Tear Jerker / Mortal Kombat 11

"Give your dad a kiss for me..."

You wouldn't expect a Mortal Kombat game to hit you in the feels, but Mortal Kombat 11 doesn't just tug at your heartstrings... it rips them out!

Click here for the sad pre-match intros.

Per wiki policy, Spoilers Off applies to Tear Jerker pages. All spoilers are unmarked.

Story Mode

Story Mode

• Pictured above: the end of the first chapter in Story Mode. Sonya sacrifices herself to ensure the Revenant Liu Kang's fortress is destroyed, leaving Cassie to deliver the worst news anyone can give to someone's husband, and it's seriously heartbreaking and extremely depressing...
  • When Sonya starts the detonation sequence for the explosives, Cassie pleads with Jacqui to override the sequence only to be told there is no override command. Despite this, Cassie still desperately tries to dig through the rubble that Sonya is buried under, until Jacqui, who's clearly unhappy about doing so, reminds her of their orders to withdraw, to which Cassie reluctantly complies.
    Cassie: General? ...Mom?! MOM!
  • Johnny Cage is present when the Special Forces return from the Netherrealm, clearly relieved to see Cassie alright until he asks where Sonya is and notices Cassie's grief-stricken expression, realizing what had happened. All Johnny can do is console his daughter who breaks down in his arms sobbing. The music that plays, "Broken Blade", certainly doesn't help, it being one of the saddest themes ever composed in the series.
    • You can see the realization that Sonya is gone cross Johnny's face, and then you can see him push it all down to be strong for his daughter.
  • It's especially gut wrenching since it comes right on the heels of seeing how healthy and even affectionate Sonya's relationship with both Cassie and Johnny had become in the aftermath of Shinnok's defeat. Talk about a Happy Ending Override...
  • Even worse is that despite the operation being successful, it becomes a Senseless Sacrifice when Kronika undoes the damage to Revenant Liu Kang's fortress. And even with Kronika's meddling with the timelines and having brought back people of the past to the current timeline, Cassie never gets to see her mother alive again; only a past version of her mother who is young enough to be her sister.
  • When Johnny is talking to Past Sonya, he makes a remark that they have one awesome daughter, but Past Sonya reminds him who she is. Johnny apologizes and says it's hard to tell, a harsh reminder that his Sonya is gone.
  • Past Sonya's reaction to finding out about her future self's death. After reading the mission report, she mistakenly believes that her own future daughter simply left her to die and confronts Cassie about it.
    Past Sonya: You left me behind.
    Cassie: Excuse me?
    Past Sonya: My final mission.
    Cassie: How did you-
    (Cassie looks at Sonya's computer)
    Cassie: Shit. No. I'm not doing this. Not now. Not with you.
    Past Sonya: Dammit, Cassie, you abandoned me?!
    Cassie: To save the company! That was my order!
    Past Sonya: Who the hell gave you that order?!
    Cassie: YOU DID! Read the full report Lieutenant.
  • With all of this, you seriously may feel like wanting to give poor Cassie a hug!
• Hanzo (Scorpion) and Kuai Liang (Sub-Zero) finding the mutilated remains of the Lin Kuei students that the Tekunin kidnapped and converted into cyborgs. While Kuai grieves in quiet anger, Hanzo, no doubt empathizing with Kuai given what happened to his family and the Shirai Ryu, places his hand on Kuai's shoulder...
  Hanzo: We'll avenge your clan.
  • Look at Kuai Liang for a moment as he grabs the Lin Kuei medallion, and you'll notice he may possibly be in the verge of tears. The highly stoic Grandmaster, who we know as a fettered but still highly capable warrior, is understandably not enduring well the destruction of the clan he made to do good. A Father to His Men, indeed.
• Cyrax's reaction to his cyberized state after he is freed from Sektor's control. As seen in MK9, Cyrax had openly opposed to the Lin Kuei's Grandmaster's plans for the Cyber Initiative, until he was eventually captured and forcibly cyberized by Sektor. Thanks to MK9's for-want-of-a-nail elements, we never see Cyrax's reaction to being made into this. Here, we see his utter disgust at what has become of him.
  Cyrax: (looking at his cybernetic body) ...No! (Audibly horrified) He ripped out my heart. Made me a machine!
  • Before he helps Hanzo and Kuai and pulls a Heroic Sacrifice (again), Cyrax outright begs Sub-Zero not to bring him back to life until they can find a way to make him human again.
  Cyrax: Please, don't bring me back as a machine. I can't live like this.
