Prey
2022 · Directed by Dan Trachtenberg
Woke Score
CriticCritic Score
Audience
Woke
Critics rated this 9 points above its woke score. Among Woke films, this critic score ranks #56 of 88.
Representation Casting
Score: 95/100
The film features predominantly indigenous casting throughout, with Amber Midthunder in the lead role and most principal cast members drawn from indigenous communities. The production actively centered indigenous talent both in front of and behind the camera.
LGBTQ+ Themes
Score: 0/100
No evidence of LGBTQ+ themes or representation in the film. The narrative focuses on survival and combat without exploring sexual orientation or gender identity.
Feminist Agenda
Score: 65/100
The protagonist is a capable female warrior who drives the narrative and proves herself through competence rather than romantic subplot. However, the feminist elements are largely incidental to the action-thriller format rather than thematically central.
Racial Consciousness
Score: 70/100
The film centers Comanche culture and history, presenting indigenous people as protagonists in their own story rather than supporting characters. The setting in pre-colonial Comanche Nation and the emphasis on indigenous agency demonstrates significant racial consciousness.
Climate Crusade
Score: 0/100
No evidence of climate-related themes or environmental messaging. The film is set in a historical period and focuses on survival against an alien threat without environmental commentary.
Eat the Rich
Score: 0/100
No anti-capitalist messaging or critique of wealth and economic systems. The film is a straightforward action-thriller set in a pre-industrial society.
Body Positivity
Score: 0/100
No evidence of body positivity messaging. The film features conventionally fit action stars without commentary on body diversity.
Neurodivergence
Score: 0/100
No representation or discussion of neurodivergence. The narrative does not address autism, ADHD, dyslexia, or other neurological differences.
Revisionist History
Score: 15/100
The film presents a fictional alternate history (alien invasion in pre-colonial America) rather than revisionist history per se. There is minimal historical revisionism beyond the speculative sci-fi premise.
Lecture Energy
Score: 25/100
The film generally avoids heavy-handed messaging, allowing indigenous representation to speak for itself. Some dialogue explaining Comanche culture and traditions contains mild expository elements but remains relatively restrained for a modern blockbuster.
Synopsis
When danger threatens her camp, the fierce and highly skilled Comanche warrior Naru sets out to protect her people. But the prey she stalks turns out to be a highly evolved alien predator with a technically advanced arsenal.
Consciousness Assessment
Prey arrives as a curious artifact of contemporary studio filmmaking, a Predator franchise installment that functions less as a sermon and more as a straightforward action vehicle. The film's primary cultural intervention is its casting and setting: a prequel that relocates the extraterrestrial hunter narrative to the Comanche Nation circa 1718, with predominantly indigenous cast and crew. This represents a notable departure from the franchise's previous entries and demonstrates a deliberate commitment to representation that extends beyond tokenism.
The film's approach to its source material and cultural context is refreshingly unselfconscious. Rather than pausing to explain Comanche society or treating indigenous culture as exotic backdrop, it presents Naru's world as simply the world, complete with its own logic, conflicts, and competencies. Amber Midthunder carries the film with the kind of understated physicality that suggests a warrior trained in the traditions of her people, not an action heroine retrofitted into a preexisting template. The surrounding cast, drawn substantially from indigenous communities, provides narrative weight that prevents the production from feeling like an exercise in box-checking.
Where the film declines to excel is in any deeper engagement with progressive sensibilities beyond representation itself. The narrative remains locked into genre conventions: survival against a superior opponent, minimal character development beyond combat capability, no examination of systems or structures beyond the immediate threat. This is not a failure so much as a circumscribed ambition. Prey succeeds as an action film that happens to center indigenous people rather than as a work of profound cultural interrogation. For those seeking substantive progressive messaging, the restraint will read as either refreshing or insufficient, depending on one's expectations for modern blockbuster cinema.
Analysis generated by our Consciousness Algorithm
Critic Reviews
“A far better prospect than even the most ardent Predator fan could have wished for.”
“Prey is a glorious monster flick, a sly revisionist Western and a really cool “Predator” sequel for viewers who don’t mind a little fan service here and there. ”
“The only real downside to Prey is the streaming format through which it'll be released, with the 20th Century movie being shuttled over to drop on Hulu later this week. It's no hyperbole to say that this is a film that demands to be seen on as big a screen as possible, if only in order to thoroughly appreciate one of the best action movies of the year thus far, let alone one of the best Predator movies since the first.”
“Prey proves to be an apropos title, as the film is cowed by John McTiernan’s original Predator.”
Consciousness Markers
The film features predominantly indigenous casting throughout, with Amber Midthunder in the lead role and most principal cast members drawn from indigenous communities. The production actively centered indigenous talent both in front of and behind the camera.
No evidence of LGBTQ+ themes or representation in the film. The narrative focuses on survival and combat without exploring sexual orientation or gender identity.
The protagonist is a capable female warrior who drives the narrative and proves herself through competence rather than romantic subplot. However, the feminist elements are largely incidental to the action-thriller format rather than thematically central.
The film centers Comanche culture and history, presenting indigenous people as protagonists in their own story rather than supporting characters. The setting in pre-colonial Comanche Nation and the emphasis on indigenous agency demonstrates significant racial consciousness.
No evidence of climate-related themes or environmental messaging. The film is set in a historical period and focuses on survival against an alien threat without environmental commentary.
No anti-capitalist messaging or critique of wealth and economic systems. The film is a straightforward action-thriller set in a pre-industrial society.
No evidence of body positivity messaging. The film features conventionally fit action stars without commentary on body diversity.
No representation or discussion of neurodivergence. The narrative does not address autism, ADHD, dyslexia, or other neurological differences.
The film presents a fictional alternate history (alien invasion in pre-colonial America) rather than revisionist history per se. There is minimal historical revisionism beyond the speculative sci-fi premise.
The film generally avoids heavy-handed messaging, allowing indigenous representation to speak for itself. Some dialogue explaining Comanche culture and traditions contains mild expository elements but remains relatively restrained for a modern blockbuster.