Say what you like about the Mortal Kombat series, it's certainly got a wide array of characters.
Or 'Kharacters,' as the creators would call them. They hate the letter C in the Kombat universe, you see. It's like an anti-Sesame Street.
Anyway, now that a new movie's been announced, we thought we'd take a look at some of the fierce fighters that have yet to be flung on the silver screen.
It probably won't be possible to stick their fatality moves into the script (the gory final fatal flourishes that, ideally, end every Kombat combat) but let's see if we can get some of our favourite characters in there all the same...
Meat
The Backstory: Meat was made in Shang Tsung’s flesh pits (the people factory where Kombat's big bad Tsung makes his warriors) but escaped before he could be completed.
Fatality Move: Meat pulls out the guts, blood and skull from his foes. Then he beats them up a bit more, as if losing your insides wasn’t conclusive enough.
Why He Should Be In The Movie: Because Meat can’t move without spraying blood everywhere. We'd love him to turn Mortal Kombat 3 from a teen flick to a splatter movie.
He occasionally teleports into a massive red puddle, one of his special moves involves tearing his own head off and chucking it at his opponent with a massive gore-spurt push.
Also, when his health is low, Meat tugs out his own eyeball. This gives him more energy, somehow.
Stick him in and the film will be rated R. But at least it’ll be fun to watch.
Who Should Play Him: Eli Roth. He’s buff enough, he could bring his own blood bags to the set and there’s a lot of geeks out there who would pay good money to see him get beaten up.
Next: Kenshi
[page-break]
Kenshi
Backstory: Kenshi was a supreme warrior, who was tricked into using a magic blade that made him lose his sight.
Please don’t make any jokes about him playing with his sword until he went blind, they have no place here.
Fatality Move: Gets out his sword, shoves it in his opponents’ heart, pulls up, then swipes it across their waist. They fall to bits. Nice.
Why He Should Be In The Movie: The bit where Kenshi loses his sight and has to retrain his fighting senses would be worthy of a movie in itself.
It could be Zatoichi meets Kill Bill by way of The Karate Kid . Which pretty much sounds like the best film ever made.
Who Should Play Him: Jet Li with a scarf wrapped around his face.
Next: Kira
[page-break]
Kira
Backstory: Kira started out her fighting career as a cross-dressing terrorist, disguising herself as a man to sell weapons to terror groups. As you can see from the picture, she doesn’t do that anymore.
Fatality Move: She slits the throats of her foes with a big knife, which is a bit dull in the Mortal Kombat universe, but it would probably be pretty exciting if it happened to you.
Why She Should Be In The Movie: It could be a way of making Mortal Kombat – dare we say it? – relevant , with Kira’s Afghanistan terrorists roots being used to explore Obama’s America.
Either that or it’d be an excuse for a series of brutal torture scenes conducted by a lady in a leotard. Whatever, we’re happy.
Who Should Play Her: Olga Kurylenko with a pencil moustache (for the early scenes).
Next: Havik
[page-break]
Havik
Backstory: Havic is a Chaosrealm cleric, who is supposed to be neither good nor bad, but just look at him! Seems pretty evil to us.
Fatality Move: This is one of our favourites. Havik tears off one of his foe’s legs, then uses it to smack their head off. Gooooreeat!
Why He Should Be In The Movie: Purely because we like the idea of someone who looks like a zombie version of Genghis Khan walking around and doing the occasional good deed.
Also, he has an awesome collection of weapons, which include a massive axe and a big club thing.
Who Should Play Him: Jason Statham in a cheap Skeletor costume.
Next: Le Mei
[page-break]
Li Mei
Backstory: Forced into slavery along with her whole village by the evil Shang Tsung, Li Mei was promised freedom if she managed to win the Kombat Tournament. Which is a pretty good incentive.
Fatality Move: She knocks her enemy’s block off, takes a few steps back, kicks the air, and they explode. Doesn’t really make sense, but it works.
Why She Should Be In The Movie: Partly because of her emotional and moving backstory, but mainly because her outfit makes her look like Batgirl after a fight with Wolverine.
Who Should Play Her: She looks a lot like Jennifer Lopez, facially. But we'd rather Jessica Alba took the part, if that's okay with you.
Next: Tanya
[page-break]
Tanya
Backstory: Evil to her core, Tanya seems to worship whatever nasty deity rocks up in front of her, shifting from being a Shinnok lackie to an Onaga follower in the blink of an eye.
Fatality Move: So gruesome it’d make Jigsaw from Saw ’s cheeks flush with shame, Tanya pulls out her victim’s own thigh bone and stabs them in the gullet with it. Nasty.
Why She Should Be In The Movie: Her convoluted backstory would allow the script to embark on a series of incredible twists and turns. And if they can convince ILM to recreate her fatality realistically, we'll buy seven tickets (in case we lose the first six).
Who Should Play Her: Rosario Dawson. Mainly because we want to see her in the outfit.
Next: Mokap
[page-break]
Mokap
Backstory: Saddle up. This one’s brilliant...
Mokap is a motion capture performer drafted in by Johnny Cage to do his CGI scenes for Mortal Kombat: Deadly Alliance.
You should probably ignore the fact that motion capture is designed to allow actors to perform difficult special effects scenes themselves, and as a martial arts expert, Johnny Cage would probably want to do his own mocap work.
Still, haha, look at how funny Mokap looks. What a great character.
Fatality Move: He pulls off an arm, smacks his foe about a bit, then kicks his head in. Not the most original kill move in the world.
Why He Should Be In The Movie: Because this could be the moment where the Mortal Kombat series goes postmodern, appealing to the sort of intelligentsia crowd who would rather go left, left, up, right, right than stroll straight ahead into the cinema to see these sorts of films.
It’s a self-referential joke that would elevate Mortal Kombat 3 to Last Action Hero status. Forget Mortal Kombat, this is Meta Kombat.
Who Should Play Him: Andy Serkis. Geezer’s got form.
Like This? Then try...
- The shonkiest zombie FX we’ve ever seen
- 9 Greatest Friday The 13th Slaughter Scenes
- The 8 most inappropriate children’s Halloween costumes
Sign up for our free weekly newsletter for the latest news, features and reviews delivered straight to your inbox.