• Throughout the early stages of the story mode, we see Jacqui and Jax's situation: Jax becoming a Shell-Shocked Veteran after regaining his humanity and the memories of the things he was forced to do as Quan Chi's Revenant left him dejected and on the verge of the slippery slope... if not for his wife, Vera, who with she had Jacqui. Atop that suffering, however, both of them lost Vera a year before, sending Jax over the Despair Event Horizon and forcing him to accept an honorable discharge. By the end of Chapter 4, when Earthrealm's communications networks have gone down, Jacqui is worried about her father following her failed attempts to contact him. We then see Jax having an honest-to-god panic attack as he is unable to hear from Jacqui. It's little wonder he agrees to join Kronika not long after...
  • Both finally come to face near the end of Chapter 9. The hurt on both father and daughter's faces when faced with his choice tells volumes.
    Past Jax: (gently pushing Jacqui aside) Hang back, kid. I know I wouldn't wanna fight my Dad. (to Present Jax) How 'bout we keep this between me, myself, and I? Never thought I'd stoop so low...
    Present Jax: YOU DON'T KNOW HOW BAD IT GETS! Losing your arms was just the beginning.
    Past Jax: I know you suffered. You still do. But you don't betray your unit! AND YOU SURE AS HELL DON'T BETRAY YOUR FAMILY!
• Jade's infiltration of the Tarkatan camp involves her coming face to face with a Tarkatan woman. Instead of holding her ground as Jade expected, she's... absolutely terrified. It's here she realizes that the Tarkatan reputation for bloodlust doesn't necessarily mean all of them are fighters by nature. Jade tries to calm her down to find Baraka's whereabouts until more of the camp's group notices her squad. After Kotal Kahn has his troops storm the place in response to seeing them mobilize, he has them all rounded up to be executed as he had before the time distortion, including the woman Jade had met before. Jade, unable to stomach witnessing such a pointless genocide, attempts to reason with and is forced to fight her lover, knocking him out just in time for reinforcements from Shao Kahn's inner circle to come investigate and imprison them all.
• Hanzo's death in the arms of his past Revenant self after D'Vorah fatally poisons him. He spends his last moments pleading to his past self that his new Shirai Ryu clan is worth preserving, more than his vengeance.
  Hanzo: The new Shirai Ryu... are worthy. It's heart... not blood... what makes them warriors...
  • And when he goes to see the heroes, his reaction at seeing the Fire Garden restored was enough to move him, seeing what Hanzo told him was true.
  Scorpion: The Fire Gardens, rebuilt? The Shirai Ryu are indeed restored.
• Past Raiden nearly succumbs to the evil influence of Shinnok's amulet as his future self did, lashing out at past Scorpion and Liu Kang and even beginning to manifest red lightning. The only thing that stops him from Jumping Off the Slippery Slope all over again is Liu Kang solemnly remarking the very same words that sent them both to fight. Raiden then has a multi-timeline Flash Back of every single time he has been brought to blows with Liu Kang across the entire franchise, and realizes that Kronika has been steering his hand to put him at odds with his trusted friend again and again. He drops to his knees in anguish at the revelation.
  Liu Kang: Enough of your madness. If you must die... (beat, his voice drops) ...so be it.
  Raiden: This — this has happened before...
• Cetrion is forced to sacrifice herself to empower Kronika. For all her power and cunning, deep down she's not different from a child longing for the love of an abusive parents. What's worse, Kronika could have just let her own sons balance the universe on their own, their powers not being inherently good nor evil to begin with, but her obsession twisted them beyond redemption.
• The ending. Liu Kang has become the God of Thunder and Fire and defeated Kronika, but everyone except him, Raiden (who is now mortal), and potentially Kitana (only if you manage to defeat Kronika without losing any rounds) is gone. Kronika has succeeded in enacting her own version of Armageddon by wiping the slate clean and creating a brand new timeline. The only consolation is that Kronika's hourglass is now in Liu Kang's hands and can now be used for more constructive purposes.
  • The fact that so many important story events have either been rendered moot or are potentially doomed to repeat themselves.
    • Shao Kahn may once again usurp Onaga as Emperor of Outworld.
    • Johnny and Sonya might never marry or have Cassie.
    • Johnny himself might once again end up dying repeatedly.
    • Jax may never receive bionic upgrades or have Jacqui.
    • Hanzo Hasashi may once again be doomed to become Scorpion and witness his family and clan wrongfully murdered.
    • Bi-Han may once again be transformed into Noob Saibot and become a powerful force of evil.
    • Everything Raiden tried to prevent was All for Nothing.
    • Kuai Liang may not become Sub-Zero.
    • If another incarnation of Kitana exists, she may once again have to endure her home realm of Edenia and her family taken from her by Shao Kahn.
    • Kotal may once again be doomed to be wrongfully imprisoned by Shao Kahn and tortured by Shang Tsung. He may never even succeed Shao as Kahn of Outworld, or even meet Jade.

