Considering how twenty-two years have gone by since we last received a Mortal Kombat movie, I’m sure lots of us were starting to think there would never be another one. But after more than two decades of rumors and false promises, it feels strange to see a reboot coming together so smoothly.
To briefly bring you up to speed on how quickly casting has heated up in recent memory, it all kicked off this past July when Joe Taslim was enlisted as the iconic Sub-Zero. Then, in this month alone, the other puzzle pieces began falling into place when Sisi Stringer (Mileena), Mehcad Brooks (Jax), Ludi Lin (Liu Kang) and Tadanobu Asano (Raiden) were hired for their respective roles, with Jessica McNamee (Sonya Blade) and Josh Lawson (Kano) joining the cause earlier this week.
Now, we can add two more fan favorite Kombatants to the tally, as Chin Han (The Dark Knight, Captain America: The Winter Soldier) has been cast as the villainous Shang Tsung. Hiroyuki Sanada (The Wolverine, Avengers: Endgame), meanwhile, will suit up as the badass known as Scorpion.
Though I’m excited to see all of these franchise staples being brought to life yet again, I do hope there’ll be no retreading of familiar territory, as 1995’s Mortal Kombat flick already adapted the original game. Then again, screenwriter Greg Russo has already assured us of how that won’t happen, saying:
“And the mission statement for the new film has always been, we don’t want to repeat what you’ve already seen. That doesn’t really appeal to anybody, I don’t think. And they already have those films. So at the same time we wanted to tell a new story that’s going to be exciting, but that’s gonna be faithful to the lore and the games that everybody knows and loves.”
Mortal Kombat arrives in theaters on March 5th, 2021.
