Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to an all new Reaction & Review. Tonight, guys, I'm gonna be checking out a film from 2021. That movie is "Mortal Kombat".
Yes, guys, it's the live-action reboot that came out a few years ago, and I've never seen it. And just to clarify something, I have already seen the 1995 live-action movie and I love it. I've also seen it's sequel, "Mortal Kombat: Annihilation", which is nowhere near as good as the 1995 movie. Still though, I have seen both of those movies, and I have them both together as a DVD combo pack sitting in my collection somewhere.
Now as for the 2021 version, I really know nothing about the content of the film itself. I have heard, however, mixed things about it. I've heard some people say that it's pretty good, others have said it's just okay, while other people have said that the movie is just a pile of shit. I don't know which way it's gonna go for me, personally, but seeing as how the opinions of this film are all over the place, that makes my job here much easier. So I can go into it fresh eyes and see where it stands with me. I'm also aware that it has a sequel because they dropped a trailer for it not too long ago. I can't guarantee anything on covering the sequel until I get through this film first.
So now that I have that all out of the way, it's finally time for me to see how this movie is gonna turn out. I want it to be good, though it has big shoes to fill if it's ever gonna stand next to it's 1995 counterpart. But at the very least, I would like it to be better than "Mortal Kombat: Annihilation". Which shouldn't be too hard to do, but there is that slight possibility that this movie could totally suck. So, I'm gonna just dive right into this one and see how it turns out. And the only way I'm gonna find out how good or bad this movie could possibly be is if I shut up and I push play, and I'm gonna do that right now. So, without further ado, it's time to kick back, relax, and check out "Mortal Kombat".
6 minutes later
OK, well, that's certainly a little messed up to see Hanzo's wife and son all frozen up like that. I was gonna suggest maybe trying to defrost them, however, I noticed some kind of weapon sticking out from his frozen wife's back, so I guess that's not an option. I'm gonna assume this is suppose to be Scorpion before he even got his powers. At least it's something so far.
1 minute later
By the way, guys, I probably should mention this, even though it's still early in the film, the CG blood that I'm seeing here in this first fight sequence is really fucking terrible. I'm not kidding, guys, it is really fucking bad. I'm hoping maybe that it'll actually get better, or perhaps maybe I'll get use to it as the film goes on, but I'm not totally sure if it will or not.
17 minutes later
Guys, I'm gonna say this right now, Sub-Zero's costume here looks like shit. And I don't mean that it's shit because it's not the traditional blue garb that he normally wears, I mean that the metal surrounding his suit looks bulky as hell, and his back looks as if he's almost wearing foil that's trying desperately to look like metal. I really hope that he gets a better costume later on in the film, because, if not, then I'm gonna have to put up with looking at his awful costume for almost the next hour and a half or so.
12 minutes later
Well, guys, I am gonna say one thing so far. Kano in this movie is pretty awesome. In fact, he's the only likable character I've found in this movie so far. Everyone else has been kinda boring, but at least there's one likable character here I've found. So, at least that's a positive.
18 minutes later
So, guys, I'm gonna have to ask this, being that there's an hour left in the film and all, but is anything interesting gonna happen in this movie? Like, at all? I mean, come on, we're working with a video game property that's main focus is fighting. It should be really interesting, but right now, it isn't. I really hope that the next hour or so actually does get more interesting, because I'm starting to lose a little bit of interest here.
19 minutes later
OK, that was a really cool finish to that fight. But then again, considering it features Kung Lao's hat, I guess that was to be expected. Still though, that was actually kinda awesome.
12 minutes later
Oh, goody, one of the only characters that had something resembling a personality is now dead. So now, I have less of a reason to care about what's going on. It is pretty sad to think of, considering the character I liked was ultimately a villain, and all of the good guys have been boring as fuck. And that's saying a lot, mind you.
The Review
Well, guys, that was "Mortal Kombat". Let me go ahead and shut the movie off here...OK. Wow, um...where to even start here? Well, I guess I can say this much. This movie is certainly nowhere near as good as the 1995 movie, however, it is still at least better than "Mortal Kombat: Annihilation". Which really isn't saying a whole lot, but at least's something. So yeah, this movie doesn't really suck, as it's just more so on the average side of things.
