Ep 86 - Mortal Kombat 2 (2026)

[00:00:00] Speaker A: Mortal Kombat 2 2026. Picking up where the first movie ended, Earthrealm is still at risk of losing their 10th straight tournament with the Outworld. Only this time, the tournament actually takes place after they do everything in their power to erase all traces of the first installment. [00:00:26] Speaker B: Completely overrated. [00:00:28] Speaker C: Hello everybody, and welcome back to our Rating the show where I get together with two of my friends, we take a movie franchise, break it down by movie, give it an overall score, and throw it back up on the board to see where it lands compared to the other movie franchises. Now this week we're talking about Mortal Kombat 2, which is still in theaters. So I do want to warn you, we are going to spoil the crap out of this movie. Most of the time we're talking about movies that have been out for quite some time, but this one being so fresh, I just want to let you know we're going to talk about a lot of things. Now that being said, the movie's called Mortal Kombat 2. If you think about it, you probably know pretty much everything you're going to see anyways. But regardless, I just want to let you know we are going to talk about the entire film. Spoiler with spoilers. Yeah. Anyways, as always, by Wyatt, Brian and Will. Brian, how you doing this week? [00:01:12] Speaker B: I'm doing good, Dan. How are you doing? [00:01:14] Speaker C: I'm doing actually really well. I've had a pretty decent week so far, all things considered. But what about you, Will? [00:01:20] Speaker A: Happy to be here as always. Looking forward to talking about this movie or fighting through it in our own tournament. [00:01:27] Speaker C: We, we might have to, we might throw hands on this one because I'm just gonna throw it out there. I, I actually had a pretty good time with this one. I did put a thumbnail in the discord and it was like I, I liked it. I think this would have been pretty good. And I don't know, I haven't gauged your opinion. We haven't talked at all since any of us have seen it. But I'm just, I'm super curious to get your opinions on this one. [00:01:47] Speaker A: Well, for those of you who watched our other review of first Mortal Kombat 2021, Dan thought promisingly that this movie would be better than the first. And I am happy to say that it, it is, it is better in some ways. [00:02:07] Speaker B: Excellent in some ways is the problem that I have because I, I went through and gave my pre chat score and I'm looking at this score going, I don't like that number. The way I break it down. Right. We all have our own criteria here. We rate movies our own sort of way. And at the end, of course, we throw them up on a big screen here. And Dan will give us a breakdown of where it compares to other movies, other franchises, etc. So stay tuned at the end for that. But I'm looking at my numbers, my final score here, and I'm like, yes, piece by piece, this is accurate. But as a sum of all its parts, I think my number came out too high, and I'm wondering why. So I want to get to the bottom of it with our conversation today, gentlemen, and I'm hoping you can help me figure it out. I think it's disappointment in what I was looking for and what I received. Maybe it's that disappointment factor that's making me not like my score here. So we'll have to get into it. [00:03:07] Speaker A: All right, all right. So, Dan, you were the one who thought that this one looked promising. Why don't you kick it off? What did you think? [00:03:15] Speaker C: So I. I do trailer reactions on my channel, so if you've watched our rating movie review on YouTube, you've probably seen me talk with this me. I think I did two different trailer reactions. I skipped the third one because I was already like, well, I'm already in. I'm already gonna watch this movie. So I don't really want to see too much of it before I go into it. But the trailer reactions I saw were both pretty promising. I grew up really enjoying Mortal Kombat 1 through 3. I'll say. And then I played some of the other ones a little bit here and there over the. The last couple of decades. This movie, like, the first movie, had the look right, But I didn't love the characters. I didn't love the story. This movie looked like it had the looks right and was bringing the characters I actually wanted to see. And it did give me more of what I wanted, like, right from the very hop, like, when you're sitting in the theater. Will, you said you weren't super familiar with these games, so I'll forgive you if you don't. Didn't catch this. But, like, right at the very beginning, it starts off with, like, the blue clouds with the thunder as it's bringing in the. The credits, like, atomic. Whatever the production companies are and whatnot. That's exactly Mortal Kombat, too. And it didn't, like, throw it in your face. It was relatively subtle, but it was just like, oh, okay, this is made by somebody who gets it. You know what I Mean, like, this is going to feel like I want it to feel. And it kind of just kept that vibe all the way through. Now there's. There's issues here and there that I have with this movie. I'm not like, this was perfect, but there was a lot of things in this that I really did enjoy and that I really think that they got pretty accurate to the video games and to what I was looking for from a silly action movie about, you know, people who try and kill each other. [00:04:48] Speaker A: Right. [00:04:50] Speaker C: I can go, like, way more into detail in specific scenes and stuff like that, but you start off with like, that, and then you go straight into. Not the overtaking of our realm. Like Outworld is conquering Earth. Earthrealm in this movie. That's what they're trying to do. You mentioned the. The 10 tournaments. They're on number 10. It starts before that when Outworld was conquering a different land. And so you get. Yeah. Something close to that and you get the last remnants. Like the last tournament fight between King Jared and. And Shao Kahn. And right away, like, I thought that fight was pretty decent. Like, I was nervous that it was just gonna be like Shao Khan walks up and crushes his face and that's it. But they give you a pretty decent fight that I enjoyed. And then they introduce you to Katana, which is a character in the game. So you kind of knew she's gonna make it and grow up to be a thing. I didn't. I. Again, I'm not great on the lore of these movies, so don't. Give me. Give me a break here. I didn't realize Katana was like Shao Kahn's, like, adopted daughter, kind of like Gamora style. Like, that surprised me, but I didn't hate it. [00:05:51] Speaker B: Yeah, that's how it is in the video game. Katana is kind of abducted as his daughter in the. In the video game. So that was all. Saw that coming. I too, liked the fight sequence in the beginning with King Jared. That was really cool. Lots of little flourishes with that kind of fun. I. I didn't find Shao Kahn to be as scary as I wanted him to be. Later, he becomes quasi immortal and okay, but he's still, like getting his ass whooped kind of by everybody the whole film through. He just can't die, you know. Well, there's the one exception, of course. We'll get to that. But. But I. I didn't find him as scary as I wanted him to be. He actually seemed like a very mature, rational human being. And I was looking for more of a, like, overgrown psychopath. Like a Bane. I was gonna say Bane on steroids, but Bane is on steroids. But, like, just like a mentally psychotic kind of Bane kind of character. And it wasn't. It was a pretty rational guy who was trying his best to take over [00:07:00] Speaker C: the entire universe, as all rational people do. [00:07:04] Speaker B: Right? [00:07:04] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, yeah. [00:07:05] Speaker B: Well, you know, I normally find rational rulers like that. You normally find these egotistical maniacs and he didn't seem like that to me. [00:07:13] Speaker C: I mean, he's got a necromancer in his employees, bringing people back from the dead to fight for him. [00:07:18] Speaker A: He's enslaving world. [00:07:19] Speaker C: He's enslaving people. [00:07:21] Speaker B: Yeah, he's. [00:07:21] Speaker C: He's rational is the word I was going to use. He's delegating really well. [00:07:27] Speaker B: Yeah, but. [00:07:28] Speaker A: But to your point, and this might be extreme and maybe people won't agree with me, I felt Shea Khan was the cold young of the first movie. In the second movie, he couldn't win a fight for the life of him. The only