It Is What It Is: Part Three – Narrative and Originality in Predators
Predator is one of the best action films ever made. It’s got Schwarzenegger in his prime, a young and ambitious John McTeirnan at the helm, Carl Weathers, Jesse Ventura and a seven-foot invisible monster. Boy, they don’t make them like that anymore…
Firstly, you should know I wrote Predators when I was 13. Like every kid, after the first time I sat and was blown away by the original, I made it better (or, in the teenage parlance, “cooler”). Sure, one Predator is cool, but what about four? There should definitely be a fight between them, too, and honestly, the female character is so boring, it would be so much cooler if she was a sniper! The difference between my vision and that of the eventual makers of Predators was that I wasn’t given the keys to sci-fi horror royalty and millions of dollars to spend, and I still required a legal guardian. In this article, I’m going to look at the narrative structure of Predators and how it functions as a sequel. But before that, let’s look at what it’s actually about.
It’s a simple premise, essentially a retelling of the original with extra Predators and “badass” appearing as a more prominent adjective in the screenplay. A group of highly trained armed combatants is dropped on an alien planet and subsequently stalked by a group of deadly aliens. In the first article in this series, I spoke a bit about the three-act structure. Predator is one of the best examples I can think of that uses the structure perfectly, so I’m going to do a side-by-side act breakdown of both Predator and Predators, so we can see what actually happens in both.
ACT 1.
Predator: A ragtag group of gruff and stereotypical soldiers enters a jungle and is involved in a skirmish; it’s then revealed to the audience that an invisible hunter with thermal vision is stalking the group—one of the gang senses there’s a problem.
Predators: A ragtag group of gruff and stereotypical soldiers enters a forest and is involved in a skirmish; it’s then revealed to the audience that an invisible hunter with thermal vision is stalking the group—one of the gang senses there’s a problem.
In Predators, they also find out they’re on an alien planet.
ACT 2.
Predator: The team begins to be hunted and is picked off one-by-one; the remaining members attempt to make a run to the location of the rescue helicopter; the Predator appears, then kills everyone, until only the male and female leads remain. The female lead is then taken out of the narrative, leaving Arnie covered in mud on his own, but now with an advantage.
Predators: The team begins to be hunted and is picked off one-by-one; the remaining members attempt to make a run to the location of the spaceship; the Predators appear, then kill everyone, until only the male and female lead remain. The female lead is then taken out of the narrative, leaving Adrien Brody covered in mud and on his own, but now with an advantage. There’s another couple of differences: Lawrence Fishburne has a pointless and immersion-breaking cameo, and Adrien Brody’s character Royce has an established character arc where he moves away from self-centered origins to an ultimately heroic return, which in turn sets up the third act.