Why The Predator Skins Its Victims

The culture of the creatures at the center of the Predator franchise has been well established across various forms of media, and one of the most noteworthy practices of their honor-based hunting culture is their skinning of certain victims. The Predator movie franchise has seen the alien hunters kill across different time periods and on different planets, and over time more information has been revealed about what motivates the species known as the Yautja. Their honor-based culture involves finding, killing. and taking trophies from other organisms that they deem to be worthy, dangerous adversaries.

However, on several occasions in the Predator movies, victims are left skinless and hanging after an encounter with a Predator. The first special forces unit to encounter the alien in Guatemala (before Dutch Schaeffer and his unit ran afoul of it in Predator) were discovered skinned and disemboweled, and hanging from their ankles on display. The Jamaican Voodoo Posse suffered from a similar fate when they were stalked and killed by the cloaked Predator referred to as the City Hunter in Predator 2. The logic that determines which opponents are skinned and displayed is a fascinating element of Yautja culture.

Skinned Victims Are Considered Easy Prey In Predator

Leaving A Skinned Victim Behind Serves Dual Purposes

The purpose of each Predator is to seek out organisms that it deems worthy of being hunted, or that pose some sort of legitimate threat. In multiple Predator movies, the hunters are seen taking down other creatures besides humans or Xenomorphs, and it’s made clear that they are searching for something stronger than themselves that poses a real challenge. The skinning (and sometimes disemboweling) is intended to represent their unworthiness in the eyes of the hunters. It’s a mark that they were still killed by the Predator, likely after being stalked by it, but were found to be “easy prey”.

In the example of Jim Hopper’s unit in Alien, they were still an elite group of killers by human standards, but their inability to even understand what was hunting them or locate their enemy due to the Cloak made them easy prey to the seasoned hunter in the jungle. The fact that Dutch’s unit found them points to the secondary purpose for the skinning of victims: intimidation. The skinning and hanging of their conquered opponents is intended to scare and warn other potential opponents in the area.

Why The Predator Keeps Trophies Of Some Victims

They Are A Representation Of Their Skill And Honor

A Yautja hunter will occasionally collect a memento from one of their victims while on a hunt, but only under a specific set of circumstances. While it’s not a hard and fast rule, the trophy is typically the skull of the opponent (stripped of skin and muscle) with the spinal column sometimes attached. The trophies are typically worn or proudly displayed as a representation of the Predator’s skill, so in order for an opponent to qualify for a trophy, it needs to have posed some sort of legitimate threat to the Predator.

Predators have been shown to collect other items while on hunts, such as the flintlock pistol that Greyback the Elder Predator presents Mike Harrigan with in Predator 2, although it should be noted that it was more of a gift than a trophy of a conquered foe. It’s still indicative of how much worth each Predator assigns to the items they collect on hunts, trophies chief among them. It’s an important distinction that signifies the worthiness of an opponent, and as the Predator franchise shows, the more dangerous an opponent, the greater the honor for the hunter.