Ah, Predator 2: The Predator movie that really only kinda, sorta, maybe works. Unevenly paced, at times nonsensical, and steeped in the War on Drugs mentality of the early nineties that promoted carte blanche police justice against farcically overpowered street gangs, Predator 2 is a movie that, even if you accept its absurdities, is a hard sell that hasn’t aged well. But that doesn’t mean there aren’t moments of genuine inspiration within the narrative. The scene where an old woman investigates the Predator in her bathroom is hilariously goofy, and the following scene in which a gang of Predators spare Mike Harrigan’s (Danny Glover) life as a sign of respect for a fellow warrior is a hell of a capper.
However, prior to the third act there are a lot of subplots bouncing around that don’t really coalesce into a grander story than “The Predator kills people.” But there is one scene that hints at something more, an angle that could have elevated Predator 2 into something a bit more engaging and thoughtful. There’s one character’s take on the Predators that would have kept the film from feeling like a rehash in a change of scenery and could have offered more to building the mythos of the Predators as they relate to their prey.
I, of course, refer to King Willie.
In the above scene, Harrigan interrogates King Willie (Calvin Lockhart) on the deaths of some of his voodoo cult gang, as their deaths bear a striking resemblance to the deaths of the gang members Harrigan is investigating. However, King Willie is particularly unhelpful as he ruminates on what he perceives as a powerful, unstoppable spirit. Think about that for a second. Leaving aside how King Willie is portrayed as a caricature of Jamaican superstition, there is the interesting nugget of an idea in treating Predators as supernatural deities rather than extraterrestrial hunters. In a cult that embraces death and soul-capture as ritualistic rites, finding an invisible, all-powerful killer in their midst provides opportunities to explore the honor-bound ritualism of the Predators. Would they accept worship and reverence, or would such antic make their prey unsavory? Would the cultists offer themselves up as a fighting tribute, or would they attempt to steer their ghostly benefactor toward their enemies? These are speculative suppositions on my part to be sure, but King Willie and his gang are so underexplored amidst the multitude of unfocused subplots that it’s hard not to wonder just how far one could go in building a religious component into the Predator mythos.
Even so, King Willie himself faces a moment of religious clarity just after Harrigan leaves their conversation. The invisible Predator drops down to the water, the lightning crackling across his armor in a manner that only hints at his massive form. King Willie prepares himself for the inevitable, drawing his swords as the spirit draws closer. He screams, but just as the fight is about to commence we cut to Willie’s face, attached to his severed head clutched in the Predator’s hand. The Predator then methodically cleans the man’s skull and mounts it among the rest of his trophies.
And really, what could be a more fitting end for a religious leader so focused on death ritual? After all, he is now forever immortalized as prey worthy of the Predator’s collection. In life he was a man who ruled the minds and souls of his followers, but in death he has given himself up to a higher power, though perhaps not otherworldly in the sense that he thought. King Willie is a relative blip in the messy plotting of Predator 2, but he is the seed for an idea that could easily germinate in a future film in the franchise.