For the last 34 years, the arcade sensation Mortal Kombat has lit up gamers in their quest to defeat the evil Shao Khan, emperor of Outworld, in his quest to claim Earthrealm for his own. Of course, one could side with Shao Khan by playing as one of his emissaries in PvP mode, but, generally speaking, the goal was to defend Earthrealm by any means necessary. Adapted several times in various formats (theatrical, episodic, comic book, direct-to-home video animation), as well as restarted over and over throughout the various video game cycles, Mortal Kombat may be complicated in lore but is ever simple in execution: kill or be killed. In 2021, director Simon McQuoid made his directorial debut with Jeremy Slater’s (Death Note; Godzilla × Kong: The New Empire) script for Mortal Kombat (2021), revamping the series with new rules, new restrictions, and even a new character. For all its missteps, it ultimately delivers an entertaining time due to scene-stealing moments from Josh Lawson’s (House of Lies) Kano and the badassery of actors Joe Taslim (The Furious; The Raid) and Hiroyuki Sanada (Legend of the Eight Samurai; John Wick: Chapter Four). Ready to go for another round, McQuoid, Slater, and many of the original cast return via Mortal Kombat II, which is bigger, bloodier, and frustratingly less inspired than before.
Martyn Ford as Shao Kahn in New Line Cinema’s MORTAL KOMBAT II, a Warner Bros. Pictures release. Photo courtesy of Warner Bros. Pictures. © 2026 Warner Bros. Ent. All Rights Reserved.
After preventing Shang Tsung (Chin Han) from sabotaging Earthrealm’s champions, preventing them from competing in the upcoming 10th and presumably final tournament so that Outworld can claim Earthrealm for themselves, Elder God Lord Raiden (Tadanobu Asano) begins final preparations for the Earthrealm champions’ entry into Mortal Kombat. Having lost Kung Lao (Max Huang), the champions of Earth seek to fill his spot by recruiting a fighter with the potential to turn the tide in their favor in the most unlikely of places, Hollywood, California, with none other than washed-up action hero Johnny Cage (Karl Urban). With the tournament set to begin and no time for training, the hopes of all turn toward a Hollywood Zero transforming into an Earthrealm Hero.
“And now, for a taste of things to come…”
– Shang Tsung (Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa) in Mortal Kombat (1995)
It’s seems necessary, strangely, to include some bona fides before moving forward: I’m old enough to have seen Mortal Kombat (1995) and Annihilation (1997) in theaters, am currently listening to both soundtracks from the CDs I bought at those times, have been playing the MK series in some capacity (though not always to storyline completion) since the first arcade cabinet, have watched the various television and limited series adaptations (including the fabulous webseries Legacy), and seen most of the animated Legends series (though reviewed only two). In addition, like Boon and Tobias, I have an affinity for the martial arts films that inspired the series, growing up in a Jean-Claude Van Damme (Bloodsport; Double Impact) household that also enjoyed the American Ninja series (among others) and has now, as an adult, turned to see what encouraged the Muscles from Bussels by exploring Shaw Bros., Fortune Star, Golden Harvest, and others. That all being said, I did not enjoy this film and, the point, dear reader, is that it’s not because I’m not a fan or am unfamiliar with the material.
“This is not good… but I’m fine… I can handle this… So, this is Outworld, huh? Well, I can see why they want a change of scenery!”
– Johnny Cage (Linden Ashby) in Mortal Kombat (1995)
Slater takes smart advantage of this being a sequel by adding and removing elements that should be left in Mortal Kombat 2021 (such as: arcana; the dragon marks) in order to move forward with the next stage of the adventure. This enables a much smoother transition as new characters are introduced, while not sidelining familiar faces in the process amid the quickly escalating stakes. Where the first film is all setup of characters amid skirmishes in advance of the upcoming tournament, Mortal Kombat II is almost entirely comprised of the tournament with events happening before, during, and after. The intention is to create an internal rising tension that sets the audience on edge as our favorite fighters seek to survive and/or conquer. Rather than just diving in, much like 2021, II opens by establishing the relationship between Shao Khan (Martyn Ford) and Kitana (Adeline Rudolph), the realm of Edenia (where much of the narrative takes place), and the rules of the Mortal Kombat tournament. Through this comes the inclusion of characters who play significant roles in the success and failure for the tournament: Queen Sindel (Ana Thu Nguyen), Jade (Tati Gabrielle), and the narratively significant Quan Chi (Damon Herriman). As was teased by 2021’s Cole Young (Lewis Tan) at the end of MK 2021, Johnny Cage joins the roster in this cinematic entry and it’s one of the best things about the film, bested only by the return of Josh Lawson’s Kano. Played by genre-hopping actor Karl Urban (Dredd; Star Trek Beyond; The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King), Cage brings the right energy of WTAF to just about each scenario, serving as the audience’s surrogate, just as Cole Young did before him. If this seems like a lot, you wouldn’t be wrong, and it becomes noticeable the further into the film one goes as the need to balance old and new characters amid new obstacles and formidable challenges starts to wear down to the point that the on-point recreations of game-based moments can’t fully obfuscate the middle story syndrome that permeates throughout and the reliance on nostalgia to generate meaning and/or significance. Put simply, just because Mortal Kombat II knows when to ring that bell and make audiences salivate doesn’t mean that its methods aren’t hollow.