reason he won is because he was literally immortal. I thought it made for a. A really bad, bad guy. [00:07:52] Speaker B: Yeah, I agree. [00:07:53] Speaker C: I'm gonna actually completely disagree with both of you. Apparently, get used to that for this episode, I guess. I liked that he was a fighter and he wasn't a demigod. Like, obviously, he becomes immortal. That's. [00:08:05] Speaker A: I agree. I agree. [00:08:06] Speaker C: But I like that he was in the fight. [00:08:08] Speaker A: With fights. I agree with that 100%. [00:08:10] Speaker B: But when. When you fight him in the video game, he whoops the out of you. He's super fast, super strong, takes hits like a tank, and you can barely even touch him to begin with. And in this, he's walking around like Pepe Le Pew. He never gets excited. He's not very animated. He doesn't do much. He. [00:08:27] Speaker C: He's got a shoulder charge. [00:08:29] Speaker B: We saw, like, twice. We see it, and it was kind of short. And slam Sonia into the wall, like, one time. And it wasn't. I don't know, I just. I didn't feel like he was this badass. Like, he was in the game. Like, when you fought him in the game, you had sweaty palms at the controls, man. You were freaking out about that fight. And I just did get that feel in this movie. [00:08:48] Speaker C: So, I mean, in fairness, I think he only has, like, two moves in the video game. Right? Like, he's got the shoulder charge and like a knee charge or something. And other than that, he's just swinging his hammer around so, like, they kind of showed you everything he does. I. I don't. I. I. So one of the things when we watching, like, say, Venom, the Last Dance, when the goo monster gets cut up by the jet plane and then just recombines and comes back to life, I checked out instantly because I don't want to watch a movie where the bad guy is unkillable. There's no chance. So the fact that this guy was, like, I wouldn't say getting his ass kicked the entire time, but was taking damage made me, in some weird way, more invested in him, not what was going on. [00:09:29] Speaker A: He lost to. He lost to Cole. He lost. [00:09:31] Speaker C: He killed Jared right off the bat. [00:09:33] Speaker B: Yeah, but he. He lost that fight. Jared. Jared lost the fight because Jared was doing a stupid flourish with his ribbons and crap. If he would have just slit the guy's throat real quick like, the rest of the fight, it would have been over, and we wouldn't have had a movie. But instead, he was, like, [00:09:51] Speaker A: in that fight, he could have been more dominant. He did take damage, but he did, like, just strength overpower him like a brute, which is fine, but Nicole straight up kills him, but he's immortal. Liu Kang straight up kills him, but he's immortal. And then there's the final fight. Like, he loses half the more than he wins in this movie. [00:10:13] Speaker C: And he does kill Luke at the end. He defeats Shao Khan. [00:10:19] Speaker A: We'll talk about that later. He kills Liu Kang at the end. Well, he gives a monologue about. [00:10:24] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. If you like it when people can't die, Dan, then you should hate this movie because they basically say death is just another portal. Wait for Mortal Kombat 3. We're gonna go collect everybody again and do it all over because nothing counts. [00:10:42] Speaker C: No, I disagree with that. Again. Again, I disagree with that. Because if there's ever a franchise where people should die but come back, it's got to be Mortal Kombat, because I want to see the fatalities, but I also want Sonya in Mortal Kombat 3. You know what I mean? Like, yeah, if ever. Like, in. More In. In the Marvel Cinematic Universe, if you're gonna bring back Gamora after you kill. If you're gonna bring back Black Widow after you kill her, I don't care anymore. I already don't care about this movie. I just want to see cool fights and cool deaths. So, like, of course, put in another coin. Bring them back from the dead. Let me see them go again. [00:11:12] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:11:13] Speaker B: In later renditions of the video game, they do die. Liu Kang dies. And they. And he comes back as one of the Necro. Whatever. Yeah. And so that. That. That is a thing that happens in the game. So it's not that bad. I just think it's kind of cheesy. [00:11:29] Speaker C: That's a little cheesy. But again, like, I. I want both. And if they're gonna give me both, like, give me an explanation. Sure they did. There's a necromancer on the bad guy side. I'm not. Whatever. They're gonna go to hell and find their friends. I hope they don't find Cole. That's fine. He's lost to time. Like, his body was burned in acid. We'll never find him again. Oh, no. Moving on. [00:11:49] Speaker B: Yeah. They made sure he wasn't coming back. [00:11:51] Speaker C: Right. And I loved. They're just like, did he not make it back? Oh, they never mentioned him again in the entire movie. [00:11:56] Speaker A: Yeah. Lines in the whole movie. Like, he was. I feel bad for the actor. Like, yeah, seriously, he got the raw deal in this. [00:12:07] Speaker B: When he was saying his line, raw deal. [00:12:09] Speaker A: But it was just such a bad deal for the actor. [00:12:13] Speaker B: It was weird because Cole Young is. Is basically like, the whole time he's talking, I'm like, that's what an extra says two scenes before they die. Right. Like, that's what he was. He's like, I'm fighting for my family, and I'm prepared to lose everything for them. And I'm like, okay, he's gonna lose everything. He's gonna die. [00:12:31] Speaker C: Don't worry, you will. [00:12:32] Speaker B: And then. And then when. When the hammer comes down, I was sitting in theaters going, yes, he's out of the franchise. And then they pushed him into the acid for extra effect. I was like, sweet. They listened to their audience. They got rid of them. They didn't put him into a video game. I'm happy about that. Felt bad for the actor. I really did. He wasn't a bad actor. It was just a bad character, a bad script. [00:12:55] Speaker A: His name's Lewis Tan. He's one of the better fighters they had. [00:12:59] Speaker B: He is. Yeah. [00:13:00] Speaker A: And so it was like, oh, sure, the character sucks, but we're here for the fights, and he's a fighter. [00:13:07] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:13:08] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:13:08] Speaker C: Well, they could have made him somebody else, and I would have been more invested, Right. [00:13:12] Speaker B: Yeah, they could have. [00:13:14] Speaker C: Couple quick things, but with the Cole Young thing before we move on to other ones. One, his entire thing is getting the crap kicked out of him. So it kind of makes sense that Shao Kahn kicked the crap out of him and it made him stronger. I Was kind of okay with that. 2. I loved how quick and brutal the hammer coming down on him was. It wasn't like he wasn't trying to fight it coming back. So now he's dead. Like he is gone. And then three. And this made me legitimately laugh. Like Shao Khan mops the floor with him, pushing him off into the thing. Like, all I'm seeing is like this duck broom, just like pushing him off. I fucking died. I was in a theater with like four people and I think I was the only person laughing. But I was laughing quite a bit in this movie. I'm just like, that's incredible. I don't know if that was the visual they were going for, but Shotgun was just like. And I was like, yep, that's. That's what you do with this character. [00:13:56] Speaker B: Oh, okay. Can we move on to some other characters? Because I got some questions. [00:14:01] Speaker C: 100%. [00:14:01] Speaker A: All right. [00:14:02] Speaker B: So we talked about how we loved KANO in the last one. And we get Kano back in this one. He still didn't have his metal face plate. I thought he was his metal face plate plate. And he didn't happen. That's okay, though. That wasn't a big deal. But I thought that Carl was a Carl Urban or he comes in as Johnny Cage and I thought he was going to be a lot of that same comic relief. His jokes didn't really seem to land that well for me. Kana was still funny, not in as much of the movie. But the Johnny Cage character wasn't what I was hoping for. It was pretty mundane. He comes in quickly, loses his first fight, and then it kind of felt like, okay, like he's out of the tournament, I guess, and we can get into the tournament structure later too. That's a whole mess. But. So two of what I was hoping to be the best characters