Mortal Kombat II - Movie Review

Added: 2026-05-13

[00:00:03]It's showtime.

[00:00:05]>> [music] >> Mortal Kombat 2 is of course the sequel to the 2021 movie Mortal Kombat that was also directed by Simon McQuoid. He has come back to direct this one and this is coming out 5 years after the first one did. It went through a couple of delays in the middle, but now it's going to be out in theaters this weekend. And in this one following the events of that movie, the tournament is about to commence and a Lord Raiden is trying his best to find champions to add to his side, especially as Shao Kahn has entered now and is beginning to make moves to take on the Earthrealm once and for all and conquer it. And one of those new champions that seems to be chosen for this is Johnny Cage, an actor who has been washed up for some time now and his career is at a dead end, but somehow he's going to have to find his way through all of this and figure out how to save the world and the universe before Shao Kahn manages to do something about it. The recent movie that came out that this is succeeding, I thought was okay. I remember watching it during the height of the pandemic in fact. That was when that whole theaters and HBO Max thing was going down. That in itself feels like a warped moment in time looking back on it and I remember seeing that at at home at the time because my my family was going through a bit of a virus bout as well and so we weren't doing a lot of, you know, outside trips to to movie theaters, but I remember thinking it was okay. There were some highlights to it, but overall, you know, nothing that really, you know, caught my attention. But the sequel, I will tell you right out the gate right now, is a far better movie. I enjoyed myself with Mortal Kombat 2 a lot more than I did the first one. And I think that a lot of that has to do with this one embracing a lot more the spirit of Mortal Kombat. One of the things about the first movie, aside from the fact that there was no actual Mortal Kombat, I mean, you could say that it was a setup to this one essentially, but one of the things that for me, I think didn't work so well, was the fact that at times it felt like the the tone when it came to wanting to be fun, but also take things very seriously, was getting warped quite often. And so, it took away from a lot of the fun and enjoyment that could have come out of that movie. In this movie, they embraced that wholeheartedly. From the very start of this, as you see Shao Kahn making his big entrance, and then the fights commencing, which again, the movie wastes no time with getting to the action, and the action is violent, brutal, gory, nasty, relentless, over-the-top and all the ways that you can imagine, very much evoking the games. I think that the movie succeeds a lot in those aspects, and those fight sequences are incredibly entertaining.

[00:02:54]There's a few really awesome ones that are standouts, absolutely. There's one terrific scene between Liu Kang and Kung Lao, which is you've seen teased in the trailers as well. That is maybe my favorite fight of the movie. I think that's a brilliantly done sequence. But, there's a lot of entertaining sequences, too. Like, there's a a sequence where Johnny fights Baraka, and early on a sequence where he fights Kitana. And there are things like that, again, sprinkled in. Like, the even the final battle that takes place, that I thought were really neatly done. And I think when it comes to some of the characters, especially the new ones, there's some really effective stuff with them. I will say that Karl Urban was not the first name that came to mind when I thought about Johnny Cage, even though I love Karl Urban, he's a great actor, but having seen the movie, I really liked his take on him. He is an actor who hasn't had a career for a long time.

[00:03:49]He's lost his sense of, you know, self-worth, and just, you know, trying to figure out who he is in all of this.

[00:03:55]And so, the movie very much gives him an arc to try and figure out who he can be, especially as Mortal Kombat is beginning and his life is on the line and the fate of the world is on the line. And so, having him go on that journey, but also maintain the charismatic nature of the movie star he once was at, you know, in his heyday, and have a lot of fun with it. I think Urban does a great job of representing that and I really liked him in this movie. But, the other character for me that was a standout was Kitana, played by Adeline Rudolph. She gets perhaps the more emotional arc of the movie. There is a lot that is going on with her as she's trying to get revenge for something that's happened in her life. And as you're following along with her story and how, she is trying to make her way through the tournament in order to make something happen, I think that her character I think you got some really great moments with her and I thought Adeline Rudolph did a great job as the character. I think they were both her and Johnny Cage are essentially like the anchors of this movie. The other characters, all of them get a moment to shine, though. Don't get me wrong. Which is really saying something because there's a lot of characters in this movie, from Sonya Blade to Jax to Kung Lao to Raiden to Shang Tsung to Baraka to Shao Kahn, of course, to Jade. I mean, they they the list does go on a bit there and I have to say it's pretty impressive that each character does get a moment where they get to do something cool and it makes them stand out in a particular sequence. And as always, it's a pleasure seeing Hiroyuki Sanada in anything as Scorpion. He is once again really great over here. I wish he was in it a little bit more, to be honest.

