Director Dan Trachtenberg Teases What Could Come After That “Awesome” and “Ironic” PREDATOR: BADLANDS Ending
Spoilers for Predator: Badlands below. If you haven’t seen it yet, you might want to stop reading now!
The ending of Dan Trachtenberg’s Predator: Badlands left fans on the edge of their seats and wanting more, and now the director is hinting that we might not have seen the last of Dek, Thia, and Bud.
The latest Predator installment takes the franchise to new territory, following a young Yautja named Dek (played by Dimitrius Schuster-Koloamatangi) on his first hunt.
Considered the weakest member of his clan, Dek sets out to prove himself by tracking down an “unkillable” creature known as the Kalisk on a remote and deadly planet.
Along the way, he crosses paths with an android named Thia (Elle Fanning) and an oddly adorable creature named Bud, who, in a shocking reveal, turns out to be a baby Kalisk.
After being captured by a band of Weyland-Yutani synthetics and rescued by Thia, Dek chooses a different path home, one that doesn’t rely on trophies or tradition.
In a brutal twist, he kills his father, rejects his clan, and sets out with Thia and Bud to start a new kind of family. But before the credits roll, a ship shows up on Yautja Prime, and Dek’s final words drop a bombshell: it’s his mother.
That moment instantly sparked speculation about where the story could go next, and Trachtenberg seems just as intrigued by the possibilities. Speaking with Entertainment Weekly, he shared,
“It's definitely, I think, an awesome ending in that it is an ironic conclusion. After we've just been dealing with this crazy father the whole movie, that it asks what else Dek might have to go through, and how much worse that could be in the hands of mom, but also because, of course, it means that should we get to see that realized, it would be a whole lot of fun.”
While a sequel hasn’t been officially confirmed, it’s hard not to imagine how much deeper Trachtenberg could explore Yautja culture, family conflict, and the emotional evolution of Dek.
The setup practically begs for another chapter, one that pits Dek against an even more formidable force, like his mom.
Predator: Badlands released in theaters on November 7 and has already dominated the box office, pulling in the biggest opening weekend in Predator franchise history, even surpassing the 1987 original starring Arnold Schwarzenegger.
With that kind of success and an ending tailor-made for a continuation, fans can only hope this hunt isn’t over yet.