‘The Predator’ – Fox’s succinctly titled effort to revive the franchise of the same name – unfortunately proved to be more of a source of frustration than inspiration. It’s sadly true among fans, and as more time passes since its release, it increasingly seems that the same can be said of those involved with the film’s production.

Between its well-publicized reshoots and other issues arising during production, ‘The Predator’ bears all the marks of a film that was hacked to bits in the edit bay. With that being the case, we have little in the way of hard information concerning what the film was meant to look like. One notable exception to this is the ending.

As we reported previously, the film’s original would have continued the tradition – established in ‘Predator 2’ – of tying the series to the ‘Alien’ films by way of Easter eggs. This was jettisoned in favor of the theatrical ending, which sees a Predator ship leave behind a pod containing a “super suit” of sorts, basically a suit of Predator armor designed for a human. Suffice to say, the new ending didn’t exactly go over as well as the powers that be might have hoped. It’s a sentiment shared on both sides of the camera, as co-writer Fred Dekker revealed when responding to an apologetic fan on Facebook:

“We live in a culture that’s so cacophonous we sometimes cling to our opinions as our only voice in the din. Or we’re so married to our childhood memories of things we love that when the formula is contradicted, some feel betrayed by any attempt to take a different approach. In all candor, I have a lot of issues with the movie (I also hate the super-suit ending!), but I spent three years on it and to have it trashed by toxic fans who don’t have the first clue how hard it is to get anything to the screen, well… that hurts.”

Be sure to check back with ScienceFiction.com for more behind the scenes information on ‘The Predator’ and the future of the franchise as it becomes available.