Aftermath DLC

• The Aftermath DLC story continues right where things left off at the end of the main campaign. The first thing you may notice is that only Liu Kang and Raiden are there, at the Dawn of Time. The Golden Ending you get where Liu Kang has Kitana by his side? It's non-canon.
• Kotal Kahn's shocking, horrible death. As Shao Kahn and Sindel's ship arrives on the shores of Kronika's Keep, Kotal's decapitated head gets thrown off the ship and into the ground. Not only does this mean that Jade lost Kotal a second time, but also that the Osh-Tekk are now truly extinct. The only silver lining to this (and even then only if you choose to side with Liu Kang) is that he resets the timeline and thus his death is undone, but it remains to be seen how he will fare in a new timeline.
• And as for Kitana herself? She gets put through the wringer during this much darker take on the second half of the original story. Not long after she's just become the new Kahn of Outworld, Shang Tsung revives Sindel, who this Kitana (circa II) has not had the misfortune of getting killed by in a Brainwashed and Crazy state. Their reunion seems happy... until Sindel reveals herself to have been Evil All Along. Not only does Kitana have to watch as her own mother betrays her and destroy everything she's worked so hard for, not only does she get told the Awful Truth that Sindel was the true murderer of her biological father Jerrod, we get to witness her get beaten to near-death again by Sindel. In her moment of defeat, she desperately reaches for Liu Kang, only for Shao Kahn to cruelly step on his hand and separate the two. Her last moments spent in the story mode are being Forced to Watch as Shao Kahn tortures Liu Kang to death and decapitates Kotal Kahn.
• Shang Tsung's machinations completely derail both sides of the conflict and ultimately screw everyone over, creating the worst possible timeline during the climax. Sheeva gets betrayed and possibly killed by Sindel. Geras possibly dies permanently at Shao Kahn's hands. The Special Forces and the current Outworld regime are all toppled and either captured or outright killed by Sindel, Shao Kahn, and Shang Tsung's coup d'état. All of the Revenants die with no chance of redemption, instead of being spared by Liu Kang but erased by Kronika. Cetrion is forced to sacrifice herself early to empower Kronika, but it doesn't matter as Shang Tsung has reached borderline-Titan levels of power by wearing her crown and absorbing the souls of gods and the most powerful members of the cast. Even Sindel and Shao Kahn, who truly loved each other and wanted an eternal empire, are betrayed and killed by Shang Tsung. The sorcerer then defeats Kronika, steals her soul and becomes a Titan. Everything worked for in the main story mode gets twisted and destroyed, leaving Shang Tsung the only victor and all the realms completely in disarray. And if you so choose, you can even have him kill Fire God Liu Kang and complete the intended outcome of his plan: become the only Elder God and use his enslaved and corrupted minions, Dark Fujin and Dark Raiden, to enforce his rule and dooming the entire universe to an utterly bleak timeline. And it's all your fault. Have a nice day.
• The good ending that comes from choosing Fire God Liu Kang ends on a better, but still somewhat sad note. The rebooted trilogy timeline is still no more, and Shang Tsung's version of the rebooted timeline is so ruined beyond the point of repair that Liu Kang ends up hitting the Reset Button anyway. He had always intended to create his own New Era, but before doing that he had to watch all of his friends and loved ones suffer and die again in order to weed out and defeat Shang Tsung at the last possible moment.

