Predator Badlands is a Disappointing Mixed Bag

A movie exists within the context of every similar movie that came before it. I'm still struggling with whether it's fair or not to criticize Predator: Badlands for copying both its subject matter and the weightless way it looks off the test sheet of other, earlier movies and shows like it, but it is a movie that released simultaneously in theaters and on streaming, a sign of unconfidence on the part of the filmmakers that I can't say is entirely unjustified. Not everything about this movie flops on the floor like a dead CGI fish, but I was unpleasantly surprised by how unambitious Badlands actually was. Nonetheless, it does possess some interesting elements, namely good casting on the part of Tessa, a Weyland-Yutani android accompanying Dek, the first Predator to be cast as the hero in his franchise. This movie is occasionally surprising, but most of the time, it's conversely the farthest thing from it.

Going into detail on a narrative that doesn't have much of it would be a disservice to you, the reader. Boiled down to its bare bones, Badlands is the simple, familiar story of a character who wants something for whatever reason and his quest to get it. It's not exceptionally creative or deep, but this movie we've seen a million times over is still a well-executed repetition. It's hard not to empathize with Dek and his reasons for going on the hunt, even if a rather plain character such as him can't shoulder the weight of his entire movie. Nonetheless, Elle Fanning's Tessa is the bright spot of this movie's mercifully small cast, a perfect traveling companion for Dek, and their vastly different personalities and worldviews are well-suited for each other's company.

Badlands is sometimes a fascinating exploration of sensitivity. Dek and the rest of his clan view feelings as a weakness, but Tessa sees them instead as a strength and even an ally. The ideological differences between her and her de facto predator guardian clash intriguingly in a somewhat more air-tight version of the awful Alien vs. Predator. Badlands also touches briefly on the theme of brotherhood, but it never commits to baking it into the more measurable aspects of the film, leaving it just as underexplored and underdeveloped as its horrendously overdone visual effects. Quite simply, this movie looks like an ugly clone of the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

Prey, Dan Trachtenberg's previous spinoff of the Predator franchise, took a brilliantly naturalistic approach to how it looked, at times evocative of the stunning The Revenant. His second effort is an admittedly detailed but visually tired tromp through a world constantly advertising that what you're looking at is weightless and fake. Audiences will be drawn to the danger of the planet that Dek is hunting on, and they'll probably be accepting enough not to demand better, but the visuals of Badlands reinforce mediocrity in every last vanilla way. This movie looks and acts like a big ball of nothing that we've seen kicked across the cinematic soccer field over and over and over again. It is a visually disconcerting vessel, only half-full inside.

To brag on Prey a little more, I appreciated both that particular spinoff's willingness to take risks and its ability to pay them off. I don't hate Badlands, but I almost wish that I did so that I could feel a strong emotion about it. Anything this movie tries to do has its legs chopped out from under it, either by budgetary constraints or an unwillingness to risk failing at trying to be anything more than a reinforcement of an uninspired status quo. I've heard it said that mediocre art deserves our contempt, and it's hard for me not to feel contemptful towards a movie so overwhelmingly inoffensive. 20th Century wanted a financial win, and they took the easiest route to it with Badlands.

Again, the characterization of this movie is barely a saving grace, but it never seems interested in committing to grounding its characters' feelings in any semblance of reality. It tepidly claims to be a character study, but it's really just one big visual effects reel that tries to be more consistently enough to make you wish that it actually were. It is also a safe, exciting, and low-thinking campaign designed to make money off of people who don't care if it's anything more or not. It's not the type of movie you taste and then immediately spit out of your mouth in disgust. Instead, it's the type that is bland enough to be chewed on for a while and then swallowed with glum disappointment.

I can think of dozens of other movies just like Predator: Badlands right now, movies that do everything it does, but better. This one isn't bad enough to be notorious; instead, it's just good enough to be forgotten.

Predator: Badlands - 5/10

Revelation 3:14-18