New Predator Movie Heading To Streaming?
It looks like this next Predator movie could be headed straight to streaming and skipping the movie theaters. It would be a big move
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In this new world order of movies, streaming, crossover studios, and new line deals, what happens with big-budget, high-profile movies doesn’t need to follow the same standard release timeline we saw in the past. These days, it might not even make a ton of financial sense for a movie to have an extended theater run to kick things off. And that could be the case with the next Predator movie which could be heading straight to streaming. According to Bloody Disgusting, this next Predator could actually be heading straight to Hulu.
This reporting is through the legal machinations around the rights to the Predator films. The distribution rights have changed hands over the years, but are currently in the process of reverting back to the original creators Jim and John Thomas. This is part of a legal battle around who owns the copyright for the franchise. In the fight to get it back in their hands, it was revealed that Disney plans to release the Predator movie on Hulu rather than in theaters or Disney+. With 21st Century being bought by Disney last year, the latter now has control of how the movie is put out there.
While this is not officially released news, it would make sense for Disney to release the Predator movie on Hulu based on what Bloody Disgusting is saying about how the financials work with these films. There’s some chance the path to profitability for a movie with a lower budget like this one might have it easier if there’s a streaming option from the beginning even if it is running in parallel with a theatrical release. And with Hulu, Disney can avoid some of the more adult/ violent content in a movie like Predator which wouldn’t play well on the Disney+ platform.
This next Predator movie has been in the works for some time now but mostly been kept under wraps. Dan Trachtenberg is at the helm with a script from Patrick Aison. They’d been working under the title Skulls from the beginning, avoiding references to Predator in an effort to mostly keep things under wraps. It worked for a while, but now the alien is out of the bag and we are getting more details on the films. Amber Midthunder is going to star as a Comanche woman and it looks like this will be a prequel with the events of the movie taking place around the time of the Civil War.
When the Predator movie comes out it will be the fifth flick in the franchise that didn’t involve the titular alien lining up in a crossover production. Starting with Arnold Schwarzenegger back in 1987, the franchise has seen a few different iterations with varying levels of success along the way. 2010’s Predators dropped some soldiers in a happy hunting ground in which they were the prey. Meanwhile, Shane Black came out with The Predator in 2018 which was developed much more along the lines of the original. That one was able to almost double up on its $88 million production budget with $161 million at the box office.
It might not be all that long until we get this next Predator movie either. With the casting filled out, they are planning to begin filming by the end of June. There’s a chance this is a good reset for the franchise and if it’s going to be on Hulu then it will be accessible for a wider audience right out of the gate.
