Mortal Kombat (2021)

More of a studio mandate than a director mandate.

Something I saw on Twitter with the (increasingly negative) reviews was one person pointing out, it's only video game movies that need to have a Canon Foreigner. No one suggested a Canon Foreigner in Harry Potter or the like, but video game movies need them. Same with comic book movies, they don't introduce a Canon Foreigner most of the time, they repurpose a character from an older comic to fill the role.

Edited by Beatman1 on Apr 23rd 2021 at 10:49:07 AM

I thought Tan got cast because the director wanted to work with him.

A few comic adaptations have had canon foreigners but these tend to be relatively obscure ones and even then they aren't actually the main lead. Though I'm drawing a blank on any game adaptations with canon foreigners besides this film and the RE movies.

Sonic's Deuteragonist was a Canon Foreigner, but that one actually went over surprisingly well with him placed as a Straight Man act as opposed to a spotlight stealer.

Didn't the first hellboy had an Alice/Cole-esque character?

Edited by Ohmknight on Apr 24th 2021 at 12:42:22 AM

He was an audience surrogate but not the main lead. Also, he was gone by the second film.

Yep. Justifiably so. He was quite the flat character.

John Myers, yes, a pretty evident studio mandate of some kind. He was however inobtrusive enough (he is very much a supporting character to the main Abe-Liz-Hellboy trio) to slide by inoffensively.

It's so weird because I'd say S Onya, Liu Kang, Kung Lao, Jax, or Johnny Cage all have the potential to be the main character of a Mortal Kombat movie. I don't know why you'd ever need to introduce someone completely new. At least not for the first entry in a new film series.

Edited by GNinja on Apr 23rd 2021 at 5:11:32 PM

Just finished it and didn't like it besides for two parts

I was kinda hyped for this movie... but it's a bit of a mess.

There is no way they conceived the scene where the heroes go for a second round as a big montage. I suspected that someone at WB wanted these kinds of movies to be under two hours after Godzilla vs. Kong came out—now I'm absolutely certain.

Just caught it.

Honestly, the original movie felt like it spent a lot more time setting up the plot.

I loved Kano, but that's not a shock.

the dragon tattoos granting superpowers could be a good way for the new games to explain all the crazy shit the characters can do, and the ridiculous amounts of punishment they can endure).

I was surprised they went all in with Bi-Han being the one responsible for the death of Hanzo's family, considering that a big thing in the series is that Quan-Chi framed him.

Sonya's actress could actually fight (no offence to Bridgette Wilson, who as I understand, was kinda tossed into the role late and lacked any form of martial arts training, hence her lack of fight scenes.

They definitely captured how messy the fights can get. There was no holding back on the gore, and even then it still didn't seem as bad as it could have been, which means either I can handle gore better than I ever realized, or they still kinda held back. I'm assuming the latter.

Mortal Kombat: The Movie aka Mortal Kombat 1995, was a great movie when I was a little kid, and is now currently a slightly less great movie that I still enjoy due to nostalgia.

Mortal Kombat (2021) is only as good as Mortal Kombat: The Movie is now, rather than being as good as the latter when I was a kid. That's a shame, cause this film needed to be better.

As long as it’s better than Annihilation.

I have not seen the original in several years, was it really that good?

Oh well I heard someone say they should do a Fast and Furious with this franchise and that makes sense. Constant sequels where everything gets more and more over the top as characters do awesome shit fits the series well.

I believe it was the first (if not one of the first) good video game movies.

It's not a great movie now, but back then, it was some good shit, even with the lack of blood.

...or at least that's my pure opinion.

Mortal Kombat: The Movie was a good movie for its time.

I thought Anderson's was flawed but decent, maybe the best video game movie next to Detective Pikachu. It's kind of surprising that the art has progressed no further in over twenty-five years. Like, I assumed a new Mortal Kombat would have to be better by default. Scorpion's Revenge was.

Just got back from the movie.

Overall, I'd say it was pretty good. The fights were excellent and the canon characters were all pretty on-point.

There is one thing noticeably wrong with the movie though, and as you can probably guess, its name is Cole Young.

