Designing The Unknown, The Story Behind The Lost Predator’s Ship

Mystery Revealed.

Per the official press kit released by the Twentieth Century Fox Corporation for Predator 2, it reads “eschewing the typical monitors, consoles, dials, switches and blinking lights, Paull has created an embryonic, organic environment designed in the Predator’s own image, with walls of a translucent substance and machine-like motifs.”

“Bio-mechanical.” “Embryonic.” “Organic.” “Living.” “Breathing.” “Heartbeat.”  From the scripts and studio material to the press, cast and crew, these are the words being used to describe aspects of this wonderous Lost Predator spacecraft, a ship where its inspiration came from a living underwater organism.

In the 2004 DVD Special Edition Commentary of Predator 2, writer John Thomas even indicated that the Lost Predator ship had “a little kind of semblance to the bone ship in Alien,” a craft known to resemble more organism than machine, that ultimately may have been biological in origin.

No monitors. No switches. No dials. All of this points to the Lost Predator ship likely being biological and alive in some present or past tense form.  And that is the mystery revealed. But how does it work?

According to both the December 1990 issue of Fangoria and the January 1990 issue of Fantazia, Larry Paull suggested there was a symbiotic relationship between a Predator and his craft, “giving the ship and its master a bizarre kind of unity.” So is the Lost Predator ship built around some matter of lifeform, harnessed into a slavery to serve this intergalactic hunter tribe?

There is a famous Star Trek: The Next Generation episode titled Encounter at Farpoint where a race of beings have secretly captured a gigantic alien lifeform and transformed it into Farpoint Station, feeding off the lifeform’s energy to power it. Farscape is set almost entirely on a living ship known as a Leviathan, as is an older show called Lexx. Could it be possible that the Lost Predators have hunted and captured their own large alien lifeform, to harness its power in the same vein?

Ironically creator Larry Paull invoked Star Trek when speaking to the December 1990 issue of Fangoria about his Lost Predator Ship creation, revealing to readers this is a secret that we may never learn:

“This film won’t be answering a lot of Star Trek and Star Wars type of questions. You won’t be finding out just how all this works. You’re just going to see it and know, somehow, that it does.”

On November 10^th, 2019 while this article was being written, we were struck with the terribly sad news that the great Lawrence G. Paull had passed away. He was 81. Hopefully he is on his way to discovering some secrets of his own. Larry Paull’s work will always be remembered, and the man will truly be missed.

We would also like to give a special thanks to artist Mark Sullivan for his invaluable time, as well as Ian and Marc Shapiro.