"If it bleeds, we can kill it" - this immortal affirmation of an unknowable foe's mortality uttered by Arnold Schwarzenegger's Dutch, embodies not only the ethos of John McTiernan's classic sci-fi actioner, but indeed all the body builders who went on to fight the many villains who personified a post-Cold War America on the silver screen. In the depths of a Central American jungle, espionage quickly evolves into asymmetrical warfare, and true to its name, the Predator upsets the military food chain in every environment it enters, whether it's the site of colonial proxy wars or even a modern day Los Angeles as represented in one of its many sequels. Join your hosts as they investigate the muddy hunting grounds of a classic movie monster who hunted other monsters, parsing exactly how its design, mise-en-scene, and tongue-in-cheek approach to its genre trappings that all make the Predator such an enduring and adaptable icon!
Drew Ayers' Article - Bodies, Bullets, and Bad Guys: Elements of the Hardbody Film
