"Just like but worse" is generally how reboots are received, and Prey does exactly that. Don't get me wrong, the acting and cinematography outside of the CGI were solid. The writing and directing were where the issues lie. The backbone of all movies. And you aren't going to beat Predator without kicking ass at everything. So instead of even talking about this garbage, I'm going to make it better by rebuilding it:
How I would make this film: First, the setting is southern Colorado. The most capable Comanche men (including Naru's brother and husband) are out in a war party and the Predator attacks the Comanche camp (slowly, over the course of days). I'd actually start the movie as the men leave. Let there be a montage of normal days, then a real world issue - Famine? Drought? Disease? Something else mundane. What few men remain to guard (none in war paint) are slowly picked off and Naru who always wanted to fight and hunt but doesn't to respect the traditions of the tribe and fully understands her integral part within it, has to take up arms against the Predator after witnessing it's brutality and minorly wounding it through happenstance, setting up the rivalry and causing the impetus for the showdown. In my version Naru also has a child to defend against the Predator which furthers our attachment to the character. Also in my version we pay attention to Comanche values where the women actually owned all the property. The Predator isn't fucking stupid and sees Naru as a threat because Predators only see you as non-hostile if you're not carrying weapons and are currently pregnant. PLOT TWIST the predator is female as well, we find out when the invisibility cloak comes down in act 3. Naru knows the lay of the land and sets up ingenious traps with some help of the other women of the village (many of which also die like the men in gory fashion). Naru in effect leads the surviving women into the battle for their lives (and their children's lives, and the future of the tribe, and not to mention their mexican and european slaves) as all the present men (including slaves) are eventually dead at the hands of the predator.
The traps all fail but eventually Naru gets an opening and/or finds a weakness in the Predator when the Predator makes a mistake and Naru strikes at the opportunity. It's pretty close the same movie as Predator, but at least there aren't any magic invisibility flowers or physics-defying stone throwing axes and the traditions (and sins) of the Comanche aren't shit upon for the sake of modern values that frankly don't belong in a 1700s period piece. The movie ends with the men returning after a fight with an expansionist white settlement or western-moving wagon train, having incurred the same or even worse casualties than the camp facing the Predator. The bloodied parties exchange weary looks of respect for what each has done. Eagle-eyed viewers will note Naru's husband is not with them, having died in battle with the white man. Even more eagle-eyed viewers will note one of Naru's brother's wives died, but he takes solace in another woman's arms, this is his second wife as Comanche were polygamous. Cut to credits.
It's the same goddamn movie with the same outcome (and probably better messaging), but sucks less because I thought about it for roughly 10 minutes and don't live in California. Would it be better than Predator? No. But I think it'd come a damn sight closer than Prey is.
