At the same time, this film shares with its predecessor the problem that neither the aliens nor the predators, but the humans are its focus. The growing use of computer-generated effects to shortcut the filmmaking process has in recent years produced the unfortunate but perhaps expected side effect of decreased believability, but the brothers Strause construct enough realistic situations - and then populate them with actual monsters - to make sure that the audience feels and reacts as if they exist.

Additionally, they employ a preponderance of practical effects (that is, dudes in rubber suits) to give the creatures tangible dimensions. But thankfully, directors Colin and Greg Strause keep the story (such as it is) moving at a quick enough pace that deficiencies in character development or general logic mostly go unnoticed. Predictably, most viewers will assign these characters numbers rather than names because it's an easier way to keep track of how many of them get killed and how often. There's a guy named Dallas (Steven Pasquale) who was recently released from prison and who is trying to save his younger brother Ricky (Johnny Lewis) from a similar fate a soldier named Kelly (Reiko Aylesworth) trying to reconnect with her daughter Molly (Ariel Gade) after returning home from Iraq and a doofus sheriff named Morales (John Ortiz) who is trying to manage this catastrophe as it escalates out of his control.

Screenwriter Shane Salerno ( Armageddon) seems to be fully aware that we care little or nothing about who these people are or what they want, so he provides each of the main characters with only the most threadbare of back stories and then releases them to fend off their infinitely better-equipped, extraterrestrial adversaries. There's a reason I barely mentioned any of the human characters in the film: They aren't important.

Soon, a small band of survivors race to evade death and dismemberment at the hands of either race, and escape the town before the incoming military provides its own solution - namely, to destroy any and all who have come into contact with the alien races. What soon ensues is a violent battle for supremacy writ large against the backdrop of a small midwestern town. But when a scout from the Predator homeworld discovers that the ship crashed, he departs for earth to track down the creatures and rescue the survivors. After a human hunter and his young son discover the vessel, they are impregnated by facehuggers and left to gestate normal aliens.

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