Todd Terwilliger

I’d like to pitch my idea for the next film in the Predator franchise. No, it’s not another Predator vs. Alien or even Predator vs. Danny Glover. No, this will be a new direction, a bold new direction, from north to north-northeast into a virgin untamed movie landscape. Allow me to set the scene.

Peace reigns in the galaxy at large. The Alien menace, while not eradicated, has been contained to a handful of isolated planets which have been converted into giant landfills. An Alien, it turns out, will eat just about anything.

This hard-fought peace has brought the Predator economy to its knees. Young Predators are no longer sent out out to earn their badges of machismo but to bring back cash for their impoverished families. Collecting a rare scalp is nice but it doesn’t put Predator food on the Predator table.

Ladies and gentlemen, this is topical stuff. Imagine a montage and a text crawl, narrated by Liev Schreiber. It’ll be a powerful, emotional beginning to a powerful and emotional experience.

Enter young Predator, G’Ghlargh, who, as chance has it, finds himself on Earth, in New York City. Unlike his forebears, however, he is not here to kill, he’s here for work. Can he melt into the great melting pot? This is a powerful, immigrant tale that will appeal to migrants and intransigents of all ages.

The Predator is able to cobble together an identity, a shared apartment in Brooklyn, and an entry-level job. People mistake his meat-hair for dreadlocks, they think he’s from the islands- it’s Enemy Mine meets Soul Man!

G’Ghlargh gets himself a job in a mail room, at a bailed out banking company- think Citi or AIG. G’Ghlargh uses his Predator powers to conquer the busy mail room. And more- he discovers how the giant corporation can recover from its free-fall, turn things around, if only someone, anyone, will listen to him.

As G’Ghlargh works his way up the corporate ladder, sometimes via the elevator, sometimes just by scaling the skyscraper walls, he finds love with the secretary of the evil CEO. It’s She’s Got to Have It meets The Secret of My Success with a new, edgy, updated spin. Michael J. Fox can cameo. We’ll get those Yello guys to do an updated bow-bow-chka-chka song with Justin Timberlake. It’ll be the hottest soundtrack on iTunes.

Dispatching the CEO through his new-found economic moxie and skill at spinal cord tearing, G’Ghlargh earns both the prize of manhood and of increased profits and stability for his shareholders. He returns to the Predator homeworld with his bride, soon to be sacrificed in a horrific birthing ceremony beyond human comprehension, but not before giving birth to a brood of sequel-ready human-Predator hybrids with murder-filled hearts and brains bent on soulless capitalism.

Think Return of the King – it’ll make us laugh, it’ll make us cry. We’ll get Annie Lennox to write a weepy ballad for the closing credits. Into the Abyss, we’ll call it. It’s adult-easy-listening gold. Gold!

This film could be bigger than The Last Starfighter with the cultural relevance of Gleaming the Cube. What do you think? Are you with me?

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