Arcade Endings

• Liu Kang's ending has him using him using his power over Kronika's hourglass to replace the Elder Gods Cetrion betrayed with himself, Kitana, Kung Lao, Raiden, and Bo' Rai Cho. But by doing so, he gives up any chance of him and Kitana ever having a normal life. And to drive home the bitterness of this ending, Liu Kang ponders what could have been and sees himself and Kitana, both still mortals, getting married in a cherry blossom grove. Now think about the events of Aftermath...
  Liu Kang: What does it mean to wield the Sands of Time? To be The Chosen One? It means making choices that break your heart.
• Kitana's ending is bittersweet. She restores Edenia to existence — only to realize that the culture is completely foreign to her due to Shao Kahn forbidding her to learn of her former home. She decides to use the ancient Edenia teachings to become a better Kahn for Outworld, but it's still a downbeat note to her ending. She's been fighting to restore Edenia back since when she was introduced in Mortal Kombat II and almost 30 years later in this game, she finds out that, in her own words, she fits in with her people no better than a Tarkatan.
  • This is made all the more impactful by the art: the ending opens with a shot of Kitana excitedly approaching a bustling Edenian market in the daytime, clearly delighted to see her ancestral homeland and finally experience what Shao Khan denied her for so long - and then changes to the same market at night, with a visibly heartbroken Kitana turning her back on the market and its citizens as they do the same to her.
  • Sindel's ending, from Kitana's perspective. Sindel uses the Hourglass to return from her millennia-long stint of being dead to find Kitana has taken the Edenian throne and used her political sway to broker peace throughout the Realms. Sindel wastes no time in narrating her disappointment while beating her daughter into submission. The final image shows poor Kitana chained and collared at the foot of Sindel's throne, looking utterly broken.
• Mileena's ending gives signs of this. Everything she did, from killing Kitana, to reviving her parents, sparing all of Kitana's friends and even having a daughter and raising her with Tanya. It was all driven from her need to be loved. For added sadness, she seems to regret that Kitana never saw her as anything more than a freak. She managed to gain everything she wanted in her new timeline... except for her sister's acceptance.
  • Worse, in some of Mileena's intros, it's implied that Kitana does want Mileena on her side. It's either that Kitana doesn't want to acknowledge her as her sister, or Mileena's own twisted mind simply won't allow it to happen, even if she does want it deep down. Mileena deciding to Ret-Gone Kitana in her ending is much more tragic with this in mind.
• Scorpion's ending. Even though his future self told him not to dwell on the past, past Scorpion still can't resist the chance to change the timeline in order to ensure that his family survives... only to find that he can't: no matter what timeline it is, his family will always die. Eventually, he figures out a reason why that might be: Kronika was a Titan, a creature even more powerful than the Elder Gods. And there are still more out there. Blaming them for the loss of his family, Scorpion wages a one-man war on them, once again dooming him to a eternal lifetime of vengeance; exactly the opposite of what his future self wanted.
• Jacqui's ending, where she realizes all the suffering her father has been put through and alters time so that Jax never gets killed by Sindel. This results in Jax having a much better life, but at the cost of him never meeting Vera during his recovery. As Jacqui begins to fade away, she tearfully says goodbye to her father and that she loves him.
• Geras, in his ending, is revealed to be a Punch-Clock Villain and Death Seeker who is tired of Kronika using him for her dirty work, and after finally getting sick of her, he realizes how hard it is to create a perfect timeline. Recognizing this is what corrupted his master, he sacrifices himself to the Hourglass, giving it the capacity to run autonomously and finally allowing him to die.
  Geras: Perhaps mortals do not need a Lord of Time. I will sacrifice my body and my mantle to re-sculpt the Sands so the Hourglass runs itself. And for the first time in all eternity... I can rest in peace...
• What happened to Amara, Rain's mother, in Rain's ending. Argus, seeking to cover up the results of his little affair with the woman, lies to her that Rain was delivered stillborn while secretly pawning him off to a poor Edenian family, before leaving Amara to die from despair. Rain was forcibly stripped from his mother's arms and robbed of the one person who truly loved him all to cover up some Zeus-level extramarital shenanigans. Is it any wonder Rain's first reaction is to take revenge on Argus after hearing that?
• Rambo has signs of just wanting to live a normal life and indicates he somewhat regrets still having to fight. While his ending is generally a high-note resolution for Rambo, Stallone's voiceover absolutely underscores how weary and broken John is, and how he's still a good man under all the killing he's done. The quaver in his voice is almost painful to hear.
  Rambo: It's time to walk away, for good this time, leaving the pain and the ugliness behind. After all I've been through, I've earned a little peace.

