Written by Mr. Mouseburger 2nd Jun 2005
The Predator is an extra-terrestrial hunter, who values the sport afforded by a worthy adversary above all else.
For this reason, it eliminates its prey in a manner befitting it, i.e. the more of a challenge you prove to be, the more of a chance it will give you.
This is fortunate for Dutch, as he is a genuine 80s action superhero, and earns himself some real alien respect by evading the Predator and injuring him with a makeshift bow and an explosive charge.
The hunter has already taken minor damage from gunfire from earlier skirmishes, but this explosion knocks out the reactive camouflage feature of its body armour, and it is forced to proceed, for the first time, fully visble.
Ironically, it is at around this time that Dutch realises that the creature sees in the infrared spectrum, so he can turn himself almost invisible by coating his body with cool, wet clay.
Tracking his adversary by its luminescent green blood, Dutch seemingly corners it in a cave, but the Predator is still fearsome even when injured. It slashes and beats him for a while, before stopping dramatically and throwing its blaster and helmet away. The message is clear, Dutch has earned himself the ultimate honour - he will be killed by the Predator without any help from gadgets.
This gives the muscle bound human a fighting chance, but really, not much of one. The Predator still overmatches him in strength and damage inflicting potential, and Dutch gets smacked about all over the jungle.
There is method to the way he receives his beating though, and he manages to lead his foe to a highly sophisticated trap mechanism he has camouflaged in a ditch. Too smart to be caught by such a primitive trap, the Predator decides to simply walk around the ditch and avoid the obstacle.
However, fortune favours the American Special forces guy, as he notices the Predator has now placed himself directly under the trap's counterbalance. Dutch springs the trap, and the alien is smashed into Terra Firma by a huge log.
Dutch breathes a huge sigh of relief, but then hears his tormentor is still alive. He picks up a large stone and prepares to cave in the Predator's skull for good.
...but then he stops. The alien is clearly mortally wounded and there is no need to despatch it in such a way. Perhaps he is suffering from some kind of strange Stockholm Syndrome and empathises with the hunter's warrior code, or maybe he just doesn't want to get glowing green blood splattered over him.
The Predator, finally beaten, still has one surprise to give our hero though, and sets off a timed explosion from a device on his arm. The time frame before detonation is just enough for a man at full sprint to get out of the blast radius. Again, this might be a further subtle insight into the alien's warrior ethos (giving it's killer a chance of escape) or it could just be a rather crap design fault by the manufacturer.
Old Bluffer's nit-picking
I really hated the cliched laughter they gave the Predator when he set off his very cool looking self-destruct device. Surely they could have concocted some alien sounding laughter instead? As it is, it sounds like someone's sad old uncle doing an impression of a Bond Villain.
The predator should not have died.
It would not be a Hollywood ending though if the main adversary was allowed to live - his death indicates the end of the peril in the film, and everyone can go home safe in the knowledge that the foe has been vanquished (at least until the sequel).
He was a cool baddie though; they just dont seem to make them like they used to.
Mouseburger
I think the Predator's explosive device was more meant to erase any evidence of his presence (blowing up himself and the pieces of armor and weaponry laying around after he took them off so there's nothing to be retrieved and studied) and preserve his dignity (rather then admit defeat and allow himself to be killed by his own prey)
Yep, the predator has a Bushido-like hunters code.
Funny, I thought it was a falling log that did the Predator in.
Like Pyro said, the Predator blew himself up to get rid of any evidence of his existence. He would have died anyway from being squashed.
Writeup significantly expanded as it was a bit brief. Also added a load of new categories which I think apply.
I really liked the last lines, reflects what badasses both parties are
Dutch: "What the hell are you?"
Predator: "What the hell are you?"
I always thought the Predator was just parroting back Dutch's lines without understanding them, perhaps to mock him.
Is there any evidence in the sequel that the Predator's have bothered to learn English?
I don't think they actually understand what they mean. In the sequel, the Predator plays back a recording of a kid going "Want some candy?" as he walks menacingly towards Bill Paxton. That said, the Predator does say "S**t happens" in the right context as he activates his self-destruct. The Predator also uses a recording of Danny Glover to Rueben Blades, but this might be because he understands the friendship between the two characters and exploits it to hunt Rueben.
The elder Predator at the end does say "Take it" after throwing Danny a gun, which might indicate some limited understanding on his part.
IMO, the laughter at the end by the predator is supposed to be its version of Billy's laugh and he is laughing because he thinks his setting off the "bomb" will kill the man who killed him.
I think the Predators understand a lot about humans and their language - especially in the wake of Alien vs. Predator's backstory.
We will learn later that the self-destruct thing is also to prevent aliens proliferation