Over the course of five Predator films, the titular alien hunters have taken on jungle grunts, LA cops, and even a few xenomorphs. But at a panel for the forthcoming sequel The Predator at Comic-Con International, it was revealed there was an equally super-powered warrior residing among the movie’s cast: Thomas Jane.
"Thomas," asked Sterling K. Brown, The Predator's Will Traeger, "would you do everyone a favor and show them your feet real quick?" Jane, the star of such Comic-Con-beloved hits as The Expanse and The Punisher, obligingly propped his bare toes on the table. "Thomas doesn’t wear shoes!" Brown exclaimed. "He walked everywhere in Vancouver, in the middle of winter, with nothing on his feet. I thought, 'You should be cold right now!'"
What We're Most Looking Forward to at This Year's Comic-Con
Horror sequels, a Momoa-shaped tsunami, and the Spider-Man we've all been waiting for—SDCC may be light this year, but there's plenty to look forward to.
By Angela Watercutter, Brian Raftery, and Peter Rubin
The panel for The Predator was full of similarly personal revelations, as the film’s cast members—including Olivia Munn, Keegan-Michael Key, Jake Busey, Trevante Rhodes, and Augusto Aguilera—gathered in Hall H to reveal early footage from the movie, which is directed and co-written by Shane Black. The original 1987 Predator, Black said, "was a piece of perfect pop art: The alien craze of the ‘80s and the Rambo craze, put together. And it had a wink to it, because you had these muscular guys with weapons that were absolutely ridiculous." (Not to mention the occasional ridiculously choppy one-liner.)
Black's new version, he noted, was intended as a sort of "Dirty Half-Dozen.” In one clip screened for the hall, Munn—playing a government biologist—finds herself in a hotel room with a group of sarcastic ex-soldiers who've just escaped an encounter with a deadly Predator. "They have me on call," Munn’s character says, "in case there’s … contact." Throwing together a bunch of outsiders, and casting the movie with a squad of recognizable character actors, gave Black "a chance to bounce people off each other," he said,"and make these guys as relatable as possible."
That bounciness continued after filming was finished. "My favorite thing on a film is set building an almost insta-culture," said Key. "We spent a lot of time in my trailer watching YouTube videos, blaxploitation movies, Dolemite movies, The Room. We would do everything in our power to get some moment from those movies into our movie.” Key was especially keen on getting one of his favorite blaxploitation lines into The Predator. "I tried six times: 'Bitch, are you for real?'"
Black also debuted a sequence in which a Predator—after nearly offing an on-the-run trio played by Munn, Room star Jacob Tremblay, and Logan’s Boyd Holbrook—is annihilated by a bigger, meaner, never-before-seen Predator that’s eager for revenge. "There’s a faction on Predator homeworld that’s been bested not once, but twice, by earthlings," said Black. "They send their champions to earth, and they don’t come home. They don’t like that. So we figured they want to punch back."
So did Munn, who wanted to make sure her scientist character could handle a firearm with relative ease. "When you see a movie where a guy picks up a gun, he just automatically knows how to use it," she said. "And girls are just like, 'I don’t know…' I didn’t want her to be proficient, because she’s not a soldier. But I wanted her to know how [to shoot], the ways guys know how."
Yet the biggest skill on display was Jane’s foot-free lifestyle (the actor explained that he spent years in a shoeless society, and was kicked out after wearing shoes to a restaurant). It was a moment that made everyone in the room think: Are you for real? "As a black man who has fought really hard to get good tennis shoes," said Sterling, "and to have good coverage on both of his feet. I’m like, this is a white man who’s just like, 'My feet are tough enough.'" Whether they’re tough enough to help The Predator crew outrun the enemy remains to be seen.