When Dan Trachtenberg shocked the world by announcing that he had been working on a secret Predator movie, no one would have guessed that the straight-to-streaming Prey would save the franchise and deliver its best Rotten Tomatoes score at the time of its release. Now, four years after it should have been released in cinemas, Prey is stalking its way to the top of the Tubi free streaming chart.
Prey takes place long before Arnold Schwarzenegger’s Dutch and his rough, tough group of alpha males took on one of the most fearsome foes in sci-fi horror history and failed to get to the chopper. Prey stars Amber Midthunder in a breakout role of Naru, a young woman from the Comanche Nation who is forced to fight for survival when a spaceship crash lands nearby, unleashing a monstrous alien that seems very capable in all forms of close combat.
The film took a completely fresh approach to the Predator franchise, abandoning the repetitive nature of several previous sequels, and finding a way to be new and fresh under the direction of Trachtenberg. The film landed the biggest opening viewership of any Disney original movie, and scored an incredible 94% with critics on Rotten Tomatoes. While the audience score on the site sits lower at 74%, the consensus is that Prey was not just a good Predator movie, but one of the best movies of the decade.
‘Prey’ Walked on Streaming So ‘Predator: Badlands’ Could Run in Theaters
In another world, where a pandemic did not shut down most of the world’s cinemas, Prey would likely have been released in theaters and become a huge hit. As it was, the film was released straight to Hulu/Disney+ and smashed several records. While it was a travesty and everyone agreed that Prey should have been put on the big screen, the film did finally get the chance to be seen in cinemas three years later when a limited number of theaters ran the movie as a double bill with Predator: Badlands in November 2025.
After realizing the mistake they made with Prey’s streaming-only release, there was never any doubt that Predator: Badlands would receive a full theatrical run, and it proved to be a popular feature, taking $184 million at the worldwide box office and becoming the highest grossing movie of the franchise, including both crossover movies with the Alien franchise from the noughties.
Although the future of the Predator franchise has not yet been announced, it is believed that Trachtenberg is working on his next addition to the classic sci-fi saga, and after two home runs – along with the equally impressive animated Netflix anthology, Predator: Killer of Killers – it is fair to say that there is a lot of expectation on the next installments, which are expected to include a sequel to Prey and whatever comes after Badlands.
Prey is currently available to stream for free on Tubi, while Predator: Badlands can be rented or purchased on the usual VOD services, and is currently holding high chart positions on both the Apple Store and Amazon Store.
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