Adrien Brody finds himself falling.  Unfortunately he figures out soon enough that this isn’t a dream and he eventually is parachuted onto this unknown planet with seven other ragtag misfits.  Soon enough they all realize that they are being hunted by the Predators and all need to work together to survive and try to figure out a way off of the planet.

In 1987 we saw Arnold Schwartzenegger and his buddies suited up and went into the South American jungle only to find this “ugly motherfucker” hunting them.  Twenty-three years later we receive what might be the best true to form use of the Predator franchise and I thank Robert Rodriguez and Nimrod Antal for that.  However, when you’re going back to a property that started out as a Schwartzenegger film that was loved only for that fact that Arnie was kicking ass and taking names it’s kind of tough to take that and create a story filled with characters you actually want to root for, rather than just make me sit in my seat wanting to scream lines like “get to the chopper!!!!” at the screen.

I don’t deny how good an adaptation of the Predator property this film is, but believe for someone who’s a fan of the original film that anything to come after that memory can only be viewed as the precious afterbirth of that movie.  I am almost jealous of anyone who went into this film without having seen any of the previous films and enjoyed the heck out of it.  However, no matter how much you ignorant filmgoers who enjoyed this movie are or how good an adaptation this movie was it can’t be ignored that this movie is no more than a technologically updated remake of the original.  The only difference between this and the original is that it’s set on a different planet, there are three predators instead of one and since the actors are actually good actors they’re expected to deliver lines believably – an expectation that was never heaped on Schwartzenegger.

Even though I did find myself liking characters like the mercenary (Adrien Brody) and the soldier (Alice Braga) it wasn’t what this film required.  This film wanted a lot of over the top action and not a character filled paint-by-numbers Predator remake.  It tried to differentiate itself with the use of the character Edwin (Topher Grace) but in the end turned out to be a complete bait-and-switch reveal towards the end which just devalues the badassness of the predators.

Overall it’s a capable film, especially for a filmmaker that I was ready to start ignoring completely after his film last year, Armored, completely underwhelmed me.  However this film has all the points you expect from it, but that’s it.  It has enough action sequences that makes it an okay movie but no more and no less.  I’d like to ask that we all just leave this franchise alone and move on to greener pastures.  Anyone agree?

IMDB says 7.4/10

Rotten Tomatoes says 64%

I say 5.5/10