2021’s Mortal Kombat was good, but not great. The film reboot of NetherRealm Studios’ hit fighting game franchise kept its promises about recreating the gory fatalities and bringing the game’s colorful cast of ninjas, special forces soldiers, and monsters to life, but stumbled in other areas.
One of the most perplexing decisions was Lewis Tan’s new hero, Cole Young. Tan is no slouch when it comes to martial arts, but Mortal Kombat has so many iconic characters, it’s a head-scratcher why they needed to invent a dull protagonist specifically for this movie. So, what’s going to change in the upcoming sequel, Mortal Kombat 2?
Moon Knight writer Jeremy Slater is on script duties and briefly discussed his plans in a new interview with Discussing Film. When asked for an update, Slater confirmed that they paid attention to last year’s fan reaction:
“I can’t really share any details about it, but we want to make something that the fans really love and I think it’s a really great creative team. They have been listening to the fan reactions and they know what fans loved about the first movie and what they didn’t. Everyone is creatively setting out to really make a sequel that tops the original in every way. We’re still very early in the process, but the fans should be really excited. It’s going to be awesome.”
He also said it was very nice to go from the PG-13 Moon Knight to the R-rated Mortal Kombat, saying “it’s fun to get in there and rip a few spines out. I have the greatest job in the world.”
We already know that Johnny Cage will be joining the party for the next movie and that Warner Bros. is still considering this as part of an ongoing martial arts saga that will continue after Mortal Kombat II. We should also expect to explore Outworld in any sequel, with Raiden setting out to assemble a new crew of warriors to take down interdimensional warlord Shao Khan.
Beyond that, we’re desperately hoping that we get more of Josh Lawson’s Kano. Lawson was the best thing about the first movie by some distance, and even though he was apparently killed by Sonya, it doesn’t seem like much of a stretch to resurrect a guy who’s part-cyborg.
Mortal Kombat is available to stream on HBO Max. More on the sequel as we hear it.