I kept waiting for anything to come up to make me like him or justify his existence... and nothing did. You could've easily replaced him with Johnny from the start or given his role to Liu Kang. I get it was apparently a studio thing, so I just hope he isn't a big part of any sequels.

I will say this, though... at least it wasn't Resident Evil bad. The real characters actually got to do shit and didn't just stand around and endlessly praise how awesome Mila Jov... I mean Alice is.

Overall, I had a pretty good time, but I think the '95 movie's still better.

Edited by lbssb on Apr 23rd 2021 at 7:27:50 AM

Yeah I agree with everyone here: Cole Young was the definite weak link of the film that dragged it down.

At first I was optimistic that maybe he will be like Tom from Sonic the Hedgehog. A cannon foreigner that initially we thought was unnecessary, but end up being well liked for having a well written character arc that neatly coincides with the main character (Sonic), actually having a personality where we can relate with him, and help drives the plot forward instead of just being there along for the ride. Instead he is more like Alice from Resident Evil being more like a designated protagonist that we are forced to follow who somehow end up being an important “chosen one” at the expense of the other more interesting characters.

Seriously, throughout the film they made it an important plot point that Cole is a descendent of the Shirai Ryu clan and to the destined warrior that was meant to win the tournament for Earthrealm, Hanzo Hasashi, and yet they barely did anything related to it for Cole’s story.

Personal vendetta towards Bi-Han for slaughterring his clan that he never knew? Nope.

A growing interest in the history of his descendents since their blood flows on him? Na-ah

Perhaps small quirks and fighting techniques resembling that of Scorpion that are revealing themselves throughout the course of the movie? No way.

All we got for the pay off was Scorpion appearing again due to Sub-Zero attempting to kill Cole’s family in a similar way as the opening scene. Its kind of cool that he appeared that way to reflect that he is a vengeful spectre, but in the end it shows that Cole really wasn’t cool enough to beat Sub-Zero; or even pull a bs plot twist where HE becomes Scorpion with the spirit of Hanzo overtaking him to allow for his revenge on Bi Han.

Edited by BigK1337 on Apr 23rd 2021 at 11:53:46 AM

Hope we get a Hellboy 2 then where the film does well enough to get a sequel and drop the canon foreigner because he’s recognized as not important.

Wonder if they'll find another way to transfer the mark, though. Unless they give it to Kitana or Jade and then they defect or something. Wouldn't be nice to the actor, though.

Yeah, it does seem unfair to the guy... maybe just cast him as Identical Stranger Kuai Liang and call it a day?

Edited by lbssb on Apr 23rd 2021 at 9:29:07 AM

My fear is that this is a pure Alice situation, especially since this was there from the first draft, presumably as a studio or director directive.

Cole is the chosen one. The plot revolves around Cole, all glory to Cole. Hellboy's Canon Immigrant was easily disposed of since he was at the end of the day, a handler, not a core character. If Cole dies in the first five minutes of the next movie, the plot holes are huge.

The filmmakers feel like they're doing the same thing here. "This movie franchise and this character are a package deal. Take it or leave it." And I'm hoping people say "Bye, have fun next to Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li. Because there are ways to make a Canon Immigrant work and this ain't it.

Edited by Beatman1 on Apr 23rd 2021 at 12:30:14 PM

@slim: Ironically I think Mayer would've worked better in 2. He could've played a buddy duo with Tom as "the 2 dads trying to control their rebellious teenage son" and everything.

Speaking of which, that's what really annoys me about Cole. Not only could Johnny have played the same role, but you would've had comedy gold having him and Kano interact. Would've made Kano's painfully obvious Face–Heel Turn slightly more personal too.

Have not seen this yet, but apparently my favorite highly enthusiastic splatter fan loved it, so I'm encouraged.

Apparently the reason Johnny wasn't in this film is because they thought having him and Kano at the same time would be too much comic relief.

This ignores the fact that the two characters are funny in very different ways: Kano for how much of a disgusting lecherous pig he is, and Johnny for being an egotistical Jerk with a Heart of Gold. There really isn't any redundancy with having both of them.

Edited by lbssb on Apr 23rd 2021 at 10:48:04 AM