in the movie. One just wasn't as much as I was hoping for and the other one just wasn't at all what I wanted. Like, Carl Urban did an okay job, but it didn't land for me. What did you guys think about Johnny Cage? And. And maybe KANO too, Our previous favorite character. [00:15:04] Speaker A: Sure, sure. This Johnny Cage reminded me of Tim Allen in Galaxy Quest. This washed up actor who this has been. Which is like a different take. Obviously in the past it's always been like this Hollywood guy who's like, thinks he's the top of anybody. Right. And can't be touched. And that was a fun play. I. I didn't mind the twist on it. The has been. Is Kind of a fun play as well. And. And it puts him in the Cole Young position of finding everything out and being like, what? This is so ridiculous. So it was okay. But that being said, I didn't love him. He had a couple okay lines, but, yeah, as you said, I think a couple of the lines kind of fell flat as well. He was okay. [00:15:54] Speaker C: That. [00:15:55] Speaker A: That's the best I can do for Johnny Cage in this. [00:15:57] Speaker B: The best part of Johnny Cage was his intro into the movie when they show his absolute Dog Water film, which laughing out loud at that. It was so funny that I didn't. [00:16:07] Speaker C: Yeah, I wasn't laughing at the movie so much. It was like, it's awful. I get what they were going for. It was very Steven Seagal, where he's just like. And a guy goes flying until the rocket launcher, like, shoots at him. He jumps up and the rocket, like, curves and just goes straight into the sky. Takes a helicopter. And then I died. And then I died laughing. And again, only one in my theater apparently thought that was funny. But I was like, okay, that was as. That was exactly as dumb as some of those scenes in, like, Predator and stuff were. So I was like, perfect. That's. That's absolutely amazing. I'm not big on the whole Steven Seagal, John Clyde Van Dam. Like. Like, Those weren't my 90s action stars, but that was like. Yep, I see what you did there. The Carl Urban Johnny Cage, I agree, didn't really land for me in a lot of ways. I liked his character. I liked his performance. He was not Kano. And I'm not entirely sure they were trying to make him Kano because we don't really need two Kanos in this movie. But it would have been okay to have a bit more of a comic relief from it. Instead, he's more of, like, the dumb character that we need to explain what the Tournament is. I think you could honestly watch this movie without seeing Mortal Kombat 1 and get pretty much everything you need out of it, right? Yeah. So I liked his Johnny Cage quite a bit. And one of the things I really liked about him was it didn't waste a lot of time. You know what I mean? Like, he. They're. They Raiden and Sony go up to him and we're like, hey, we want you for the Tournament. He's like, okay, Cosplayer, piss off. And he creates this giant, like, electrical portal. And he's like, oh, you're the real deal. And we just go. And like, maybe that's too fast for some people. But I hate it when they're like, let's spend half an hour convincing this person or like, talk him into it. And they still kind of head to when he's in outrealm, but they kind of like, he's. He goes for the. The door. He's like, here's what they have to say. And he's like, whoa, I don't really want to die. And he gets sucked into the tournament. He's there anyways. And like, yeah, I kind of like that they sped speed, sped that process up as opposed to, like, again, I'm gonna go back to a different thing. But like, if you ever watched, like, the Luke Cage television show or the Jessica Jones television show, like, the entire first season is them just, like, moping around like, I don't want to be a superhero. And I'm just like, yeah, do it. Like, I'm watching the show already. I'm in 10 hours invested. Just be the superhero. I like that they kind of skipped that with this. And he still had the, like, I don't know that I want to do this. I don't really want to die. I'm not really the person you think I am. But they kind of get past that and kind of like the movie progresses despite him not wanting to be there. So I did enjoy that. [00:18:30] Speaker B: The tournament. [00:18:31] Speaker A: So that we got the tournament. Finally got the tournament. [00:18:33] Speaker C: Yeah. And I. I love the. Pretty fun. Yeah. As far as Kano goes, I love that they brought him back. I did. I was really surprised they didn't give him the. I played because that felt like that's what they were like, hinting towards with, you know, smacking his eye out in the first movie. But Quan Chi, creating the eye for him was a funny bit. And like, oh, my God, when he first enters. Oh, you got this. When he first, like, comes back to life and they're like, why didn't you make him a revenue? It's like, oh, he doesn't have much soul to say. It's like, oh, right, Loophole. I was like, I died. Like, I thought it was so funny. [00:19:08] Speaker B: I. I did like that, that, that they. They just a little bit of dialogue to explain something. And you're right. Speeding through things. This movie, I'm not going to see it for its plot. So you don't need to heavily invest me in the plot. You just need to give me a couple of lines to go on, acknowledge the thing in the room, and we can move on. That's good enough for me. That's what this movie did. And I was, I was happy that it progressed through some of those slower, dumber plot points quickly and gave a nod to things that didn't quite make sense. Even though they didn't have a great explanation. They gave me something so I can be like, okay, that, that'll count. It's Mortal Kombat. We're not worried about it. We're gonna move on. So, yeah, I, I, I did kind of like that, that direction that they went. [00:19:54] Speaker C: Yeah. I also, before we get into the next part, as far as Kano goes, I liked the twist, I guess we'll call it that he, like, goes back to EarthRealm and for the reason he did, where he's just like, this place sucks. Like, yeah, I'm fighting for the right team, but I don't want this to win. Like, I'm gonna live in a desert. [00:20:13] Speaker B: Yeah, there's no beer. [00:20:16] Speaker C: Yeah, he had that, like, list of things he wants. Like, that made sense to me. That was like a throw. Not a throw. That was like a pivotal moment. They're like, oh, yeah, I can totally understand why for his character, want to win, but you also want the good things in life once you win. So like, I, I, that worked for me. That, that was a perfectly fine explanation for why he would switch sides. What'd you guys think with the other, I'm gonna say the other main character of the show. Because if Johnny Cage is one, I would say Katana is the other main character. Yeah. What did, what did you guys think of her? Did she, did her character arc work for you or. [00:20:52] Speaker A: Her character arc makes sense, I feel because it was kind of a dual lead protagonist story. There wasn't enough of her story to be invested in her as much for her to be the one, the chosen one, you know, it felt a little lackluster to me. It all made sense, but it just didn't have that nice build or momentum for it. I don't know. I guess the character itself was fine. [00:21:24] Speaker B: Yeah. I think the biggest flaw with her character was that she's handed those fans and then we're just supposed to believe that that's going to be her weapon of choice for the ultimate tournament defending her civilization. And she's going to take this brand new weapon, which, frankly, that's not a great weapon. I know it's from the game, but let's face it, that's. I, I wanted to see her like go on some sort of a training montage with these or have had them for a long time, but she's like handed these fans which weren't anything what she's used before. Although she's taught everything as a weapon, and suddenly she's really, really good with them. And it just seemed a bit awkward. I would have liked some kind of explanation, like they've done with a lot of other things in the show. All they said was that she can use anything as a weapon, and she uses that for the ribbon. And that made sense. So the fans seem kind of cheesy. And yeah, her character wasn't developed enough, but this is kind of a shallow movie, so I wasn't really expecting that. Would have liked it. Doesn't surprise me at all. [00:22:29] Speaker C: Yeah, it didn't really bother me because kind of the same reason, like, why Rey can use a lightsaber. I'm just referencing every movie but this one tonight. I guess you're kind of shown