20 Awesome Recent Horror Movies That Flopped At The Box Office

While it's fair to say that Predator: Badlands was far more of a sci-fi action film than its more horror-tinged predecessors, that didn't stop it being another robust franchise entry.

Director Dan Trachtenberg delivered sly humour alongside thrilling action, while aided by two sharp lead performances from Elle Fanning and Dimitrius Schuster-Koloamatangi.

But Badlands also came to market with a $105 million budget - far higher than any previous film in the series, and likely resulting in the film's more permissive PG-13 audience rating.

Yet even though Badlands became the highest-grossing Predator movie to date, its $184.6 million haul was still a disappointment relative to its large budget, which resulted in a break-even point of around $260 million.

There's a lot to unpack here - though Trachtenberg's two prior Predator movies, Prey and Predator: Killer of Killers, were widely praised, they were also straight-to-streaming ventures, which may have left audiences more reluctant to leave the house for a Predator movie.

It also doesn't help that the last theatrical Predator film, Shane Black's The Predator, was a critical and commercial dud.

Conversely, some franchises just don't have a whole lot of growth potential in them, and so, for as popular as Predator is, it just doesn't seem to connect beyond those already familiar with it.

With that in mind, it seems unlikely we'll see another large-budget Predator movie anytime soon. Expect more modest, mid-budget outings on the scale of Prey.