[00:05:39]Like, even that was my thing with the first movie, too. I wanted more of Scorpion, as well as Sub-Zero, Joe Taslim. He is also in this movie. And both of them I would have liked a little more time with, but they both were awesome once again. Some some great stuff with them. The score over it by Benjamin Wallfisch really really great.

[00:05:58]Very much incorporates the Mortal Kombat techno syndrome theme a little bit more than the last one did. So you definitely get that playing in some epic ways. And the way that they've incorporated some of the in-game stuff like, you know, some of the combo moves that are in the fight sequences, the way that those sequences are staged, you know, initially in different arenas like in the blue portal area for example with Liu Kang and Kung Lao. Like it's shown as if it's right from the games. I like the markers that appear in the sky during some of the fights where you see each one of them represents a character in a round and depending on who wins or loses it it gets extinguished. I think if you're a fan of the games, you're going to catch on to a lot of things like that. There's some very direct references made that were a lot of fun.

[00:06:44]For example, Ed Boon, the co-creator of the series, right there. Like he's he's awesome. It's great to see him. You hear his iconic get over here at one point, too. Like it's there's a lot sprinkled in here, which I think does, you know, speak to the fact that the first movie got a bit of a mixed response, to put it mildly. A lot of fans were also all over the place on it. And this movie feels a lot like, all right, we heard a lot of the complaints. We're going to try and fix up a lot of that. There's an unapologetic sense to everything that McQuoid, the writing for team with Jeremy Slater as the writer, and all of the actors are doing in here that really they understood this time around how exactly to tackle this. And so that makes it a very enjoyable experience, but at the same time there are things that do fall to the wayside. I mentioned the premise earlier when it came to what's going on in this movie.

[00:07:38]That's about the plot of the movie. It's there's not much more to it than that.

[00:07:42]Some of the things that you get with the characters are add a little bit of depth, but beyond that you're there for the action and once that gets going it's non-stop. And so, there's not a ton when it comes to the narrative. The dialogue is very stilted. There's some fun one-liners for sure. It's great hearing Johnny say "It's showtime" or hearing the "Get over here" from Scorpion and things like that, but I mean beyond that there the some of the dialogue exchanges are not the best. Some of the performances are not a little stilted at times, sure. Some of the CGI at times is definitely a little bit wonky. There's one shot in particular that I remember thinking this needed to be fixed a bit where Johnny is standing in front of a portal and he's talking to Sonya Blade and you get the outline of the green screen like almost behind Johnny. Like you can kind of see it. And we were watching this this was an IMAX where we went and saw the movie, which does have the expanded aspect ratio. I'll make note of that in one second. But I remember thinking okay, that's a shot that doesn't look very good. And there were a couple of moments like that with the green screen and the effects, which could have looked better. I mentioned about the IMAX because the aspect ratio changes in this movie. Some of them are fine like with the action. Like there's an extended section of the movie, which is just entirely in that, you know, 1.9 ratio. But initially in the movie they keep switching only with like establishing shots of a scene and then the actual scene is not an IMAX. So, it would be like a one second up and then it would be back to wide screen. It's not something that is going to bother people if you're not seeing it in IMAX, but because we saw it in IMAX, it's just something that I was mentioning that I I don't think that's the a very well handled, you know, section of it. It like Like it does get a little better later on, but initially it was really really uh scattered and it was a little jarring to see some of that. Also, overall, while it does have some issues, absolutely, I also find myself thinking that at the end of the day, what did I come here for? Why do I go for a Mortal Kombat movie? I go for the really fun action. I go for the fun characters. I go to have some, you know, comedic moments with some of them. Kano, Josh Lawson, who plays him once again, extremely funny in the movie. I thought he was really really great over here once again.

[00:10:08]Uh I think there's some great, you know, moments like that that you get with characters, for sure. So, while I don't think, like I said, it's an perfect movie through and through, I think it's an enjoyable watch, and I think it's an entertaining time, and I hope that you guys are fairly entertained by it, as well, when you go check it out this weekend. I'm going to give Mortal Kombat 2 a 7.5 out of 10.

[00:10:31]So, let me know what you guys think of Mortal Kombat 2 if you go check it out this weekend, and if you have already seen it, maybe let me know what your thoughts are in the comments down below.

[00:10:39]Guys, thank you very much, as always, for watching. Look forward to more videos very, very soon. As always, if you like this, please do subscribe.

[00:10:45]Thank you very much, once again, and I'll see you guys at the movies.

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