that, like, she's probably been training how to use everything as a weapon since, like, at least since Shao Kahn kidnapped her, essentially. Probably under her father as well, because they know they're under the gun to, you know, potentially protect their realm from Outworld. So I get the impression she's probably been taught to be a warrior her whole life. And the do. The weapon we do see her training with is kind of like the fans closed. Obviously, that's a very different thing. But she is using, like, a tiny little pointy blade thing. It's made of wood, I think. But still, it didn't bump up against. I get what you're saying. I do get what you're saying. It's Mortal Kombat. I want to see her use fans. Yeah, they show me a warrior using fans. I'm kind of cool with it. [00:23:22] Speaker B: They just didn't seem that deadly. They seemed awkward. It seemed like a really weird choice, and it didn't. I wanted them to make that make sense, and it didn't make sense. That's. I'm not. I'm not in this for the plot. I'm in it because I'm nostalgic about the movie and I want to see how they represent it, which. Moving on a little bit here. I think that they did a good job of listening to the fans. The fans did not want them fighting in dirt caves anymore. They wanted real locations from the video game. And we got a. Of real locations from the video game. They weren't real. They were cgi, obviously, but you know what I mean. [00:23:56] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:23:56] Speaker B: A lot of new locations, which I. Unfortunately, I think that's where a lot of that extra big budget went to, was the cgi. Effects in these locations. But it looked great. Right. Like, we had some really goodlooking locations that I remember from the video game, and I was very happy. The acid pit. We had that outer world one with the portal in the background. We had all. All this stuff. It was. It was really cool. The scenes that they set for this, lots of different locations, like when we went to see Baraka. So that was a cool little uptick from the previous movie, which had a slower budget. And we were just fighting in dirt caves like the Taliban or something. It was good. [00:24:31] Speaker A: Don't. Don't forget the farm. [00:24:33] Speaker B: Oh, the farm. [00:24:34] Speaker A: Yeah, the farm. [00:24:34] Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah. Where his wife beat Goro. [00:24:39] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:24:43] Speaker C: The one thing I'll hit back on on that. And one of the. One of my bigger complaints with the movie, I guess, was the. What do they call it? Hell? Netherworld. Yeah. [00:24:56] Speaker B: Another world or an underworld. [00:24:59] Speaker C: So that fight was probably the most underwhelming for me because that's one that they played up a lot in the trailers. Like Scoopy Scorpion versus Noob Saibot, which is like the undead version of Sub Zero. I don't know. Like, my eyes are going. I'll give it that. And, you know, I was watching on the big screen. But, like, I felt like there were times during that fight where I didn't really have a good handle. What was going on? Like, the screen was just kind of flipping. [00:25:19] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:25:20] Speaker C: Doing all kinds of things. I'm just like, where are we? What's happening right now? [00:25:23] Speaker B: A little too much. People are falling off of cliffs, bouncing around, jumping from place to place. There's. You can't tell if it's acrobats or tripping over their own feet. You don't know if they're intentionally doing this or if they're falling. There was a lot going on. A lot of flash and fanfare there. And I'm with you. I didn't like that sequence. I also. I wanted to see Scorpion fight Sub Zero again. And I know we already saw that, [00:25:47] Speaker C: but you were the one ragging on that last time. [00:25:50] Speaker B: Noob Sabot was. Was just not cool. I don't know. [00:25:54] Speaker C: I agree. I. I thought he'd have multiple clones. It looked like he only ever had one clone at a time. [00:26:00] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:26:01] Speaker C: Yeah. So I thought it was gonna be like he's gonna fight all four of them at the same time, which he kind of did, but all he really did. [00:26:09] Speaker B: Really? [00:26:09] Speaker C: Yeah. Like, they. He has the clone and they kind of fall into the ground and come up somewhere else. That's kind of all he did, like, did he have any other. Like, not that that's not a powerful move, but like any other powers or. [00:26:22] Speaker B: It was basically Noob Saibot split himself into two so he could fight two people at the same time. And I wanted to see Scorpion take him on all by himself. I want to see that kind of thing going on also. As much as I wanted to see that, that fight, I also kind of felt a little tired bringing Scorpion back yet again after he found peace and thought everything was over with. You know, his imaginary world in hell burns away and he dons his suit and goes back to work again. It felt a little tired. So it was like I didn't know what I wanted, but I'm pretty sure I didn't want what we got. [00:27:01] Speaker C: I'll give you that. I'll give you that. I think Scorpion and Sub Zero are like the mainstays of this franchise. And it'd be kind of hard to not have either one of them in this movie or in. In a movie. Yeah, maybe you could get away with it if you move on to like the. The cyborg robots like Cyrax and. And whatever the other one's name is. Yeah, but honestly, they're just not as cool. [00:27:24] Speaker A: Or you could do the new Sub Zero, right? The brother or whatever, isn't it? [00:27:28] Speaker C: Yeah, that's where I thought they were gonna go, to be perfectly honest. I thought they were gonna. And then they. They did Noob Saibot instead, which I wasn't opposed to. It just didn't work for me as much as I wanted it to. [00:27:38] Speaker B: I. I really like where Sub Zero has gone in the video game franchise. I think they've done a great job with his character, bringing in his. His tutelage, the. The girl that he teaches Frost. Those are great characters in the franchise. They came in at the time when the franchise was building up their backstory and really world building within Mortal Kombat realm. And those are really good. This one just felt like, hey, these are good characters that we want to see, so we're going to put them in this movie. And that was really all there was to it. Now, I do know that they specifically held off on some of the bigger fan favorites because they wanted to keep a few in their pocket for the next film. I don't know if they're going to greenlight another film after this, but I know that that's what they did. They wanted to bring in some of the heavy hitters, but they still kept a few back. Cyrax being one of them. I mean, I can name off a couple, but they didn't bring them all in. So I don't know where they're gonna go in the future with this franchise. I kind of hope that it just ends here because I don't see it getting any better. But who knows? We'll. We'll see. You know, the previous movie made all its money off of streaming services. This one. I don't know about you, Dan. I didn't see a lot of people in my theater, so I don't think this is going to be a big box office hit. I think it may be one of those. And I'll probably tell people, if you really want to see this, definitely wait for it to come out on streaming because I wouldn't, I wouldn't be surprised [00:29:03] Speaker A: like if, if you saw the 2021 version, you're probably not enticed to go to this one in theaters, but you probably check it out on streaming especially. So audience reaction has been quite, well, critics, pretty lukewarm. [00:29:17] Speaker C: I was in an empty theater, but I was also watching it at 4 o' clock in the afternoon on a Wednesday, so it's not exactly ideal. Bubba Hotep says he saw it on I can't remember, but his theater was full. It looks like if I'm looking at IMDb, it had a 68 million dollar budget which is actually really low. Like that's not bad. I know that sounds like a lot, but compared to a lot of other blockbusters, opening weekend was 38 million and it's already grossed 75 million worldwide. So like, I wouldn't say it's a flop. It hasn't necessarily made its money back yet, but for the opening seven days, that's. Those aren't bad numbers. [00:29:53] Speaker A: And for a race movie, right. It's a rated R, which you have to put into consideration. [00:29:57] Speaker B: And Skinny Matthew. Mortal