Mortal Kombat II is a satisfying if predictable martial arts bloodbath
Mortal Kombat II is a movie stuck in a lose-lose situation. It’s a film that feels a lot like the mid-‘90s arcade game that drew the ire of moms and politicians alike — to the point it doesn’t even feel like a “real” movie at times. There are parts of this film that feel almost indistinguishable from watching someone play the game on Twitch. So it’s faithful to the source inspiration … so faithful, in fact, that it kinda hurts it as a cinematic effort.
The brutal irony of it all. For years hardcore Mortal Kombat fans clamored for a movie adaptation that captured the spirt of the video game series — gruesome head injuries and all. Out of all of the live-action Mortal Kombat adaptations we’ve gotten (and we’ve gotten a lot more than you might think … there was a syndicated TV show in the late ‘90s everybody’s forgotten about, among others) this is easily the truest to the video game lore. It’s got a ton of characters from the franchise and it doesn’t skimp out on the gore. Women have their eyeballs squished on spikes, faces are mulched off in whirring blades and the grand finale gives us a brain-slicing jubilee that’ll almost have you trying to insert another quarter into the nearest cup holder. It feels a lot like traditional Mortal Kombat. And that’s precisely the biggest problem with this movie.
It’s a weird, snake eating its own tail kind of scenario here. The Mortal Kombat games were based on a lot of old, hyper violent martial arts films from the 1980s. Like, the creators of the game itself pretty much admit to ripping off films like Big Trouble In Little China and any number of Jean Claude Van Damme “classics” as the basis for the franchise. So there’s obviously the ability to tell a real, genuinely griping cinematic story with the concept. What is Mortal Kombat, after all, but Bruce Lee’s magnum opus Enter the Dragon with people getting their spinal cords yanked out by ninjas in color-coded costumes?
I recall seeing the 2021 Mortal Kombat movie but I don’t remember much about it. If you didn’t see that movie (or lack a basic comprehension of the MK mythology), you’re going to be LOST. This movie has an Avengers sized cast and there’s not much of a refresher course provided to Johnny Come Lately viewers. If you can tell the difference between Kano and Kung Lao you’re alright, but if this is new material for you — yikes.
Probably the most surprising thing about this movie is how singularly focused it is on a single character. The unmistakable anchor of this film is Karl Urban, portraying a washed-up action movie star of the ‘90s named Johnny Cage. He’s recruited by the MK staples to journey to “Outworld” — imagine, the post-apocalyptic hell-scape of The Road Warrior, only with way more people roaming around with 9,000 jagged teeth in their skulls and swords for arms — so they can topple the totalitarian big bad Shao Khan once and for all. And if you don’t know who Shao Khan is (no relation to Chaka or Kubla, by the way), just visualize what would happen if Shredder from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Skeletor from He-Man had a baby and it never left Planet Fitness.
With so many characters in the main story arc it’s no surprise that this film kinda overdoses on subplots. A few of them are true to the established MK lore, while others feel like flavorless imitations of the Marvel Cinematic Universe industrial complex. There’s one plot point in particular that feels like it was yanked out of End Game and repainted with Mortal Kombat characters at the last second. And if it’s noticeable to a pop cultural outsider like me, I’m sure it’s glaringly apparent to everybody else watching this movie.
When I say this movie feels a LOT like the video games I ain’t jerking you around. Like, there’s even a physical SCOREBOARD on the movie screen keeping track of who’s winning and losing. They might as well have tacked on a life bar while they were at it; when the end credits finally rolled, I was halfway expecting a high scores list to scroll. You get plenty of karate fights to the death with supernaturally powered assassins, but it’s not like we haven’t seen this kind of thing before. Like in the last three live-action Mortal Kombat movies to hit theaters coast to coast.
There’s humor here, of course. There’s a great little scene with Johnny Cage and Baraka that’s easily the best part of the entire film. But pretty much everybody else in the movie is roaming around with humorless dispositions, taking everything ultra serious and never breaking the fourth wall — even when lightning gods are invading fan conventions and a terrible remix of “Rock You Like a Hurricane” pumps out of the speakers. This movie is a 16-year-old Hot Topic “rebel” who has no conceptualization of how ridiculous their outfits look. If you like “self-awareness,” you probably won’t like this movie at all.
But at the end of the day is Mortal Kombat II entertaining? Well, some people are definitely going to enjoy it more than others. For better or for worse it knows its audience and it totally panders to them. The end result is a movie that’s booked more like a pro wrestling match than an “honest” cinematic effort — something genetically engineered to score “oohs” and “awws” from the hardcore fans on opening night but not exactly a film with depth and substance for subsequent viewings. And that’s not a surprise at all. You don’t go into a movie called Mortal Kombat II and expect Wild Strawberries and if you were … well, maybe that Bergman-inspired Scorpion spin-off might happen in another zillion years or so. But I wouldn’t hold my breath.
MK II doesn’t aspire to be much more than a bloody, fan-servicing popcorn extravaganza. It succeeds in some areas and falters in others. It’s not exactly my cup of tea, but I never outright hated it, even at its weakest points. You already know whether or not you have any interest in Mortal Kombat II based on the title alone. And if you’re into it, you probably won’t be disappointed. You know, just as long as you weren’t expecting Liu Kang to have an existential breakdown a’la Max Von Sydow or anything like that.
GIVE IT A WATCH IF YOU LIKE: Don “The Dragon” Wilson straight to video movies, what arcades smelled like in 1995, people who use hats as projectile weapons a lot
Director: Simon McQuoid
Writer: Jeremy Slater
Starring: Karl Urban, Adeline Rudolph, Jessica McNamee, Josh Lawson
Studio: New Line Cinema/Atomic Monster/Broken Road Productions/Fireside Films
Distributor: Warner Brothers
Language: English
Runtime: 116 minutes
Release Date: May 08, 2026
