Predator Trivia
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97 free Predator trivia questions with answers — entertainment quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
Predator started life as a script called Hunter that two unknown brothers slid under a producer's door, and ended up as one of the defining action films of the 1980s. This Predator trivia quiz covers the 1987 original in depth: Dutch and his team, the CIA man with the handshake, the tracker who senses something in the trees, the mud that hides body heat, the chopper, and the alien that removes its mask for a fair fight. Behind the scenes there are questions on Jean-Claude Van Damme's brief spell inside the suit, Kevin Peter Hall and his sasquatch, Stan Winston, James Cameron's mandible suggestion, the red suit behind the cloaking effect, the glow-stick blood, Alan Silvestri's score and Arnold's mid-shoot wedding. The quiz then follows the franchise through Predator 2 in Los Angeles, Predators, The Predator, Prey and its Comanche heroine, Killer of Killers and Predator: Badlands, plus the Alien crossovers and the name fans give the species. Every answer was checked against Wikipedia's articles on the films, and each question shows its source once you have answered.
30 of 97 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01In which year was the original Predator released?
1987
Predator opened at number one in the US in June 1987 with $12 million and finished the year twelfth at the domestic box office.
Q 02Who directed the original Predator?
John McTiernan
John McTiernan had directed only the low-budget horror film Nomads, but it impressed the Predator team enough to win him his first studio film.
Q 03What is the surname of Arnold Schwarzenegger's character, Major Alan "Dutch"?
Schaefer
Schaefer: Schwarzenegger came back to the role 33 years later, voicing Dutch for the 2020 video game Predator: Hunting Grounds.
Q 04What was the script's working title before it became Predator?
Hunter
Hunter: the writers first imagined a band of alien hunters chasing many species, then narrowed it to one creature stalking combat soldiers.
Q 05Which sibling screenwriting duo wrote Predator?
Jim and John Thomas
Jim and John Thomas, then unknowns, resorted to slipping the script under the door of a Fox producer; they later wrote Predator 2 as well.
Q 06Which martial-arts star was originally cast as the Predator before being replaced?
Jean-Claude Van Damme
Jean-Claude Van Damme lasted only briefly in the suit, and the crew still give clashing accounts of his exit, from being too short for the monster to rows over wearing it.
Q 07Which 7-foot-2 actor ultimately played the Predator?
Kevin Peter Hall
Kevin Peter Hall does show his face in Predator: out of the suit, he plays the pilot of the rescue helicopter at the end of the film.
Q 08Which effects artist created the final Predator creature after the original design was scrapped?
Stan Winston
Stan Winston already knew the film's star: he had built the robot effects for The Terminator, and was called in when the first creature failed on set.
Q 09Which director, sitting beside the effects artist on a plane, suggested giving the Predator mandibles?
James Cameron
James Cameron saw the effects artist sketching monsters on the flight and said he had always wanted to see something with mandibles; they went straight into the design.
Q 10Who composed Predator's score?
Alan Silvestri
Alan Silvestri came to the film fresh from Back to the Future and returned for Predator 2; his themes were revived again for Predators in 2010.
Q 11Which Little Richard song plays in the helicopter as the team flies into the jungle?
Long Tall Sally
'Long Tall Sally' plays in the helicopter, and Mac later recites its lyrics while chasing the creature through the trees.
Q 12Who plays CIA agent Al Dillon, Dutch's old Vietnam ally, in Predator?
Carl Weathers
Carl Weathers won the part on the strength of Apollo Creed, his boxer in the Rocky films; the casting director said she loved him in them and knew he would be great.
Q 13What name did the internet give the arm-clasping greeting between Dutch and Dillon?
The Epic Handshake
The 'Epic Handshake' became an object-labelling meme, with the two clasped arms standing for parties agreeing on something.
Q 21Which character in Predator recounts a local legend of a demon that makes trophies of men?
Anna
Anna, the captured guerrilla played by Elpidia Carrillo, knows the tale from her village, where it is told of the hottest summers; she alone leaves the jungle with Dutch.
Q 22Why does the Predator spare the guerrilla prisoner?
It only attacks those it considers a threat
It only attacks those it considers a threat, meaning the armed: Dutch realises this and tells the prisoner to drop her weapon and run for the extraction point.
Q 23What does Dutch cover himself in to hide from the Predator's thermal vision?
Mud
Q 14Jesse Ventura plays which heavy gunner on Dutch's team?
Blain Cooper
Blain Cooper hauls the minigun nicknamed Ol' Painless; the casting director wanted real veterans, and Ventura was a Navy man turned pro wrestler.
Q 15Predator's Jesse Ventura later served as governor of which US state?
Minnesota
Ventura governed Minnesota from 1999 to 2003; Schwarzenegger became governor of California later in 2003, making Predator the rare film with two future governors in its cast.
Q 16Which Predator cast member ran unsuccessfully for governor of Kentucky in 2003?
Sonny Landham
Sonny Landham, who played the team's tracker, mounted a Republican bid for Kentucky governor in 2003 that went nowhere; his co-stars Ventura and Schwarzenegger both actually won governorships.
Q 17Which member of the original Predator cast went on to direct the 2018 sequel The Predator?
Shane Black
Shane Black had just sold his script for Lethal Weapon when he took a small part as the team's radio operator; he co-wrote the 2018 film as well.
Q 18Which team member is the first to be killed by the Predator?
Hawkins
Hawkins is the first to die, killed after catching the fleeing prisoner, who is spared; Blain falls next.
Q 19Bill Duke plays which sergeant, who provokes the team into blindly firing into the jungle?
Mac Eliot
Bill Duke plays Sergeant Mac Eliot, who glimpses the cloaked creature and, enraged at the death of his friend Blain, sets off the wild volley into the trees.
Q 20Which expert tracker on Dutch's team is the first to sense something inhuman in the jungle?
Billy
Billy, the team's tracker, feels the creature's presence long before anyone sees it; he later throws down his gear and waits alone to face it, buying the others time.
Mud: Dutch finds the trick by accident, when he crawls from a river onto a muddy bank and the Predator walks straight past him.
Q 24Predator is set in which region?
A Central American jungle
The story is set in a Central American jungle; the writers chose the region because US special forces were running operations there at the time.
Q 25Most of Predator was actually filmed near which Mexican resort city?
Puerto Vallarta
Puerto Vallarta: its jungle was so dry and brown during the shoot that crews trucked in plants and watered the locations daily to keep it green.
Q 26Roughly how much did Predator gross worldwide on its original 1987 release?
$100 million
Roughly $100 million, $98 million by the trackers' count: enough of a return to launch a franchise of sequels, crossover films, comics and games.
Q 27Predator received a single Academy Award nomination, in which category?
Best Visual Effects
Best Visual Effects was a two-film race that year, and Predator's creature and shimmering cloak lost it to Innerspace.
Q 28What colour suit was worn on set to create the Predator's cloaking effect?
Red
Red stood out most against the jungle's greens and the blue sky, so the suit could be matted out of the shot and the gap filled with background footage.
Q 29The Predator's glowing green blood was made from glow-stick liquid mixed with what?
Personal lubricant
The luminous blood was glow-stick fluid mixed with K-Y personal lubricant; the suit's electrical spark effects were rotoscoped by hand on light tables.
Q 30Producer Joel Silver came to Predator fresh from which earlier Schwarzenegger hit?
Commando
Commando: Silver had produced the 1985 hit, and the casting team liked Bill Duke in it so much that he was brought along to Predator too.