Kombat 3 was confirmed back in October, so looks like we will be getting a third one to this and we will have to revisit this franchise, [00:30:06] Speaker C: which I don't like as much as it's a rated R movie. I also bet money this has the dad Deadpool effect where people are taking their kids to it being like, oh, it's Mortal Kombat. Yeah, I grew up on this stuff and there's gonna be a lot of F bombs and people getting disemboweled. So now the one thing it didn't have, and I'm super happy about this, is there was absolutely no romantic subplots anywhere. You had the two main characters being Johnny Cage and Katana, of course, I'm pretty sure in the 95 version they do have a bit of a fling or he's trying to make them have a bit of a fling. So I was a little bit nervous we'd get something silly like that. And I'm really glad they didn't. Like, there was no Sonja Blade love interest. There was no, a ton of love interest. Like at most there was a bit of a respect between Jax and Jade. But that's as far as that went. Right? [00:30:52] Speaker A: That was the friendship fatality. Right? [00:30:54] Speaker C: There you go. [00:30:55] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:30:55] Speaker C: That would have been hilarious if you actually did like a friendship and like turned her bow staff into something like here's a doll. That would have been actually pretty funny. But no, that was one of those things where like, I, I didn't need that. I didn't want that. It would have felt shoehorned in and unnecessary. And I'm, I'm glad they had the restraint to not try for it, I think. Yeah. [00:31:13] Speaker A: I read somewhere that there was a Liu Kang katana romance katana interest, but they cut it from the movie. I don't know if it didn't get filmed or didn't. It just didn't make the cut. [00:31:27] Speaker B: But Luke Kane's character felt a little one dimensional. He was all about rescuing his brother and that was about it. Like there wasn't much more to it than that. And I'm okay with that. He didn't need to be any more in the movie than he was. And I like the fight scenes that he was in and what he did that. Honestly, the Liu Kang Kung Lao fight scene was one of the better ones. With the hat constantly spinning around and they're both flicking it and flinging it, grabbing it and stuff. That was actually a pretty cool one. I, I did have fun watching that. [00:31:58] Speaker A: I would say that's the number one fight in this movie. [00:32:01] Speaker C: Yeah, I, I liked Liu Kang. Not Liu Kang, Kung Lao as a fighter in the second game. And I feel like in the first movie he's got the hat, but that's really it. This one you actually see him do like the spin, the teleport, throwing the hat, cutting people. Like, I guess he did cut somebody in the first one, but it just felt more like the character I wanted to see. And I, I really liked that fight scene actually quite a bit. [00:32:25] Speaker A: Yeah, I'd say, and I'm obviously biased to martial arts films, I'd say that was the one quality fight scene in this movie where like they set it up as like A side scroll fighter style. And then they have actual good martial arts people doing the moves so they didn't have to cut every three seconds to a new shot to make it look like things are connecting. And then I. I had. I was like, why is this the one? Because both of those people, Ludy Lynn, who played Liu Kang and who played Hong, they are both have worked for. I think Max still works for the Jackie Chan stunt company, so in good company of. Of quality work there. Right. So it made sense to me why that fight definitely dominated compared to the rest. [00:33:22] Speaker B: And. And the reason so many other fight scenes didn't work, because they didn't have as good a choreography. And they used really blatant special effects to cover those things. We had flashing lights like crazy in this. Whether it was the. The Sonja fight and all the screaming that you couldn't see with the wind effects going on. You had Raiden when his slit. When his. When his throat was slit. And it looked like a bad rave going on in there with the blue light shining over everything. Could not see what was going on because we. We didn't want to see Carl Urban tele prompting his fights and whiffing it by six inches. And there were some other ones too, which was weird because you get into the Kung Lao Liu Kang fight and the hats flying around and fireballs are popping off, but you could still see clearly what was going on. The camera held on to the characters for good long takes because these guys were good at what they did and we didn't have to have all that flashy junk going on, which kind of ruined the other fights for me. When they started throwing in those extra special effects, I was just like, they're obviously doing this because they didn't want to take the time to train them to properly show this fight. [00:34:35] Speaker C: Yeah, to some extent, yes. But also, Mortal Kombat's supposed to be flashy, right? Like it is. [00:34:41] Speaker B: But we saw it flashy in the Liu Kang Kong Lao fight in a way that worked. And you could see it the other fights. They were using it to mask the shitty choreography. And it was. It was very frustrating. I would rather have seen shitty choreography, to tell you the truth. [00:34:57] Speaker A: Yeah, no, I think you can see a clear level of confidence in the fighters in the different. Different characters there and actors, which obviously makes sense. And, you know, I think they cast Carl Urban for, you know, star power more than physicality, which is a choice, and that's fine. [00:35:18] Speaker B: Yeah, he really didn't look like he was gonna win any fights, Right? [00:35:22] Speaker A: Exactly. Well. And didn't really doesn't. I don't think he nut punches Baraka, and then Baraka's his best friend for some reason. [00:35:30] Speaker B: Yeah. Hey, if you guys punch me in the balls, we're not friends anymore. I'm sorry. That ain't happening to me. [00:35:38] Speaker A: Yeah. But that's kind of one of my biggest critiques of this movie. One, the fights just didn't live up to my expectations, aside from the one we talked about. But the second thing is, and I didn't actually go through the math on this, I feel like there was more fatalities in the first movie than in this one. Like, there's more fights in this one, but less fatalities overall because nobody's dying. Like, only two or three people actually biff it fatalities in this. And it's a Mortal Kombat movie. Everybody should be fatalitying. Aside from I did like, the Katana leaving Johnny Cage to fall over, because that's definitely in the game and, you know, a nod to the game, and that's fine. But aside from that, it should have been Fatality City, and I just wasn't getting that from this movie. [00:36:29] Speaker B: I agree. The fatalities were lackluster and few and far between when. When people did get murdered that it wasn't as cool as in the video game. Like Jax getting stabbed in the chest with the spear. That wasn't a fatality. That was just. He got stabbed in the chest with a spear. I wanted to see something crazy, and I didn't get that. [00:36:50] Speaker A: Yeah, Khan should have beat him to death with his own metal arms. Like, that's a fatality, right? [00:36:57] Speaker C: I don't know that. Okay. If we're go. I know this is what you mean, but technically, I don't think Shao Kahn has fatalities. [00:37:04] Speaker A: Like, no, you're probably right. But later in the games, can't you play? [00:37:07] Speaker C: Yeah. Further on, I think you can play as him. Than he probably does the. The one. While we're talking about fighters, I really liked Quan she in Mortal Kombat 4. So I love that he was in this and he doesn't fight. I was like, I'd love to see, like, something with him. Like, it doesn't have to be, like, a. A massive fight. He doesn't be one of the major tournament players, but, like, not only is he one of my favorites, but he has one of my favorite fatalities of all time where he, like, rips the person's leg off and then beats them to death with their own leg. I was like, that's super cool. [00:37:35] Speaker A: Right? [00:37:35] Speaker C: Maybe we'll get it in the sequel because he doesn't die in this one. But who knows? [00:37:39] Speaker B: Well, and you know what else we didn't get to see was Shang Tsung did not turn into anybody else. He didn't do jack. You're right. [00:37:47] Speaker A: He. [00:37:48] Speaker B: He almost [00:37:51] Speaker A: stabbed him. [00:37:52] Speaker C: Well. And he almost sucked the soul out of Johnny Cage. And