How Prey changes history of Darkhorse’s Predator comics: Details explored as Raphael Adolini’s gun’s origin is changed in movie

The latest film in the Predator franchise, Prey, has retconned a significant detail in the film’s continuity. Since the release of the first movie, Predator, in 1987, tech-savvy hunters have developed a cult following.

Hailing from the Yautja species, these apex predators pop onto our blue planet for a hunt and to prove themselves as worthy hunters. However, after the first two films, the timeline of the Predators film franchise was a mess.

The film franchise has kept its fair share of mysteries, with one being the secret of the flint stock pistol famously given by Greyback to Michael Harrigan. The mystery was seemingly solved by the Dark Horse Comic Predator: 1718.

However, the new movie Prey has changed the history of the gun yet again, creating a conundrum of where the gun came from and how it will land in Grayback’s custody.

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In Prey, flint stock gun given by trapper to Naru is engraved “Raphael Adolini 1715”

Prey is one of the best films in the Predator franchise. The story takes place in 1719 in the Great Plains, and our protagonist is Naru, a member of the midwestern Comanches tribe.

Naru can be seen marveling at the Yautja spaceship, assuming it to be a thunderbird, a noble creature that symbolizes power, protection, and strength.

Naru, just like the other tribespeople, dreams of being a hunter, but the women of the tribe are restricted from hunting activities. When a Yautja is seen hunting trappers and her tribe on the great plains, Naru takes it upon herself to prove her might and slay the feared Yautja beast.

Naru and her brother, Taabe, after escaping from the French fur traders’ trap, re-approach their camp to rescue their dog, only to find their people dead. One of the fur traders calls on Naru to offer her his flint stock pistol to protect her.

After Taabe loses his life, Naru sneaks up on Yautja by consuming an orange flower that cools her blood, making her invisible to the Predator’s thermal vision. She uses the flint stock to shoot the mask off his face and kills the Predator using a projectile that follows the lasers from the same mask.

At the film’s end, Naru offers the gun to the tribe chieftain, and it is revealed that the gun is the same flint stock offered to Harrigan by the Yautja Greyback. To refresh the memory, in 1990’s Predator 2, after Danny Glover’s character Harrigan kills the Predator, the Greyback offers him the gun with the engraving “Raphael Adolini 1715” as a mark of respect.

While viewers thought that the mystery behind Adolini’s flint stock would be solved in the sequel, sadly, it wasn’t.

Fans had to wait six years before the release of Predator: 1718, a comic by Dark Horse that revealed the mystery of the gun. The flint stock belonged to pirate captain Raphael Adolini, who clashed with his crew over a mutiny.

Furious that his crew robbed the sacred gold from a church, he took them on one by one. The Predator Greyback popped in to help Adolini, but the captain was shot in the back by his crew member.

With his dying breath, Adolini offered the flint stock to Greyback.

Earlier, while fans had explanations for the mystery of guns, they now have two. The sad part is that both reveals are contrasting, which means that either one of the reveals exists in Predator continuity and not both.

We assume Prey has retconned the comic book origins of Adolini. The gun is now expected to be taken by Greyback, which will then be given to Harrigan.

How this will happen is the next mystery as fans wait for the sequel to Prey. However, fans must pay attention to the animated credit scene that showcases multiple alien ships approaching the Comanche camp. Perhaps the makers have already hinted at a sequel.

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Prey is now available on Hulu. The film stars Amber Midthunder as Naru, Dakota Beavers as Taabe, Ray Strachan, Stefany Mathias, and Dane DiLiegro as Predator.