Adeline Rudolph as Kitana in New Line Cinema’s MORTAL KOMBAT II, a Warner Bros. Pictures release. Photo courtesy of Warner Bros. Pictures. © 2026 Warner Bros. Ent. All Rights Reserved.
Video game adaptations are hit and miss most of the time, largely because the desire to recreate the gaming experience becomes tantamount to narrative. For a series like II, just having the characters on-screen, to see them battle one another, to be able to identify that familiar end-match wobble, set location, or fatality can feel like enough when the games (as they progressed) started to integrate a story that mostly served as a break from slamming buttons on a controller or console. But there *is* a story of secret shifts behind the scenes (2002’s Deadly Alliance), of betrayals leading to tragic consequences (2011’s Mortal Kombat), and the devastating outcome of these long-gestating plans (2016’s Mortal Kombat X). Slater borrows heavily from these games in ways that will please series fans as seeing anything familiar drops that delicious dose of dopamine, but it entirely comes off as gobbledygook to the outside. To get vaguely specific, a pay-off to a joke made in MK 2021 finds Kano stealing something from Raiden’s temple and that action is critical to the events of II. Smart, easy, and demonstrates a reason to resurrect Kano via Quan Chi’s dark magic arts and connects the events of 2021 directly to now — excellent choice; well-played. Additionally, in a move that speaks to trusting the audience, the script doesn’t explain who Quan Chi is any more than it needs to. Instead, for those who know and recognize the name of the amulet, a certain amount of seat jumping is going to occur. However, and this is most significant, for the rest of the audience who don’t, it’s meaningless in a way that frustrates because the name implies a significance that is never explained; an issue that’s emblematic of the issues with Mortal Kombat II on the whole. And before someone says that’s what the next film is for, the intention should be to tell the story in front of us fully. This is precisely the central issue with MK 2021 as the film serves as little more than setup for the tournament itself, which we are now observing. So, either it was ok then or it’s not ok now, but one should be consistent with the complaint. Just because both films serve up live-action recreations of favorite fatalities shouldn’t be enough to push aside that, as a film adaptation, both recent MK films forget to build an engaging story first, then develop fight sequences that move the characters and the stakes forward. Unfortunately, both iterations seem content in providing excuses for splitting characters in twain either by sword or chakram hat and forgetting that the characters need arcs, too. It sure feels good to watch Scorpion split Noob Saibot (Joe Taslim) in half, but what difference does it make? One can have the violence *and* emotional significance and audiences deserve more.
This right here cuts to the heart of the major issue with II — violence is the goal, not the survival of humanity.
L-R: Damon Herriman as Quan Chi and Max Huang as Kung Lao in New Line Cinema’s MORTAL KOMBAT II, a Warner Bros. Pictures release. Photo courtesy of Warner Bros. Pictures. © 2026 Warner Bros. Ent. All Rights Reserved.
In 1995’s Mortal Kombat and 2020’s Mortal Kombat Legends: Scorpion’s Revenge, each film utilized Johnny Cage, Sonya Blade, and Liu Kang as entry points for the audience. Even while introducing the larger ensemble (or integrating Scorpion as a key component to Earthrealm’s survival), the focus on these three enabled the audience to know who and what mattered when bodies started dropping. There was weight. The mistake of the first film was the introduction of a new character, which required establishing new relationships instead of cementing old ones. Lewis Tan (Mike & Nick & Nick & Alice; Iron Fist; Wu Assassins) is a capable actor and trained martial artist who does the best he can within the role, but is shorted from the get-go because audiences don’t have a relationship with the character and it only gets worse here when (a) Urban’s Cage gets introduced and (b) when the script decides to give Cage the exact same arc with almost the same outcome. Cage is, canonically, a self-absorbed narcissist, not someone who would wallow, even washed-out, which makes the choice here for his arc stand out even further. Additionally, whereas 2021 actually made us care about Cole, concerned even that he might go down swinging against Goro, there’s no real concern for characters in II, which means that any loss we observe to Team Earthrealm comes off as transactional and impersonal. Even in a series that finds ways to bring back favorites, something which this film does using a game-based mechanic, having a fatality be more about the violence inflicted or endured instead of actually caring what happens to the character is a mistake in the adaptation process. It also, in-film, involves a moment that underscores a frustrating view toward Cole that is an absolute disservice to Tan as a participant in this series who served as the face of the first entry in this supposed trilogy (or more).
