfect fit—and honestly, I’m more excited for future animated follow-ups than I am for Dan Trachtenberg’s upcoming live-action entry, Predator: Badlands.
“In the grand scope of the series, Predator: Killer of Killers is a solid entry that sits squarely in the middle.”
Dan Trachtenberg is the franchise’s new daddy, and while his take on the series isn’t universally loved, it’s in pretty good hands. The man knows how to make a fun monster movie and clearly loves the lore, but sometimes that love can be overwhelming. Predator: Killer of Killers shares the same issue as his previous entry, Prey: too many self-referential callbacks and a reliance on world-building that doesn’t quite land.
One of the joys of the Predator series is its simplicity: Monster hunts Badass, Badass turns the tables, Monster explodes. Rinse and repeat. It’s a primal thrill that resonates deeply within the reptilian brain. The franchise has never lent itself well to meta-humour or universe-building—it’s just too basic. The premise alone invites the audience to surrender to a state of drooling compliance and just go along for the ride. Introducing cameos, recurring objects, or attempts to ground the story in canon breaks the trance and highlights the obvious plot holes and the overarching ridiculousness of the premise.
Another problem that has become unavoidable is the Yautja themselves: the more we learn about them, the less intimidating they appear. At this point, they’re almost a joke. In the original, it took a squad of heavily armed commandos to wear one down enough for a lone, shirtless Austrian to best it in single combat. Now, these supposed apex predators are dying en masse to elderly Iron Age warriors and teenagers flying rusty aircraft. It’s still fun, but it takes increasingly ridiculous action to offset the diminishing returns.
In the grand scope of the series, Predator: Killer of Killers is a solid entry that sits squarely in the middle. It’s tighter than Nimród Antal’s Predators or Shane Black’s The Predator, but it doesn’t quite have the same impact as Prey, even though it borrows some of its themes.
It’s a Predator movie in the same way The Animatrix was a Matrix movie: both offer interesting interpretations of their worlds but don’t feel wholly connected to their source material. Mostly, that’s a vibes thing—and not entirely negative. Being an animated feature within a live-action series creates a separation that can’t be overlooked. Predator: Killer of Killers is excellent, with almost every frame picture-perfect, but it’s hard to see it as equal to its counterparts, or more than a seat warmer for Predator: Badlands.
Predator: Killer of Killers may not leave a lasting impact on the series, but for anyone looking for some casual, spine-ripping action or a solid animated thriller, it’s easy to recommend.