Why don't I go ahead and start this review off proper here by first talking about the writing. The writing here is...well, a mixed bag at best. Now, much like with the 1995 film, they sorta have the same premise where Outworld needs to win 10 "Mortal Kombat" tournaments so that they can invade Earthrealm and ultimately conquer it. And so far, they've won 9 tournaments. One more and, well, they win. So Raiden and Liu Kang are gathering the best fighters to stop Shang Tsung and his band of villains from winning the tenth tournament. However, this is where the similarities with the 1995 film end because, this time, Raiden is recruiting specific fighters that have this special marking on their body, which is the famous dragon logo for the "Mortal Kombat" series. And also, unlike the 1995 film where they actually do their fights in the tournament, Shang Tsung is looking to kill all of the fighters who have the special marking and they're doing this before the tournament even starts. And so far, they've killed many people that have had this logo. We don't see this, mind you, as we're just told all this through exposition.
And that's one of the big problems of this movies comes in is that we're given mountains of exposition from our characters perspectives. To give you a couple of examples, we have the opening prologue where Sub-Zero kills Hanzo, AKA Scorpion, and his entire family, with the one lone exception being the baby girl that Raiden saves after Hanzo dies. What happened to Hanzo's daughter after that is never explained at all. I'm going to assume she's been long dead afterwards, but I still feel like that should've been explored a little bit more. But anyway, it's said that Sub-Zero is looking to kill Hanzo and the rest of his lineage. Now, I'm not the biggest expert when it comes to the lore of "Mortal Kombat", but I'm pretty sure that Sub-Zero had more of a reason to do this other than just simply killing off Hanzo's lineage. Yes, you get Hanzo's side of it. He wants revenge for his family. But you learn nothing about Sub-Zero's motivation. Which makes his character uninteresting because he has no real character to begin with.
While I'm on the subject of exposition, Liu Kang's entire backstory about how he got his special mark is told through exposition. You're not shown anything about him other than learning that he's on the side of Earthrealm and wants to protect it with Raiden and Kung Lao from Shang Tsung's forces. He's just a generic good guy. Which, to be fair, he did sorta come off as somewhat generic in the 1995 film. But he actually had a purpose there. He wanted to get revenge against Shang Tsung for killing his brother, and you cared about him then because he actually had something called character development. In this movie, he's only there to help train our would-be heroes against the forces of Outworld. Even when, spoiler here, Kung Lao gets killed off by Shang Tsung, you really feel nothing from it because, one, Shang Tsung doesn't get killed off here unlike the ending of the 1995 film. And two, there's no chemistry between the two characters because nothing comes from it in the end. And I don't want to hear that "they're saving all that for a sequel" excuse. If you can't establish something like that as your solo film, then you have fucked up right then and there and I'm not having real hopes of him having any development in the sequel there. I could be totally wrong on that, but I'm not having any real hopes there.
Since I'm already kinda talking about characters, let's talk about our main hero Cole Young. I'm just gonna be upfront when I tell you guys this, but Cole Young is easily the most boring character in the entire history of "Mortal Kombat". I'm dead serious, guys, he is boring as shit! It's hinted that he's suppose to be the descendant of Hanzo, but I refuse to believe that because the guy has all the personality and backstory of cat piss. I'm gonna give you his entire character right here: He's an MMA fighter and he has a teenage daughter and wife that he wants to protect. Ta-da! I've given you his entire backstory right there. And what makes his character even more pointless is that, by the time a certain twist happens near the last third of the movie, his entire character is completely overshadowed and, if you somehow actually cared about him in some small way, you're gonna immediately forget about him as a main character, and also acting as some supposed ancestor to Hanzo.
As for other characters, um...what about them? There's almost nothing there that I could tell you about them that's interesting or compelling in any way. The only exception out of all this is Kano. Kano is the only interesting character here who has something resembling a personality and depth that you can actually care about. Well, until a certain point anyway because, well, I kinda already spoiled it. So yeah, once he got killed off, everyone else I could give less of a fuck about because they were so boring and bland that I seriously felt like almost shutting off the movie just so I could go watch the 1995 film again, which I'm gonna do as soon as I finish this review, because, damn it, I'm really in the mood to watch it right now. However, I'm gonna be patient and finish talking about this movie first.
So yeah, guys, writing here is, well, horrible. I said earlier that it was a mixed bag at best. But now that I'm actually getting a chance to talk about it a bit more, the writing here just went from being a "mixed bag" to just downright "horrible". And yes, I know it seems like I'm being kinda biased because I've been sorta comparing it to the 1995 film. And since it's a reboot and not another remake, it really shouldn't matter too much, right? Well, if this was able to stand on it's own standards, I probably would've given the writing here a pass. But since it doesn't, I can't do that here, because the writing here is just that shallow and horrible.
