Mortal Kombat

[Lucky Planet]

My review is the *complete* opposite of this. I personally thought the fights were better, and the lead character was *much* better (Cole Young was a square and the worst part about MK1 to me). I thought it improved on the 1st one in basically every way and my only real complaint (if I had to pick one) is how death continues to mean absolutely nothing LOL

I gotta go into spoilers on why I had problems
and why it's messy for me.

Spoiler

not only does death mean nothing, but there are 3 fights in a mortal Kombat movie without any death, that was ridiculous to me lol.
might as well just be street fighter.

sindel was wasted on a very short fight. raiden was wasted, scorpion was shoehorn in just for the fight shown in the trailer, shang tsung kinda wasted, just really bad writing.

shao kahn having an invincible cheat code was such a horrible cope out. just awful. why do that why? it diminishes any suspense because you know he can't die. that was so dumb.

the whole amulet plot was kind of nonsense

 

[mccgavin]

I thought it was a very significant improvement over the first film. It felt a lot more accurate to the world and story of the games. The fights were a lot better, and there were many more of them. Death not mattering kind of comes with the territory of this series, there's no way of really getting around it.

 

[Lucky Planet]

I thought it was a very significant improvement over the first film. It felt a lot more accurate to the world and story of the games. The fights were a lot better, and there were many more of them. Death not mattering kind of comes with the territory of this series, there's no way of really getting around it.

I guess I wish the fights were a little longer and had more gore and more fatalities.

 

[CoryLevy91]

I legitimately think MKII (2026) is a contender for one of the best video game adaptations of all time. It's fun, faithful to the tone and spirit of the games, features a veritable boatload of nods and homages to the IP, juggles a massive amount of character with relative ease while not shorting any of them yet it tells a relatively original story set within the huge lore of the series.

The characters are great, the fights are pitch perfect, I was shocked that they managed to include Johnny Cage yet they also made Kitana massively important in a have their cake and eat it too style, the score got me JACKED, the gore was outrageous, the effects were glorious (Baraka's mouth is an insanely great practical effect in 2026) and I absolutely marked the hell out that QUAN F'N CHI is here and being a scheming little weirdo. I was supremely surprised with how well they played the 'stakes' throughout the film in way that really resonated.

It's clear that this series of MK films are handled by people who really do care, love and respect the games. They're not 1 to 1 adaptations and they don't need to be because the diligence the creatives, crew and cast all took with bringing the film to life shines through. Again it's not an award winning melodrama with a powerful message but it shouldn't be; it's a Mortal Kombat film and **** me if it isn't fun as ****!

Sidenote: seeing this only makes my stance on the Cregger Resident Evil film even stronger. I don't want to hear a video game can't be adapted faithfully because of its tone or content when MKII is over here being a certified banger of a time.