In Retrospect: Mortal Kombat (2021)

I guess there's a reason this spawns from a company called MIDway.

I think my estimation has actually fallen since I saw this opening day. Like dude, I would gladly take the 90s film over this. And it took me a second to kinda articulate as to why, but the quality of this film overall is like if a Sci-Fi Channel original movie had an actual budget. This halfassed script, decent actors but not great characters, blank slate of a protagonist which makes me wonder why the fuck we even have him, the slightly off beat references that should be awesome but kinda make you roll your eyes when they happen, the effects which are passable, just everything about this leans so much into that direct to cable movie element which I have to say I've not seen in a considerably long time. Now I know, I know...it was a rough goddamn patch of time when this movie went into production and when it got released, I'm taking that into consideration and not trying to bash it too hard. Cause it's not a bad movie, this is nowhere near Annihilation but it ain't that goddamn good either folks. Best damn scene in the movie is the opening, it was investing, a notch emotional, had really good fight choreography, I loved it! I think the true nail in the coffin for this is our main character, may I ask why we just decided to add some guy who isn't a character in the games to be our focus and might I go one step further and ask why did you make him the most uninteresting nothing character? Poor Lewis Tan had exactly two things to work with, jack and shit. And jack left town. He's trying but there is nothing to this to the point where I almost feel offended for the guy, imagine you got cast in a Mortal fucking Kombat movie and you're just some...guy. Not Liu Kang, not Johnny Cage, not even Stryker! It's almost stunning how bland Cole is. Like...I gotta move on, I'm gonna be hear all fucking day. I will however say I do indeed have higher hopes for the second film, I truly do. It does look better. As long as they don't do stupid shit like in this where you drop Kung Lao in that undignified fashion, kill Goro in THE FIRST FRAKKING MOVIE HELLLLOOOOOO, and not even give us the shit sucking tournament on which this entire franchise is built upon, we'll be fine! Those are choices man, but they are not good ones! Holy fuckaroli it's like the longer I think about it the more the score dwindles. But hey, they at least didn't rush a sequel. It took them 5 years to get around to Mortal Kombat II and I will commend the filmmakers on that alone, all the time in the world to iron this script out, make the right calls, and craft a good movie. I'm not saying I'm walking in with the highest of expectation but I'm certainly walking in with hope. I however am leaving this film never to return. 1.5 stars, 4.5/10, I'll catch you tomorrow!

Mortal Kombat (2021)

Thank God this movie wasn't absolute horseshit like that trailer.

Now you're expecting me to say it's the best Mortal Kombat movie to date. Nope. I can't even explain why I didn't like it, now I must set a disclaimer. I did not hate it. I thought it was average. I can't even discern what angle the filmmakers were going for, they didn't make another practical remake of the original film, they didn't make it an all out fight fest plot be damned, now you think I would be thrilled that it wasn't another movie where a buncha' fighters take a boat to an island like yesterday when I gave good grief for the animated movie treading familiar waters. But here's the thing, there is no tournament. At all. The plot follows new character Cole as he's very much slapped into this world of magic, creatures, and abilities as he meets up with various characters and has to learn his special abilities to fight in the tournament. The tournament that never even begins. Oh sure you get your fights and your gore, but there's no real semblance of beginning, middle, and end. Now I know. I know. This film was in production at a very uncertain time, and while the effects are done okay the story needed revisions. Several revisions. Now the characters are done well, there were a few I didn't know but the ones I was familiar with were played by good actors and it got the basics right so I have no complaints there. The effects look good, though Goro looked just flat out like Hulk from The Avengers except with 4 arms. But the designs worked for me with tons of love going to Scorpion and Sub-Zero giving a proper update from the 95' film. And I must admit the film never really got me pumped though the fights are decent, but really the highlights were at the beginning with Hanzo and at the end with Scorpion, those were done very well. But it just kind of fell flat for me, it's an okay movie and I have no problem seeing the second but this is totally a rental not a theater experience. It really is sandwiched between the two other live action films which some may consider bad but it's purely logical. Annihilation got a 1 for f***'s sake and the original got a 7, that's a wide berth. So this gets 2 stars, 6/10. Christ this really was a rocky week of quality, with the first Mortal Kombat movie being the best still for me with Scorpion's Revenge coming in second. I can scarcely believe that and I just wrote the damn thing but man that first film is better than most would give credit for, and I wouldn't mind adding it to the movie collection at all. So sort of a disappointing end to the month but there are always possibilities and opportunities in the future. So give this a watch if you're hardcore for Kombat or just want to judge it for yourself.

