The box office weekend has seen a new apex hunter, as 20th Century Studios’ Predator: Badlands has added a worthy trophy to the Yautja’s collection with a franchise-record-breaking US$80 million global haul.
As reported by Variety, Predator: Badlands garnered US$40 million over its opening weekend in the United States alone, making it the biggest opening seen by the long-running franchise since 2004’s Alien vs. Predator, which saw a domestic debut of US$38 million. The film earned another US$40 million at the international box office, bringing its total to a respectable US$80 million, which is a promising start considering its US$105 million budget.
Marking a return of director Dan Trachtenberg, who helmed the franchise’s two most recent entries, 2022’s prequel Prey and the animated anthology film Predator: Killer of Killers, Predator: Badlands saw the franchise shift focus from the conflict between humans and the Yautja, instead shining the spotlight solely on its alien hunter protagonist Dek (Dimitrius Schuster-Koloamatangi) as he embarks on a dangerous mission on the remote planet Genna to prove his worth and earn the Yautja name. The film also marked the first in the franchise to omit humans entirely, with Dek instead forming an alliance with the Weyland-Yutani synth Thia (Elle Fanning) as they face alien and synthetic threats alike.
Predator: Badlands‘ impressive performance comes at a fortunate time for the box office, which has seen a number of misfires of late, such as Disney’s Tron: Ares and A24’s The Smashing Machine, which made October a bust as it saw the worst collective haul since October 1997.
Apart from Predator: Badlands, the November film lineup is set to redeem October’s poor performance, with upcoming releases such as Paramount Pictures’ The Running Man, Universal Pictures’ Wicked: For Good, Lionsgate Films’ Now You See Me: Now You Don’t, and Disney’s Zootopia 2 all aiming to keep up the momentum.
Kevin is a reformed PC Master Race gamer with a penchant for franchise “duds” like Darksiders III and Dead Space 3. He has made it his life-long mission to play every single major game release – lest his wallet dies trying.
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