then, like, decides not to. [00:37:57] Speaker A: I know. [00:37:58] Speaker C: Like, I think he literally just puts him down and walks away. I'm like, what? Why? Why did you not. I don't think he got hit from behind or anything. Like, I literally think he just was like, nah, I'm good. [00:38:06] Speaker B: Didn't somebody shout at him to get his attention or something? And he's like, oh, that's all right. I'll get this later. And put together. I can't remember. But, yeah, like, maybe he was just [00:38:13] Speaker C: trying to, like, focusing. Like, what he was supposed to do was kill Raiden. He's like, oh, yeah, this is taking too much time. I need to go do that other thing instead. But it was like, what? [00:38:24] Speaker A: Just. [00:38:24] Speaker C: All right, you might be right on the fatality thing, but I wasn't sad about the fatalities we got. For the most part, a lot of them. The fights were relatively brutal. And you got to see. [00:38:36] Speaker B: Katana's was really cool. Hers was really cool. At the end, I. I liked Shao Kahn smashing Cole Young. That was really cool. Pushing the body into the acid, so that counts. I liked that. [00:38:47] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:38:48] Speaker B: I don't remember anything else. [00:38:49] Speaker C: Scorpion kills Noob Saibot. [00:38:52] Speaker B: How? Like, I don't remember. [00:38:53] Speaker C: Rips him in half. He rips the clone in half. [00:38:55] Speaker B: Oh, that's right. Yeah. He stabs him through and sword up through the middle. And cuts the clone in half. [00:39:00] Speaker C: Which is a fatality from one of the games, I'm sure. [00:39:03] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:39:03] Speaker A: Right, Right. [00:39:04] Speaker C: You get the. The Shao Khan murders Lord Raiden. Not Raiden. Lord Jaden, whatever his name is. The king at the very beginning. [00:39:14] Speaker B: Lord J. Yeah. Then you have Sonya shoot a hole through Siren, whatever her name is, [00:39:22] Speaker A: with [00:39:22] Speaker C: a spike from the pit. [00:39:24] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:39:24] Speaker A: And then your thoughts on her. What were your thoughts on her? [00:39:27] Speaker B: Screamer. [00:39:28] Speaker C: Super underutilized for what she was. Not that I care much about Sindel, but like Mother. What? [00:39:34] Speaker A: Should have had some hair action, too. Right? That's what I remember. [00:39:37] Speaker C: Yeah. She should have some interaction. [00:39:39] Speaker B: She should have been wearing a red shirt. She. She was an extra just waiting to be killed. I immediately knew she was not gonna make that fight scene. Right. [00:39:46] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:39:47] Speaker C: I don't. I don't care that she lost the Fight. She is Katana's mother. I like. They use it a little bit to be like, oh, listen to me, or I'm gonna crush her skull. They could have done more with that relationship. [00:39:59] Speaker A: I agree. [00:39:59] Speaker B: Yeah. But again, I didn't come here for plot. I came here to watch these guys do fatalities. And we didn't get enough fatalities. I didn't get to see. I didn't get to see a lot of the stuff that I really wanted to see. I didn't get to see. Did John. Oh, Johnny Cage did do his shadow kick at the very end. He kicks the medallion to break it. [00:40:21] Speaker A: Medallion. And just shatters the beast. [00:40:24] Speaker B: Yeah, he. He didn't do his little, you know, throw the ball of energy. We didn't get to see that. But that's okay. That was kind of cheesy. [00:40:32] Speaker A: He did his nut punch. [00:40:33] Speaker B: His nut punch. Which we were. You know, we're all waiting for that. [00:40:36] Speaker C: The one move I really wanted to see was Sonya Blade. When she, like, does the handstand, grabs person with the legs, and then kicks. I thought that's how she was going to defeat Sindel. By, like. Because she was kind of watching the spikes where the spikes were popping up. I thought she'd grab her. Comes up and would have been really cool. That's the one where I'm like, okay, I wish we saw that. For the most part, I got what I wanted from this movie. [00:41:00] Speaker B: Not me. I was left wanting. The fight with Jade was lame. Didn't really go anywhere. Didn't really see much from Jade at all. Like, she lights up her staff toward the end and that was. It didn't really, like, use it very much. [00:41:14] Speaker A: Like, also, it didn't really make sense why that happened. [00:41:18] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah. Put the end piece on it to, like, make it less useful. Like, what? [00:41:24] Speaker A: Yeah, it's exactly. It's like a literal, like, showing you that he is enslaving her. And then she breaks free. Like, that's it. And it's so dumb. [00:41:36] Speaker B: And then Raiden. Still absolutely useless in this movie. Completely useless. [00:41:42] Speaker A: Yeah. Almost more useless in this movie, actually. [00:41:44] Speaker B: Yeah. At least he didn't do anything, like, completely stupid. He just didn't do anything at all in this movie is what they ended up doing with him. [00:41:52] Speaker A: So. [00:41:53] Speaker B: Yeah. But I think one of my biggest problems with this, though, is that we've got the scorecard in the sky. And then Katana's like, I switch teams and the fire goes to the other side. And I was like, literally loses the tournament. How is that? That's so Dumb. Like, it was just. That was the stupidest thing ever right there. I was mad about that. I threw popcorn in the theater. Like, I took a handful of popcorn and threw it. I was angry with that. [00:42:24] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:42:24] Speaker C: Really? That did not bother me at all. Totally lost the tournament. The light went out, man. [00:42:29] Speaker B: It was absolutely. Earth lost the tournament. We were. [00:42:32] Speaker C: Okay. [00:42:32] Speaker B: Done and finished. [00:42:34] Speaker C: Okay. The timing of it, I'll give you. If she switched over when there was still a blue light on. Okay. I get what you're saying. It would have been better. Yeah. Yeah. [00:42:43] Speaker A: And it was just like. [00:42:45] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:42:45] Speaker B: You don't get to turn around and uncross the finish line. You don't get to do that. It was dumb. [00:42:51] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:42:51] Speaker C: That's fair. I'll give you. [00:42:52] Speaker A: That is paper thin. It's just. I would have accepted she kills Shao Khan after the tournament and then takes over all the realms. [00:43:04] Speaker B: That would have been better. Yeah, that would have been better. [00:43:06] Speaker A: Leaves Earth or releases Earth back to its. You know, whatever. Yeah, that would have been better. This. [00:43:12] Speaker C: This was just like. [00:43:13] Speaker A: And again, you guys aren't here for the plot, but this is horrible. This is horrible. [00:43:19] Speaker C: I mean, that's kind of what she does, but. Yeah. Yeah, I know. [00:43:23] Speaker A: But the switching of lights was just rough, rough stuff. [00:43:27] Speaker C: Good. [00:43:28] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:43:29] Speaker B: That's all I got for this [00:43:32] Speaker C: at all. [00:43:32] Speaker A: But Baraka was like the Drax of Mortal Kombat, I guess. He's like, okay. Funny lines. He's kind of a big brute, kind of dumb. [00:43:47] Speaker C: His stupidity is what you're supposed to [00:43:48] Speaker A: be getting all about fighting. Yeah, he's Drax. [00:43:52] Speaker C: He. He looks like. His mouth looked a little awkward, but also, I was trying to think, like, I've never seen something that looks like that. So it might be like that. It looks totally fine, but it just looks awkward because I'm not used to seeing anything that looks like that. Yeah, I did. I. I thought it was kind of a funny bit that he legitimately thinks his name is Johnny Cage. Like, is his middle name. And I was like, yeah, that's pretty fun. I like that. [00:44:13] Speaker B: And I liked how they turned around and he went back to tell the story to Barako and his, like, clan and stuff. That was kind of wholesome in a gruesome way. [00:44:23] Speaker A: Yeah. Yeah. You know, no, Barack overall wasn't bad. And I think the most thing is probably the best it's looked on, you know? [00:44:31] Speaker B: Yeah. Honestly, I kept, like, trying to look through the teeth to see if I could see the guy's mouth underneath the costume one time