Last fall, we heard the surprising news that 10 Cloverfield Lane director Dan Trachtenberg had secretly been working on a new Predator movie. Under the title Skulls, the movie was originally said to follow a Comanche woman who goes against gender norms and traditions to become a warrior. But thanks to Hollywood not being able to keep secrets, we know that this will actually be another movie in the Predator franchise at 20th Century Studios, and an up-and-coming Native American actress is taking the lead role.

Discussing Film has learned that Legion star Amber Midthunder is taking the lead role in Skulls, which will soon be starting production in Calgary, Alberta. /Film has independently confirmed the accuracy of this report. Midthunder can currently be seen as a series regular on The CW’s Roswell, New Mexico, so she already has some alien experience. Otherwise, she’ll soon be seen alongside Liam Neeson in The Ice Road, and she also had a bit part with him recently in The Marksman too.

We don’t know exactly how the Predator franchise ties into the plot for Skulls. However, the powerful aliens who have killed some of Earth’s deadliest soldiers would make for a formidable opponent if the aforementioned Comanche woman was out on her own in the middle of the woods trying to prove herself as a warrior. Perhaps thinking she’s being tested by her tribe, she will try to deal with the stealthy creatures as best she can. That’s purely speculation on our part, but if that’s the case, we’re again frustrated by how much fun this reveal would have been in theaters. It would have blown the Unbreakable reveal at the end of Split out of the water.

Skulls is written by Patrick Aison, marking his feature writing debut, but he previously work as a co-executive producer for the Jason Bourne franchise spin-off series Treadstone and as a supervising producer/writer for Amazon’s Jack Ryan series. Aison also worked as a consultant on FX’s Legion, which may be how Dan Trachtenberg found Amber Midthunder for the lead role.

John Davis, who has produced all of the Predator movies over the years (including the Alien vs Predator movies), is again producing through Davis Entertainment. With production beginning imminently, we can probably expect to see the movie in theaters sometime next year.

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