Is Predator: Badlands Still a Predator Movie?

It all comes down to this. JD and Paul reach the end of What the Hell Are You? A Rewatch of Everything Predator with Predator: Badlands, and Paul's wife Megan joins them for the final hunt. Dan Trachtenberg makes perhaps the strangest creative decision in the entire franchise: this time, the Predator is our protagonist. Does turning Predator into a sympathetic hero finally push the franchise somewhere new, or does it fundamentally misunderstand what made Predator interesting in the first place? JD, Paul and Megan debate whether Badlands still feels like Predator, how much franchises need to evolve to survive, what Dan Trachtenberg has added to Yautja culture, whether the movie borrows a little too freely from Dune, Avatar, Star Wars and Alien, and why Weyland-Yutani may ultimately be the most dangerous predator of all. Plus: Dek's bizarre family dynamics, Elle Fanning playing both sides of the synth divide, James Cameron's surprising influence on the ending, Predator callbacks, sick kills, Paul falling asleep during the movie, and the official final ranking of all nine Predator films. After months of trophy hunts, thermal vision, spine ripping and arguments over whether Predator even has a memorable theme, the season ends here.