I could. Oh, there was Oh, I didn't see it. [00:44:40] Speaker A: They CGed in like a tongue. [00:44:43] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:44:43] Speaker A: One time I could see behind that or it wasn't there or something. And then in the slow motion parts, you could be like, oh, that's a rubber ass mask. Don't slow mo him. [00:44:58] Speaker B: Why. Why did they wear those weird robes to go into the back door? Remember Baraka takes them to the back door, they're wearing those weird robes, and then they just take them off. And it was like, what was that for? What scene got cut where they needed to wear those? Like, what is that? [00:45:14] Speaker C: I mean, they're sneaking through a lot of tunnels to get to that point. So I don't know what they thought they were gonna run into between A and B. Yeah, I did bump into that for like the tiniest fighters. [00:45:24] Speaker B: Were worried about some like, sewer rats or something. Come on. This is. [00:45:28] Speaker C: No, we're worried about the castle finding out that they're there. But like, the whole point is they're trying to get in undetected. If they get detected, it's over. So from a distance, you see people in robes. Like, oh, that's what the tarot wear. [00:45:40] Speaker B: Clear potato stack cloth. [00:45:43] Speaker C: Really wearing was pretty. The part, the part that got me was they're like, oh, this whole area is completely unprotected or un. Unmonitored. And they get to a door and there's two guards. I'm like, that's not what you said, but okay. [00:45:56] Speaker A: Exactly. Yeah, yeah, yeah. [00:45:59] Speaker B: I. I didn't really like a lot of the costumes in this. They weren't. They weren't. They could have been worse. I think the first movie had bad costumes as well, but I. I would have liked better costumes in this too. And again, I. I really thought this was going to be 100 million budget. You say it was a 65? 68. [00:46:17] Speaker C: 60. [00:46:18] Speaker B: Something like that. 68 million. Okay, this. These were 68 million costumes. So I guess that's okay. So it wasn't too bad. At least Kung Lao looked really cool with his new souped up hat. Yeah. [00:46:31] Speaker C: With the exception of like Raiden and Scorpion, most of them were just wearing clothes. And like, I'm kind of okay with that. Like, most of them are just wearing clothes. [00:46:40] Speaker B: Yeah, right. [00:46:41] Speaker C: Like, a lot of them aren't wearing terribly elaborate gear in the movies. [00:46:46] Speaker B: Several wardrobe changes for some reason. I don't know what was up with that, but he had like three or four, four or five different outfits that he wore through this. But yeah, they were all kind of close. They were clothes from the different Video games. And so I think that's really what they were just trying to do. They're just trying to pack as much video game stuff into this as they could. And that was okay because that's kind of what I came for. I just would have liked at least one more really good fatality. I felt it was just a little bit low on that end and it. That's probably the biggest problem I had. And then the plot was terrible as always, but it wasn't as bad as the first plot, I guess. [00:47:24] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:47:25] Speaker C: I think the only way you get more fatalities is if you have completely no name fighters. And I kind of liked that. I knew everybody in this movie. [00:47:33] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. [00:47:34] Speaker A: But why? Why like you said, though, like, they can just bring them back. So just kill them. Who cares? [00:47:40] Speaker C: I don't think they're bring like, unless they were going to change like the movie we got. They can potentially bring them back the next movie, but it's not like they can kill them and then just wake up in Raiden's temple. Which would have been fine with me too, but a different thing. [00:47:53] Speaker A: Right. [00:47:55] Speaker C: Because like, the stakes are that you lose the tournament. Not that you die necessarily. [00:48:00] Speaker A: Even though it's called Mortal Kombat and you're killing. [00:48:03] Speaker C: Sure. But you could easily have like a. You're gonna fight to the, you know, to the death in this realm. Yeah. But you're. You're still. We can bring you whatever. I don't care. It's Mortal Kombat. I want to see you die and come back and play again. Right. [00:48:15] Speaker A: Like, I guess so. I mean, to me, I think they have such a vast roster. Just start clipping people and like, for me, it doesn't make me look forward to the next installment because they're going to go on this, like, rescue mission to the Nether Realm to like, rescue the fallen soldiers of Jax and Liu Kang and Kung Lao. And I'm just like, great. So we're just gonna get more of the same people, not in a tournament style. So it's gonna be a mess. Just like the first one. Like, it really doesn't inspire hope at all. Whereas at least this one, you knew what you were gonna get, which was nice. [00:48:52] Speaker C: What if. And I'm spitballing here if I remember, because the games are convoluted and they're all over the place. [00:48:58] Speaker A: Right. [00:48:59] Speaker C: What if we did lose the tournament, but Shao Kahn died, so he didn't get to take over. But the next movie is Outer World being able to invade Earth because technically they won and so the next movie is more of like an all out apocalypse with like we had that in the video Heroes. Exactly. And that's what I'm stealing from is like all of Earth's heroes, and especially the ones we bring back, are now fighting for their world, not in just a tournament. I could be potentially okay with that. [00:49:28] Speaker A: Yeah, I mean it would have a little better structure as well and you could introduce more characters on either side. I. I like that a little bit more. [00:49:36] Speaker B: What are we gonna face it? Any plot at all is gonna be an improvement because both these movies have next to nothing as far as plot. I will say that the sequel had a little bit more, a little bit better plot, but only because we had a tournament and that just naturally gives it structure. [00:49:57] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:49:57] Speaker B: Even though they fucked that up at the end with the whole blowing lights in the sky, at least it had some structure to it. So really it doesn't matter what they do in MK3, they just got to put some decent writers into it. Maybe give it a little bit more time and give. I think go ahead and flex the roster. Give us more fighters and more fatalities and. And let's see where it goes. But I. I don't care. I don't go see these for the plot. So. [00:50:25] Speaker A: Yeah, to me. [00:50:25] Speaker C: And yet that's your biggest complaint. [00:50:27] Speaker B: Yeah, I mean that's, that's. I. I did get what I wanted for the most. I would have liked more fatalities, but I did get what I wanted. I saw the cool characters fighting in some cool scenes with a lot of little Easter egg stuff thrown in in the mix. So I guess I got what I came for. I just wish I didn't pay movie theater prices to go see it because I don't think that was worth [00:50:47] Speaker A: might be a streaming movie for most. I. I think through talking about it, I just feel like Mortal Kombat is a one and done movie. It's a tournament and you conclude it. Otherwise you do like what the tournament every 10 years. So just have a new roster every movie and just forget it. Maybe that wouldn't sell tickets because people like to get connected characters, but I think if you're doing a video game movie based on those characters, the roster tournament is fine way to do it. [00:51:19] Speaker C: So the weird thing for me is I don't like. It's probably baked into the video games because like in the first movie, if it is a one and done, it gives it extreme stakes like oh, we've already lost the last nine tournaments. This is the last time we need get rid of that entirely. And just be like, every tournament is on the line. And now every movie can have a tournament and like you know exactly what you're getting. And everyone is like, oh crap, if we lose this, we lose everything. Yeah, but it's not like oh like because now they have to lose nine tournaments in a row before there's like, oh, we're on the line again. [00:51:49] Speaker A: Exactly. There's no stakes again for this tournament style. So I agree. Change the lore to every year or whatever. It can still be every 10 years. But every tournament is the realm taking