Lewis Tan as Cole Young in New Line Cinema’s MORTAL KOMBAT II, a Warner Bros. Pictures release. Photo courtesy of Warner Bros. Pictures. © 2026 Warner Bros. Ent. All Rights Reserved.
Additionally, whereas 2021 cultivated action set pieces that felt unique in each configuration, several of the action sequences were either mirrors of other scenes involving the same character (sure, they were meant to be symbolic the second time of growth, but the execution is heavy-handed) or just down-right dull because they served little purpose than “we haven’t seen this character fight yet.” (One can at least appreciate that McQuoid made sure to adapt the game-selection motif in a clever way that allowed for combatants to teleport into and out of respective arenas.) This may seem like nitpicking as people come to Mortal Kombat for blood and violence, to see bones broken and bodies cleaved, but that makes sense for a video game and not the framework of movies. There are plenty of direct-to-video films that understand, more significantly, that fight sequences should be staged in such a way that the characters are pushed and grown through the process and that it should serve the story, all while looking damn cool while doing it. This applies even to John Wick (2014), a film series referenced verbally by Cage in II and which was, itself, almost a DTV title. Frustratingly, in the first Cage fight, not only does the camerawork make the usually effortless Urban come across as struggling to make Cage seem like a capable martial artist in close-ups, the long shots reveal the obvious stunt double. Likewise, when Cage first meets Team Earthrealm, Liu Kang, Cole, and Jax (Mehcad Brooks) are in the midst of a training session that appears incredibly stilted. One might be able to give them grace, offering that the movements appear like something one might see in the combat sequences of Warriors Two (1978), except that it’s clear the three are not engaged in a kata, but are actually trying to connect their attacks. Comparatively, the one fight featuring a former co-star of Jackie Chan’s and member of Chan’s stunt team demonstrates that the Mortal Kombat films can put on an incredible show when they give a damn. Keep in mind that Boon and Tobias were inspired by more than JCVD when making their game and, though the initial games, featured stilted movements that were anchored by the limitations of the technology of the time. Through advancing tech, just as we’ve seen modern Hong Kong action grow more fluid and natural, so have the games themselves. When even the stunt sequences fail to dazzle, when they lack impact beyond the visceral, the whole of the film can’t stand.
L-R: Martyn Ford as Shao Kahn and Ludi Lin as Liu Kang in New Line Cinema’s MORTAL KOMBAT II, a Warner Bros. Pictures release. Photo courtesy of Warner Bros. Pictures. © 2026 Warner Bros. Ent. All Rights Reserved.
There are many specific examples of areas which aided in it crumbling which I’d like to dive into, including but not limited to Cage’s reference to Big Trouble in Little China (1986) and how Mortal Kombat II itself suffers by making its white lead the actual pivot point (unlike Carpenter’s fantasy actioner which uses ole Jack as comic relief); Kano’s frequent WB property-related insults; the shoe-horned incorporation of Scorpion (Sanada) and Sub-Zero (Taslim); and the significance of incorporating Quan Chi (played for laughs here when the sorcerer should be feared); but that would delve into spoiler territory best left for around the home release.
All of these are likely going to seem like nit-picks to those who enjoyed it. Maybe you didn’t notice. Maybe you did and didn’t care. That’s fine. All of it is fine. Like what you like, don’t what you don’t. As a fan of the series and its adaptations, Mortal Kombat II suffers as much from being a middle film as it does trying to placate too many masters. Slater is on record as saying he’s listening to fans when finalizing his scripts and the problem with that is then it’s no longer his vision, it’s the version he thinks people want to see. I don’t want to see what I think a Mortal Kombat movie should be, I want a Mortal Kombat movie that understands it’s not all about viscera and bone, but doesn’t shy away from it either. Much like how John Moore’s Max Payne (2008) failed to understand what made the first video game so damn great by removing the emotional heart of it to focus on the slo-mo violence, Mortal Kombat II gives the audience all the bloodshed without any weight or true character consistency to the point that none of it matters beyond the spectacle — and what does it say about audiences if that’s what they think we deserve? Give us a vision, give us a perspective — make it bold, make it bloody, and, most importantly, make it fucking count.
In theaters and IMAX May 8th, 2026.
For more information, head to the official Warner Bros. Pictures Mortal Kombat II webpage.
Final Score: 2 out of 5.
Share this:
Categories: In Theaters, Reviews
Leave a Reply