Mortal Kombat

Shit that still held up.

For a movie I haven't seen in about 15 years, I still liked it! And from my limited knowledge on Mortal Kombat it did pretty good, which is strange because Mortal Kombat in some form or another has been a part of my childhood. I played Mortal Kombat 2 lots on the Super Nintendo, played the arcade cabinets, and watched the movie despite me being roughly 10 years old. Hell I even remember how I saw this movie for the first time, I got my Nan to buy the VHS at a Sam's Club of all places and I think she knew about the game cause she asked what the rating was but I got it and I quite liked. But now I have a lot more appreciation for it, it genuinely truthfully is a pretty decent movie! It takes the basic plot, Liu Kang, Johnny Cage, and Sonya Blade through various means are brought to the tournament of Mortal Kombat spearheaded by Shang Tsung and must fight for the sake of the world. Fairly accurate to the games. The first thing I gotta say is the production of this movie is excellent, even though the CGI is not quite good it's used when needed. The sets are outstandingly crafted, the cast does pretty good with lots of love going to Robin Shou and Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa being the highlights of the cast, this soundtrack man, ho my gawd is the bomb dot com, no horeshit Jack. Just the amount of practical effects used must truly be applauded cause you would think oh it's CGI bullshit, it's so dense every single image has so much going on, they use it for anything and everything but that is far from true. This has honest to God effort in sets, choreography, acting, they wanted to do it as best as they could. Ooh but it doesn't have the blood and gore, oh it doesn't have an R rating, jabber jabber jabber, accept it for what it is. The filmmakers knew damn well the demographic was teens so they made a movie for teens to be able to go see, and shock twist everybody it made over $120 million dollars with an $18 million dollar budget so it did great in theaters and no doubt became a mainstay for video rental stores. And trust in me when I say, you get your money's worth of fights, in Street Fighter there was hardly any but here my God, after 40 minutes in it's practically non-stop fighting, it gives some preamble and explanation to this world then is all out martial arts. I have to praise the actors cause they just flat out did it all, they were trained for extensive fighting and they do pay it off. Now obviously some are more seasoned fighters than others but that doesn't take away from the effort of these actors. I mean I couldn't do 1/10th of the moves they pull, it's mighty good stuff! I was just so pleasantly surprised with the quality, and urge people to watch it again if you haven't already. 3 stars, 7/10! I wish...God how I wish I could say with all of my might the next one is just as good. I'm getting depressed just thinking about it. Tomorrow, I will face annihilation.

Mortal Kombat: The Journey Begins

What a way to f***ing start this week!

Oh man, this...this brought back some stuff. So how does one describe The Journey Begins? Shite. I mean that's the easy way at least, but you have this direct to video project that is this mighty bizzare mix of 3D and 2D animations, essentially being the cliffnotes version of Mortal Kombat to get you prepped for the big movie. Except for the fact the movie hit about 10 days before this. Friggin' whoops apparently! How do you mess that up? It even has some behind the scenes footage with cast interviews and stuff at the very end, so you would think this would come out like a solid 2 weeks before the film. I'm sorta dumbfounded at that. The story is this pseudo-prequel/parts of the original movie/ buncha' bullshit you never saw. It starts on the boat where Liu, Johnny, and Sonya are heading for the tournament as they come actoss these characters and learn the backstory of the actual Mortal Kombat tournament. And this is where the 3D animation comes in, and it's not good. I mean not. Good. But it is fascinating to see because they used motion capture for it, and such technology was in it's sheer infancy, I mean even in Two Towers it was still being perfected but they did such a good job with it. And boy howdy, you better f***ing believe I thought this was the most high tech, cool, state of the art shit you ever seen. I rented this tape a good fair amount of times in my youth, and the 3D CG fights were my favorite part. I'm so happy I waited until a more mature, seasoned, and intelligent me started writing reviews. In fact even the animation style is so unheard of, they used 3D backgrounds and environments that look much worse than a Nintendo 64 game but still animated the characters in the 2D style. So you have this hilariously jittery, poorly tracked, flat out garbage animation trying to interact with a 3D world. They had no budget for this, they blew it all on CG wonder, they barely had animation cells to film a scene. It's that special kind of cheap animation where they constantly reuse bits and pieces and the lip syncing makes Godzilla movies look masterful. I simply cannot wrap my brain around why this exists. I know I didn't exactly have a warm reception to the new Mortal Kombat trailer but I think it is extremely safe to say we are on an upward spiral. It's not getting worse than this. No way. Absolute tripe. Thank God you can watch it for free on the YouTubes, because I have wasted money on a bit in my life, but I'm not wasting it here. 1 star, 2/10, I somehow have nostalgic memories of this but it does not hold any sway this time. Watch if you are morbidly curious or are still part of the Kombat Klub. Movie coming up tomorrow on a very special day so stay tuned for more.

