Film Review: 'Mortal Kombat'

Out of all the games that make up the fighting game genre, no series has tested its might more than the infamously violent “Mortal Kombat.” Having its beginning as a classic arcade fighter that surely ate plenty of coins back in the '90s, “Mortal Kombat” made a name for itself with its unique and memorable characters, its graphic violence and gore, and most notably, its fatalities. The levels of brutality in this game were very controversial for the time, but no number of outraged parents could possibly stop this franchise’s rise to the top. 

The people behind this clearly put a lot more effort into making the characters recognizable instead of everything else that makes a movie work.

To this day, “Mortal Kombat” is still going strong with its game entries, but its success in the television and movie medium has been slightly different. This franchise has had a handful of screen adaptations, from two movies in the '90s, a live-action tv series, an animated series, and even some web series. Out of all of them, there have certainly been more misses than hits. However, 2021 has given us a new attempt at a “Mortal Kombat” movie. Will this movie redeem the past attempts at a decent movie, or will it just make us wish someone were there to rip our heart out? Let’s select our character and press the start button. 

The story is what you’d expect for a “Mortal Kombat” movie made for a general audience: A bunch of fighters are chosen to participate in a fighting tournament called Mortal Kombat. The purpose of this tournament is to give Earthrealm (our world) a chance to stop an evil realm known as Outworld from conquering it. After nine tournaments, Outworld is one victory away from conquering Earthrealm. This is essentially the basic plot of the games, pretty cut and dry, and the minds behind this movie still find a way to mess this up! This is going to be a slight spoiler, but the tournament, you know, the whole premise of the story? The, you know, title of the movie and franchise? It never happens. Why does it never happen? I shall answer this question later.

As for characters, this is a “Mortal Kombat” movie, so of course, we have the classic characters such as Kano, Liu Kang, Raiden, Scorpion, Sub-Zero, and Sonya. They are portrayed relatively well, and the actors do clearly try with their roles. I will say though, the best performance in the movie was Josh Lawson as Kano, that man clearly did his homework on how to capture the foul-mouthed, conniving, carefree energy of Kano. Other performances I can commend are Hiroyuki Sanada as Scorpion and Joe Taslim as Sub-Zero. The actors portray them well, and while they do not get as much screen time as the others, their scenes together are the clear highlights of the film.

Now you may have noticed something interesting about my discussion of the classic characters. I never mentioned Johnny Cage, the wise-cracking, nut-punching Hollywood actor turned combatant. Well, that’s because he’s not in this movie. Do you want to know who is in this movie though? Cole Young, played by Lewis Tan. 

Cole is the main character of this movie, and he essentially is the “chosen one” of this story (as opposed to, you know, Liu Kang). First of all, the name Cole Young sounds like tofu tastes, but that would be an insult to tofu because that has infinitely more flavor than this character does. Cole is such a nothing character. He has no personality, his goals and ambitions are basic and cliché, and he is just not interesting at all. The fact that they swapped out Johnny Cage for this character is frankly insulting.

Other characters that make appearances in this movie are Shang Tsung, the evil Outworld sorcerer who oversees Mortal Kombat, alongside Mileena, Jax, Reptile, Kabal, Goro and even some obscure characters like Nitara and Reiko. Shang Tsung is the biggest problem I have with this movie since he is the main antagonist and the story kind of revolves around his plotting, or lack thereof. 

Shang Tsung in the games is one of the most intelligent characters in the series, constantly scheming and playing everyone around him, even succeeding in his goals in some cases. In this movie, his master plan on dealing with the main cast is to “throw fighters at them and kill them before the tournament begins.” Not only does this not work, but it just ends up giving the main characters even more motivation and spirit to fight. One of his other brilliant plans is to attack Raiden’s temple (for reference, Raiden is a thunder god and protector of Earthrealm) where our heroes are all training. Raiden sees this, sets up a barrier to stop them, and then they just…leave! 

What? 

Shang Tsung, who is supposed to be a master of manipulation, is an absolute idiot in this movie. There is one thing that goes right for him in the film, and it was not even his plan. He’s also the reason that the tournament does not happen. So, there you go folks, the main reason the plot does not happen is because of Shang Tsung’s sheer idiocy. 

Now let’s talk about costumes and special effects because another thing “Mortal Kombat” is known for are its unforgettable character designs and flashy special moves. The costumes in this movie look genuinely amazing, with every character looking like how they’re supposed to look. However, even the costumes are not perfect. Mileena looks less like she has a monster mouth and more like she just got done eating barbeque ribs, and Reptile looks like a very generic lizardman rather than the reptilian-themed ninja that we are all familiar with. As for the special effects, they range from decent-looking to downright bad with many instances of poor CGI. 

However, this being a “Mortal Kombat” movie, the main question we must ask now is how are the fights? The fights are decent for the most part. In all fairness, the only really good fights are both fights between Scorpion and Sub-Zero. You can tell that pretty much all the effort went into those fights, and rightfully so. If you cannot portray the legendary rivalry between “Mortal Kombat’s” two poster boys in a satisfying way, then what’s the point? The rest of the fights are either forgettable or uninteresting. Don’t believe me? The fight with Goro takes place in a shed. 

All in all, while there are some things I like about this movie, it is ultimately not a good one at all. The people behind this clearly put a lot more effort into making the characters recognizable instead of everything else that makes a movie work. Using famous characters and placing little references to the games is not what makes a good movie, and it’s such a shame that this film turned out the way it did.

I give “Mortal Kombat” 3 ripped spines out of 10.