Predator 2 is a more interesting film than its reputation allows, a sequel that makes the bold decision to abandon everything that made the original work and replace it with something entirely different. Stephen Hopkins's 1990 film moves the action from the jungle to a sweltering Los Angeles in the grip of a drug war, swaps Schwarzenegger's military team for Danny Glover's overworked detective, and pitches the whole thing at a register of urban action chaos that is closer to RoboCop than to the original Predator. It does not succeed as completely as the original, but it is a film of genuine energy and occasional invention that deserves more credit than it typically receives.
At a Glance
Director: Stephen Hopkins
Runtime: 108 minutes
Starring: Danny Glover, Gary Busey, Ruben Blades, Maria Conchita Alonso, Bill Paxton, Kevin Peter Hall
Release: 1990
Critics Rating: ★★½ (2.5/5 stars, flawed but more inventive than its reputation suggests)
Audience Rating: ★★★ (3/5 stars, a cult favourite)
Review Breakdown
Plot
Lieutenant Mike Harrigan, a maverick LAPD detective operating in a near-future Los Angeles torn apart by gang warfare, finds himself investigating a series of killings that he eventually realises are the work of an extraterrestrial hunter. The urban setting is the film's most significant creative decision and its most successful, giving the Predator a new environment that tests its capabilities in different ways and gives the film a visual identity entirely distinct from the original. The plot is looser and more episodic than the original's tightly structured survival narrative, and the film's pacing is less assured, but the individual set-pieces are frequently impressive and the Predator's trophy room, which includes an alien skull that would later become the premise for the Alien vs. Predator films, is one of the franchise's most memorable individual images.
Characters
Danny Glover's Harrigan is the film's most underrated element, a character of genuine physical presence and moral conviction whose determination to pursue the Predator gives the film its dramatic engine. Glover plays the character with a weariness and a stubbornness that makes him feel like a real person rather than an action archetype, and his performance is considerably more interesting than the film's reputation might suggest. Gary Busey's Keyes is the film's most entertaining supporting creation, a government agent of manic intensity whose obsession with capturing the Predator gives the film its human antagonist. Bill Paxton's Jerry Lambert is the film's most purely enjoyable ensemble member, a cocky detective whose arc follows the franchise's established pattern of reducing the overconfident to the terrified with considerable efficiency.
Tone
Hopkins pitches the film at a register of urban action chaos that is deliberately louder and more frenetic than the original's sustained dread. The Los Angeles setting gives the film a different kind of oppressive heat, and the gang warfare backdrop gives the Predator's hunting ground a human violence that contextualises its own. The film is less interested in building tension than in delivering set-pieces, which is a legitimate creative choice that suits the urban environment better than it would have suited the jungle.
Meaning / Themes
Predator 2 extends the original's concern with the ethics of hunting into a more explicitly urban context, using the Los Angeles drug war as a backdrop that mirrors the Predator's own violence. The film's most interesting thematic thread is the parallel between Harrigan's maverick approach to law enforcement and the Predator's own code of honour: both operate outside institutional constraints, both pursue their quarry with a personal intensity that their respective organisations regard as excessive, and both ultimately earn each other's respect. The Predator's gift to Harrigan at the film's conclusion, a flintlock pistol from 1715, is the franchise's most explicit statement about the continuity of the hunt across human history.
Direction
Hopkins's direction is energetic and visually inventive, using the Los Angeles setting with more imagination than the film's critical reputation suggests. The slaughterhouse sequence is the film's directorial highlight, a demonstration of spatial horror in an industrial environment that gives the Predator's capabilities a new and effective context. The film's pacing is less assured than the original's, and the tonal consistency is harder to maintain in the urban environment, but the individual sequences are frequently impressive. Alan Silvestri returns with a score that builds on the original's established themes while giving the urban setting its own sonic identity.
Cultural Reception
Predator 2 received mixed reviews on its release and was a modest commercial success, though it grossed considerably less than the original. Its standing has improved significantly since, particularly among fans of the franchise who have come to appreciate its willingness to take the series in a genuinely different direction. The Alien skull in the trophy room became one of the most discussed Easter eggs in science fiction cinema history and directly inspired the Alien vs. Predator crossover. It is now regarded as a flawed but entertaining sequel that deserves more credit for its creative ambition than it typically receives.
Final Verdict: A flawed but genuinely inventive sequel that deserves more credit than its reputation allows. Glover's Harrigan is the franchise's most underrated protagonist, the Los Angeles setting gives the Predator a new environment that tests its capabilities in interesting ways, and the trophy room's alien skull is one of the franchise's most consequential single images. Predator 2 is not the original. On its own terms, it is a more interesting film than most people remember.