same_difference | Predators

Given the name you should be expecting a remake/homage to the original film in a similar vein to Alien to Aliens. In many way it was, just a much less good attempt, that was possibly tried too hard be a homage to the original.*

*Apparently the director said something to the affect of:

"Rodriguez says he hopes to reinvent the series, so that people will remember Predator and Predators, and forget the bad ones".

I enjoyed it though, but I'm very good at managing expectations when it comes to films. I find mediocre films can be a lot more entertaining if you go into watching them with the right frame of mind.

The film was very, very trope heavy. Makes me wish I hadn't read the TV tropes website at times, other than for the usual reason of the feeling you get after you've discovered you've lost an hour or two of you're life to it.

Read all links at your own risk, and only if you have no particular plans for the next hour or two.

Firstly I might as well just link at the TVTropes website for the Predator films.

It's mentioned in the link, but my god was that whole poisonous plant scene a massively blatant Chekhov's Gun.

It argues that the Black Dude Died first trope was subverted, however I think the order of ethnic slaughter was pretty damn blatant: Mexican, African, African American, Russian, Redneck, Japanese guy.

The entire main cast were cliche's, though strangely Vasquez doesn't die.

The best example of it trying to hard to be a homage* was in the final battle scene between Royce and the Predator. Considering how much Royce character was portrayed why didn't he just shoot the Predator at point blank range in the back of the head?

*The one on one blade fight between the Yakuza and the Predator does draw inspiration from the native American vs Predator fight in the first film. Plus of course the multi ethnic cast and general uselessness of the mini-gun was taking straight from the first film.

Then there was a really odd use of a variant of the The Worf Effect. For those who sensibly don't click the link it's not quite the correct usage, as it only happens once, but it's close enough. Basically it's the villain beating up the known tough guy on the hero side (well he's sort of on there side) to show how tough he is. The thing is only doing this at the end of the film after the bigger villain has been revealed for ages kind of makes it a bit pointless as we already get they're scary and hard. Unless of course it was an effort to reduce the impact of having already seen other hard predators be beaten relatively easily.

Finally though they must be team fortress fans. A russian mini-gun wielding huge man who seems a little slow and has someone important to him named Sasha. I wonder where they got that from.*.

*Then again perhaps Valve 'stole' things first.