Talking Trailers

I do not recall ever really talking about trailers and it is good to have your opinion on record to compare when you actually see a movie, plus I wanted to do something new so I might as well. We got 3 trailers to talk about that I have seen recently, each having a strong impact on me so let's discuss.

Mortal Kombat (2020): I hated it. Which is so dang weird because when I heard they were doing a new live action Mortal Kombat film I was interested. A hard R rating? Cool looking production stills? A chance to talk about the 90s films? Far out man. And then the trailer happened. Shite. It lost me very early on when the narration stated they were hunting a fugitive and then Sub-Zero popped up and I was just like, huh?? How is he a fugitive? Then they said superhuman abailities and I lost a lot of hope, because the trailer seems like it's trying to do this semi-realistic take on Mortal Kombat which I find to be unforgivable. Just go mental with it, don't try to pin some superhero-esque bullshit like you're expecting Superman to appear, they tried that shit before and it was not pretty. Not to say that the character designs weren't cool, they look pretty grand, and the gore looks legit, but it's the actual elements of the plot that have me seriously dreading this movie. I think they're even gonna pull some nonsense with this Tom Dick nobody being the main character and not an actual person from the video games, which I am praying with all of my might is not true. I don't want to hate it but this trailer has inspired little hope.

Cruella: God I am gonna get so much shit for this. I'd rather watch this than Mortal Kombat. I really am very interested in seeing this. First of all, Emma Stone you have the biggest balls in Hollywood today to say that you are taking up this role after Glenn Close, I mean you have all of my respect for taking it on. Second I heard a lot of people say the trailer had Birds Of Prey/Joker vibes and while I can slightly see it, I feel it's an unjust and ultimately naive label to put on this movie. This looks like such a different beast, because it's not a live action remake. It's a character piece on a Disney villain, which I know they did with Maleficent but even then this looks so different. I don't need to know why Cruella DeVille is the way she is, but she's entertaining regardless. And I for real for real have zero idea what they are going to do with it. That's why I'm so genuinely intrigued to see it. It looks actually kinda cool! So yeah, sign me up for this!

Godzilla Vs. Kong: Ooh. Ooh momma, hold on now. Gotta take a minute. Whew....holy f***!! It's happening, footage has been released! So much to talk about. Great effects, good buildup, I wasn't gaga for the soundtrack but truthfully the Monsterverse has always had such interesting musical choices. 2014 Godzilla had the 2001 A Space Odyssey theme, Godzilla KOTM had frickin' Claire De Lune, Kong Skull Island had Bad Moon Rising, so it has variety if nothing else and we'll probably get some more brilliant music choices for another trailer. It was very Kong centered, I like the relationship with this little girl, we see some other new monsters he fights, but come on man. Godzilla man. Yo, I changed my computer desktop to that neon filled city shot with Godzilla in it, I'm such a damn nerd but how could I ignore such a gorgeous shot? The action looks stellar, Godzilla may be a bad guy which I really love, the reprise of the 2001 theme brought me back to 2016 when I was constantly watching Godzilla, I seriously cannot stop watching this trailer. And to hell with all of you who side with Kong. "Kong bows to no one.", bitch please he gon' learn today! Last movie wasn't called Godzilla KING Of The Monsters for no reason, thank you very much. One shall stand, one shall fall. I trust you'll make the right decision.

Hopefully I can keep doing this, just a sort of trailer roundup of the stuff I've seen and my initial reactions. I had some hot takes for sure but I speak my mind truthfully as always. So I'll see you for a new review later this week.