The Yautja — the menacing species of hunters from the “Predator” movie series — aren’t exactly the most compelling aliens around.

They hunt. They turn intermittently invisible. They kill.

They don’t say much.

So if you’re going to make one of them the protagonist of your movie — as director Dan Trachtenberg has with “Predator: Badlands” — you’d be wise to give that Yautja a colorful sidekick.

That’s what we get in Elle Fanning’s Thia, a synthetic, human-like creation that’s both chatty and emotionally complex. Fanning’s performance helps the highly entertaining movie push up against what is ultimately only a medium-high ceiling.

“Badlands” begins on the home world of the Yautja, which is where we meet our fanged hero-to-be, Dek (Dimitrius Schuster-Koloamatangi).

Not yet a full member of his clan and still to earn one of the cloaking devices that have made the Yautja such dangerous foes dating back to 1987’s “Predator,” he engages in a blade fight with his brother, Kwei (Mike Homik). Kwei ultimately tries to talk Dek out of his plan to earn the trophy of all trophies, the head of a massive monster known as the Kalisk, residing on the extremely dangerous planet Genna.

Despite the well-choreographed action, this is all rather uninteresting, as is the similarly testosterone-heavy subsequent confrontation with their physically imposing father. We’ll refrain from providing the details of that clash, but the latter likely won’t be in the running for Yautja Dad of the Year anytime soon.

In “Predator: Badlands,” an undersized Yautja hunter tries to prove his worth. (Courtesy of 20th Century Studios)

Regardless, off to Genna the undersized Dek heads. There, he quickly finds himself in a jungle, the dangers of which put Earth’s hairiest jungles to shame.

Soon, he’s out of that den of alien snakes and finds himself the desired next meal of a circling winged creature, one that knows how to use the planet’s perilous environment to its advantage. Nearby resides Thia, legless and trapped in the “vulture’s nest,” as she puts it. She could help Dek, she tells him, but she’ll need a weapon. And while he wants to be a big boy and accomplish his task on his own, he soon has little choice but to enlist her aid.

Thia is desperate to return to the outpost of the company that sent her and other synthetics to Genna — a company that will be quite familiar to many science-fiction fans — to reattach her legs. She sells Dek on the idea that she is but a “tool” he can use in the hunt for the Kalisk and soon is riding on his back and offering running commentary — think a severed C-3PO slung behind Chewbacca in “The Empire Strikes Back.”

Elle Fanning’s Thia spends much of her time on the back of Dimitrius Schuster-Koloamatangi’s Dek in “Predator: Badlands.” (Courtesy of 20th Century Studios)

At first, Dek finds her annoying but admittedly useful, though he grows to truly value her as the story progresses, a story that, along with the Kalisk, which possesses a rare ability, brings in the menace that is Thia’s “sister,” Tessa (also portrayed by Fanning).

Dimitrius Schuster-Koloamatangi’s Dek encounters the massive Kalisk in a scene from “Predator: Badlands.” (Courtesy of 20th Century Studios)

Trachtenberg has — since directing 2016’s “10 Cloverfield Lane” — planted himself in the “Predator”-verse when it comes to film. After helming the well-received “Prey,” set on Earth in the early 1700s, he directed the impressive animated movie “Predator: Killer of Killers,” which debuted in June on Hulu.

On “Badlands,” he shares the story credit with screenwriter Patrick Aison. They’ve presented a tale that, while rather shallow, works pretty well.

We would have been happy to spend a bit more time with Thia, a delight thanks largely to Fanning (“Super 8,” “A Complete Unknown”). Outstanding on the canceled-too-soon series “The Great,” she brings a lot of personality to Thia … if not to Tessa.

(“Predator: Badlands” contains sequences of strong sci-fi violence)

‘PREDATOR: BADLANDS’

Rated PG-13. At the AMC Boston Common, Causeway, South Bay Center, Alamo Drafthouse Seaport, Landmark Kendall Square and suburban theaters.

Grade: B+