Shortly after it was reported that a secret Predator movie would be released in 2025, a new rumor suggests it will be an animated project, a significant change of pace for the franchise. Fans of the Predator franchise certainly have a lot to be happy about over the past few days. First, it was confirmed that Predator: Badlands, the previously announced film by Prey director Dan Trachtenberg, would be getting a theatrical release date of November 7, 2025. Then, just yesterday, the president of 20th Century Studios, Steve Asbell, revealed that a second secret Predator movie would also be released before Badlands in 2025 on streaming.
According to Gizmodo, various sources told io9 that the upcoming Predator movie is going to be an animated anthology movie. The rumor reveals it will focus on three stories set across three distinct periods, with one story focusing on pirates and another on samurai. There are no details about the third potential plotline. Nothing has been made official by Disney or 20th Century Pictures, so at the moment, this is only a rumor.
While it should be taken with a grain of salt, the rumor is certainly possible based on what little fans do know about the recently announced movie. It also allows Trachtenberg, who is confirmed to be directing the secret Predator movie, to continue on the ideas seen in Prey without making a direct sequel. As Asbell previously revealed, the director was not interested in doing Prey 2. Prey showed that fans of the Predator franchise wanted to see the character dropped into different periods, so it makes sense to expand on that idea. An animated anthology format is a good way to test the water for concepts that might not be ready for a full theatrical release.
Animated Genre Spin-Offs Getting More Attention
Animated films designed to flesh out a live-action franchise were briefly all the rage in the mid-2000s, with The Animatrix, Van Helsing: The London Assignment, The Chronicles of Riddick: Dark Fury, and Batman: Gotham Knight being highlights. The trend has come back into fashion as Warner Bros.’s big holiday movie event of the year is The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim, an anime prequel to The Lord of the Rings films. Meanwhile, the Terminator franchise got one of its best entries in years, along with the Netflix anime Terminator Zero. As franchises like Spider-Man, Star Wars, and the upcoming DCU start to emphasize animation as being as important as live-action, it could be vital for Predator also.
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The unknown third story might be an Alien vs. Predator continuation. Asbell has already teased that they are considering revisiting Alien vs. Predator as a concept, but it would not be what fans assume. One of the animated segments could see a Predator encountering a Xenomorph in a mini-isolated Alien vs. Predator storyline that could test if audiences wanted another go-around in live-action. Before Disney purchased 20th Century Fox and renamed it 20th Century Pictures, work on an Alien vs. Predator anime had been completed and is now just sitting in Disney’s vault. This wouldn’t be the first time Alien vs. Predator got the animated treatment, but it could be the first time it sees the light of day.