tournament. And then because it's in every 10 year tournament, you can cycle out some of your heroes and villains more often. But you don't have to do them all at once. You know, a fighter can be good for two or three tournaments. Maybe they don't die in a horrific style. Fatality. [00:52:18] Speaker C: Well, or die and come back. Whatever. So the one last thing I do want to mention and like, I swear I want to get on the reviews because we've already been going for quite some time. The one thing I did think was a little bit odd was at the very beginning of the movie you do have that massive fight scene between Shao Kahn and King Jared, I think his name is. And like the realm is there watching. They all understand the stakes. Everybody is like, oh my God, this is going to be awful. I hope we don't lose. Oh crap, we lost. And then EarthRealm, like nobody knows about it. Like we've lost nine tournaments in a row. These 45 people have just disappeared from history and nobody's heard of this whatsoever. We're about to get invaded by realm and nobody's heard about it. [00:52:59] Speaker B: I can explain that, Dan. It's because the birthmarks disappeared in this film. Notice that? No more Mortal Kombat marks on anybody. Just didn't even talk about it. [00:53:10] Speaker C: Sure. And I'm glad with that like as little as we want to reference the first movie. I'm good with it. But like, why? I don't know. [00:53:16] Speaker A: In. [00:53:17] Speaker C: In universe it is weird to me that not only did Raiden not tell anybody about the tournament until like it. It's starting, but also like nobody knows that world even exists. I get that in the real world we don't have an outworld, but like, who cares? [00:53:29] Speaker A: It's a. [00:53:29] Speaker C: It's a made up world. Make the earth different. [00:53:31] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. I think the. I think it comes down to is Raiden's just a terrible mentor and just is like Earth is so fragile. I. I don't want to like, alarm everybody. It'll just be chaos here in Earth. Let's just find these fighters last minute and hope we can make it. [00:53:48] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:53:49] Speaker B: No, it's because they know America's gonna launch some nukes if they find out we're on the ropes. [00:53:56] Speaker C: Shao contrast to Beat Together has a nuke ties to his back. We'll go Predator style. If we lose, just blow up. If you like what we do and you want to help support us, consider joining our Patreon. There's a link down below. Thank you to our producers as well as our executive producer, Dino. And a massive shout out to our writers, Elder JM990, Ms. Hillary, and Real Bubba Hotep. Thank you all very much. [00:54:18] Speaker B: I went and saw this because I was a pretty big fan of the video game franchise, and like I said, I saw most of the things that I wanted to see, would liked more fatalities. The plot absolutely sucked. After talking about this with the guys, I realized that my score was a little bit high, mostly because I think I overestimated on the plot. We got into some more plot details, and I brought that back down. This is coming in at a 58 for me, which is a little bit better than the first movie, but still, I don't think this is one that you should see in theaters. I think you should wait for it to come out on streaming services. If you're a fan of the video game, you will enjoy watching this for what it is. Just don't expect a lot because it's just not. It's just not. [00:54:59] Speaker C: I enjoyed these games growing up, and as much as people are like, oh, I didn't come here for the plot. That seems to be the number one complaint. Just this podcast. I didn't bump into a lot of the things, or if I did, I bumped into them in a very minor, like, oh, that's weird, kind of a way. But not enough that they, like, really took me out of the movie. I came here to watch some fight scenes. I came here to watch some silly action. I came here to watch some fatalities. And this gave me pretty much all of that. It gave me characters I recognized, locations I recognized. We're following characters I actually care about. As opposed to the first movie where you're stuck behind Cole Young or whatever his name is. This is. I mean, it's a little early to say this because the 95 movie has a lot of nostalgia and love for it. Despite it being not very good. This is kind of the definitive Mortal Kombat movie for me. I. I think this is In a lot of ways, if not every way. Better than that. 951 was definitely better than the 2021 one was. I had fun with this one. I was pretty much alone in the theater. I wish I could have seen this with my buddies, the same ones I saw the first movie with. I think I would have had even more fun watching and laughing and talking about it with them afterwards. So watching this by myself and still enjoying it, I don't really have a ton of complaints. It's not great, it's not amazing. It is a silly action movie based off a video game. But I knew that going in. I gave this a 76. I really did enjoy it. [00:56:13] Speaker A: Here's what I think. Is it better than the first iteration? 2021's Mortal Kombat? Yes. Did they write a lot of their wrongs by just ignoring the tattoos, ignoring Arcana, or the mention of it, and just destroying Cole Young and everything he ever stood for? Absolutely. Bonus points for that, I suppose. That said, for me, an action movie needs to focus on the action. There's something to be said casting somebody who looks like the character, but if you don't have the physicality to go with it, that dwindles the movie for me, you know. So having one really good fight in a movie about fighting with no plot except for they fight, you gotta have your fights banging every single time without Ms. Katana looked spectacular as the character. The costuming was great, but her physicality was one of the worst. I felt it was very clunky. They had to have a lot of cuts. It just didn't feel authentic. Even though she got to do the best finisher. Was it earned? I'm not sure. I did love a lot of the call outs to the video games. We talked about Dazed and Confused, Johnny Cage, who falls over super funny if you don't get your finisher off in time. I feel like there was a gong before every fight started, which is just like in the game the Nut Punch. Ed Boone was actually in this movie. He played the bartender. So, you know, they actually went to the source a little bit more with this one and it showed. But unlike Dan, I can't not have at least an attempt at a plot. I. I need it. You can have it all. We can have it all. I sound like a broken record, but we can have a popcorn movie that has a decent plot and I just feel like this one fell short. Overall, 52 out of 100. Catch it on streaming if you're a big fan. Otherwise, we ruined the movie anyway. So do whatever you want. [00:58:26] Speaker C: And with that, we have Mortal Kombat climbing the ranks. Not high enough to make it on the first set of the pages, but tying with Jurassic World, coming in with a 68, a 56, and a 49, for a grand total of 57. I can't say that this is wrong, because the first movie is pretty bad, but I am a little. I'm a little disappointed that you guys didn't enjoy this one at least a bit more than you did. But so be it. That's where it goes. So until Mortal Kombat 3 comes out, which apparently is happening, unfortunately, this is where it's going to land. How do you guys feel about that? [00:59:00] Speaker B: I think franchise to franchise, I like where this is at. I think it's as good or better maybe than Jurassic World. So that's. That's a good tie right there. I'm not a big fan of the Accountant like you guys were. Obviously, you can see my score in red there. So I. I would like both Jurassic World and Mortal Kombat to come in above the accountant, but that's not for me. So I'm okay with this. Definitely better than Venom. Definitely enjoyed this better than. Than watching the Venom movie. So I like it. [00:59:29] Speaker A: Yeah, I'm okay with it. I mean, as long as it's in the bottom half, that's okay with me. [00:59:36] Speaker C: Fair enough. Well, that's our rating of Mortal Kombat 2, but what's yours? Leave a comment down below. I'd love to hear what you think about this. This movie. We record this live over at Twitch TV, the Mongolie show at 9pm Eastern Standard Time every Thursday night. So if you want to go and hang out with us live there, you can go and hit the follow button. Or if you enjoyed this, L. YouTube, make sure you hit like and subscribe so that I see you in the next one.