Say, remember when it was announced that a PREDATOR reboot/sequel was in the offing? That was over a year ago, and since then we haven’t heard much regarding the project, which is being penned by PREDATOR star Shane Black and his MONSTER SQUAD co-writer Fred Dekker. (Here’s the last significant update we received.) Black is, after the success of IRON MAN 3, understandably swamped at the moment – he just finished making the film noir THE NICE GUYS starring Ryan Gosling and Russell Crowe – but we genre fans thirst for a fresh take on our beloved PREDATOR franchise and require a status update pronto! Thankfully, we get one today.
The reboot’s producer John Davis (who made his bones on the original 1987 thriller) had occasion to talk about the new film with Collider recently and spewed some exciting words the site’s way about the direction PREDATOR is going:
Shane shot a movie and he’s doing a pilot now, but I’ve read a lot of his script and I think it’s genius. I think it’s genius and I think it’s entertaining, and what it did is recreate a famous franchise in a different, interesting way; looking at it from a different light. He’s just an amazing writer-director. He’s got a way of looking at this that makes you excited again. I love this franchise. It was the first movie I ever did. I remember in being in the jungle with Arnold [Schwarzenegger] as a 28-year-old and going, ‘This is a fun business!’…Shane’s amazing. He’s an amazing storyteller.”
Shane’s got a writing partner, Fred Dekker. They’ve been doing it together and Fred’s great. The two of them together, they’ve been in the business for a long time, but the writing is so fresh, the perspective is so fresh. I’m telling you you’re going to get something you don’t expect and you’re going to say, ‘This is the most entertaining way to reinvent a franchise.’ I mean he’s the guy who wrote Iron Man 3.”
We always complain about reboots and remakes around here, most of the time with good reason, but I’m sure most of us can agree PREDATOR deserves some fresh blood; this series has been stagnant for too long. Even the Robert Rodriguez-produced PREDATORS underwhelmed thoroughly, even if it has its moments. Black is undoubtedly the man to bring the intergalactic hunter back to the big screen – now we just have to wait ever so patiently for him to get around to it.