While I'm on that subject, the acting here is also equally as bad. Most of the acting sounds stilted and robotic. Two of those I can think of immediately are Shang Tsung and Raiden's actors. Shang Tsung's actor sounds incredibly wooden, and Raiden's actor is almost the exact same boat, however, with him, I would say that Raiden's actor sounds fucking lifeless in this role. And he obviously does not have the charisma of Christopher Lambert from he portrayed the character in the 1995 film. Speaking of lifeless and wooden, Cole Young's actor just sounds completely emotionless throughout a good chunk of the film. I don't know if it's just the actor himself or if the script he was given just didn't work, but it sounded like he just phoned it in the worst way, and considering he's suppose to be the main character of the movie, it really makes him look worse than usual.
The only two actors I'm gonna give an exception to are Jax and Kano. The latter, in particular, because he actually seemed like he was having fun with his role. Then again, he actually had a little more to work with, unlike Cole's actor. Now granted, Kano's actor, Josh Lawson, does have a bit of a habit of spewing out pop culture references, but I honestly think they work fine for him because, like I said, he was one of the two actors here who actually tried. The actor playing Jax also did a pretty good job, too, though he doesn't get nearly enough material to work with, unlike Kano's actor. Still though, props to Mechad Brooks for trying. Though Josh Lawson is easily the biggest highlight when it comes to the acting here.
Special effects here are decent at best. There's quite a bit of CG involved, and for the most part, the CG isn't too bad...as long as they don't show digital blood flying. Allow me to explain. Now, when it comes to close up shots of wounds or any of the fighting that shows blood gushing out, that actually looks pretty good. However, if it's not viewed up close, and the blood is just flying out during fight scenes, then we have a bit of a problem here. All of the CG bloods in those instances look awful, especially during the opening prologue where Hanzo is stabbing some ninjas. The CG blood looks horrible and noticeably fake. And to any filmmakers out there, don't use digital blood for your movies, because 9 times out of 10, it's always going to look like shit. "Stitches" and one or two other films that escape me at the moment do digital blood right and they do it better. Not so much this movie. The CG blood here is mostly shit, when viewed from certain angles.
The fight choreography here is OK at best. It's not great, by any means, but it's at least serviceable. And that's the best compliment I can give the fight choreography here because a lot of it is just really forgettable. Part of the reason is because none of the sequences here, with maybe the exception of the final fight, is completely forgettable. I didn't even care about the fight between Cole Young and Goro because that fight was boring as shit. Now if you want a better fight done with Goro in it, look no further than the 1995 movie where he battles Johnny Cage. That fight was more interesting because it actually flowed better and had better pacing. It was short, I'll grant you that, but at least it kept you interested to see how Johnny was going to outmaneuver the four-armed monster. The fight between Cole and Goro does not have that luxury because it goes on for a little bit too long. So yeah, outside of that fight scene, the rest of the fights are just OK at best.
Camerawork here is pretty good. Lighting here is lit well enough. The sound-mixing here is good. And the score is incredibly generic and forgettable. There's just not much else to say about it.
Overall, guys, when everything is said and done, am I able to recommend "Mortal Kombat"? If you're a fan of the series, then I could maybe recommend it as a rental of sorts. If you see it running on some streaming service, then sure, maybe I can recommend it as a once over. But to physically purchase a copy of the film...no. I really couldn't recommend it because it's just not a very good movie. Now I'm not about to claim that the 1995 film is a masterpiece or anything, but it has more than enough entertainment value that it can be rewatched again and again on multiple viewings. This, however, doesn't really have a whole lot of entertainment value. And unless you're just watching it for the upcoming sequel, then there's not much of a reason for you to watch this thing at all. Especially if you're not a fan of the "Mortal Kombat" series. As for me, well, I wanted to like it. I really did. Because I wanted to see how this film could stand on it's own standards as a reboot film. And the final product, unfortunately, doesn't really deliver on that aspect. Now, who knows, *maybe* I'll cover the sequel at some point when it comes out on home video, just don't expect it to happen anytime soon. Now...as I said earlier, I was tempted to shut off this movie just so I can rewatch the 1995 film again. And now that I'm done with this review, I'm gonna go and do what I promised. I'm gonna go and watch the 1995 "Mortal Kombat" movie right now simply because this movie inspired me to watch something that's actually better.
Anyway, guys, with that, we come to the close of another Reaction & Review. Until next time, ladies and gentlemen, take care, and I will see you all later. Peace.
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