Gameplay/Other

• The Krypt shows Kenshi's decaying corpse, having failed in his mission to take revenge on Shang Tsung for the deaths of his ancestors and leaving Takeda an orphan. A pretty harsh Player Punch for a good number of players, especially since it was Shang Tsung himself who killed him and escaped justice. Thankfully, the Krypt isn't canon.
  • That being said, the protagonist of the Krypt can be seen dead in the Aftermath DLC, and lo and behold, he has Kenshi's blindfold. Thanks, Shang Tsung.
• The new version of Goro's Lair in the Krypt, which is not only suffering from twenty plus years of neglect, but sitting in his throne is none other than Goro... as a rotting corpse. It's a bit tough seeing a series icon like him in such a state. As you enter it, you'll get a cutscene of Shang Tsung wistfully reminiscing about the now-dead Goro, saying that he was his favorite champion and he misses him dearly.
• During some Brutalities (namely Joker's "Batter Up!"^note He smashes his cane on the opponent, forcing them to kneel before he bats the opponent's cranium from their torsos with his cane, Johnny Cage's "$500 Sunglasses"^note He throws his sunglasses at the opponent, which proceed to blow up in their face and RoboCop's "That One Time"^note He parries an attack with his riot shield and then makes the opponent hold their hands up, then blows up their groin (if they're male) or face (if they're female)), nearly every character^note Except Shang Tsung and Nightwolf has some unique quote which they say moments before they meet their doom. As funny as some of them are, others are downright saddening.
  Scorpion: No more!/Finish me...
  Sub-Zero: Finally...
  Sonya: Wait!/You can't!
  Raiden: Forgive me...
  Kung Lao: Please!/Don't!
  Kitana: Spare me...!/Impossible!
  Jade: Spare me.../Gods, no...
  Fujin: No...!
  Frost: So cold...
  Geras/Robocop: Again...?
  Cetrion: Mercy!/Mother, help-
  Rambo: ...do it!
  Johnny Cage: Not like this!
  Skarlet: I submit-!
• One of Rambo's Brutalities has a sense of sadness to it. In his Buried Alive brutality, he slashes the opponents throat, kicks them into a pit trap... and like the Brutality's name implies, buries them alive before placing the shovel in the ground as a grave marker. What makes it sad is that this is a game where nearly every other brutality is over the top with gore and blood and guts... yet this one is just Rambo silently burying them in the ground and not even seeing if the opponent is dead — he just wants the battle done no matter what.
• A lot of people find Kung Lao constantly being put down by the others or worse, compare him to Liu Kang to be quite disheartening.
• Would you believe that a Friendship falls under this? Kitana's Friendship sees her reuniting with Mileena, and the two play and hug like normal sisters. Compared to the hateful and threatening dialogue the two share with each other in game, not to mention Mileena's ending having her kill Kitana and effectively remove her from history, it's almost like Kitana's Friendship offers a look into what relationship the two would've had if Kitana accepted Mileena as a sister.

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