Mortal Kombat Legends: Scorpion's Revenge

A couple weeks ago, the DLC story expansion to the videogame, Mortal Kombat 11 was released and added an additional few hours of narrative that picks up on where the core MK11 plot left off. I finished that up a few days ago, and picked away playing with the new characters and doing online battles with a friend I occasionally duke it out with online. On top of that, several weeks ago Warner Bros. released a straight-to-video animated movie dubbed Mortal Kombat Legends: Scorpion’s Revenge (trailer). Animated features based on the MK license are nothing new; one is include as a bonus feature on the original live action BluRay I reviewed here a few years ago. That and the other ones released in the previous century varied greatly in quality, and a pivotal difference with Scorpion’s Revenge is that it features some of the brains behind the highly acclaimed DC animated films working on it. Assault of Arkham’s Ethan Spaulding is directing, while Teen Titans Go vs. Teen Titans penned the script.

I ate up too many MK comics, movies and videogames over the years so I have an admittedly high familiarity with its canon. With a title like Scorpion’s Revenge I was initially led to believe this would be a side story focusing on Scorpion’s rivalry with Sub-Zero. It initially starts out that way with Scorpion’s origin story where he returns to his village to see his family and fellow villagers slaughtered by a clan headed up by Sub-Zero. Sub-Zero (Steve Blum) ultimately slays him as well, and in hell Scorpion (Patrick Seitz) makes a deal with one Quan Chi (Darin De Paul) to restore his essence to enact revenge while also entering the Mortal Kombat tournament. That opening scene is graphically intense for an animated feature, and Warner Bros. granted the animators a lot of leeway to maximize everything they could out of the R rating. If you have played the recent MK games and are familiar with their ‘X-Ray Attacks’ then a lot of the gore and violence in Scorpion’s Revenge will ring a bell.

After that initial intense setup for Scorpion and Sub-Zero, the rest of the film is essentially a remake of the original live action film, yet has some noticeable differences to switch things up. Liu Kang (Jordan Rodrigues), Johnny Cage (Joel McHale) and Sonya Blade (Jennifer Carpenter) return as the three core protagonists that meet up once again on a boat leading to mysterious location where the Mortal Kombat tournament is emanating from. Sinister sorcerer, Shang Tsung (Artt Butler) is behind the festivities on his own personal island of hell, and has all kinds of trickery to distract the heroes. While the general broadstrokes of the live action film and this animated feature hits similar beats, a lot of it is freshened up. Some of the key battles feature different matchups, and the characters from the second game have varying degrees of supporting roles, and I feel for poor Jax (Ike Amadi) because the filmmakers here found a new way to de-arm him, which is as excruciating as ever to relive again and again.

I got into Scorpion’s Revenge style of mixing up the exposition this time around. Sonya Blade has an edge to her and has absolutely zero tolerance for Cage’s nonstop flirting with her. Having Scorpion constantly out for revenge on Sub-Zero in their rivalry is a better use of those two characters instead of as lowly goons for Shang Tsung like in the live action film. Raiden (Dave B. Mitchell) is back as the wise elder with an occasional pun that guides the heroes along their journey and sets them up for an awesome final stretch of battles against Quan Chi, Goro and Shang Tsung. I will re-emphasize the gruesomeness of the violence here as the artists hold nothing back and ensure it matches the pedigree established by the games. It all adds up for a gritting finale as the warriors lay waste to one another.

There is a decent amount of bonuses on the BluRay. Producer, Rick Morales and Writer, Jeremy Adams are on hand for the feature commentary track. They go out of their way numerous times to appreciate Warner Bros. for letting them go all out with the violence and offer up other random insight and production facts throughout. There are four mini-behind-the-scenes extras totaling just over 20 minutes breaking down the characters, lore, weaponry, animation and sound design of the film. All are quick watches with an interesting anecdote or two, but not worth going out of your way to see….except maybe the one on sound design where it was amusing to see how they showcased all the various foods squished for the blood splatters and bone crushing sound effects.

Part of me wants to give Mortal Kombat Legends: Scorpion’s Revenge an easy recommendation because of their excellent use of the license and canon that any MK nut like myself will get a thrill out of, and it is a breezy 80 minute watch to boot. Watching its take on remixing the plot from the heralded live action film for a new generation was something special to immerse myself in to witness how it all unfolded. However, if you are not all that familiar with the near 30 years of MK lore a lot of the characters and general plot beats will either go right over your head or will likely incite many unintentional chuckles. Suffice it to say, only fans of the series should go out of their way to see Mortal Kombat Legends: Scorpion’s Revenge. Bonus update, upon doing research for this I discovered the long delayed live action reboot film wrapped production at the end of 2019 and is currently slated for a January 2021 theatrical release date. Here is hoping it will up to the legacy of the original as being one of the best live action videogame film adaptations.

Other Random Backlog Movie Blogs

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12 Angry Men (1957)
12 Rounds 3: Lockdown
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The Accountant
Angry Video Game Nerd: The Movie
Atari: Game Over
The Avengers: Age of Ultron
The Avengers: Infinity War
Batman: The Dark Knight Rises
Batman: The Killing Joke
Batman: Mask of the Phantasm
Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice
Bounty Hunters
Cabin in the Woods
Captain America: Civil War
Captain America: The First Avenger
Captain America: The Winter Soldier
Christmas Eve
Clash of the Titans (1981)
Clint Eastwood 11-pack Special
The Condemned 2
Countdown
Creed I & II
Deck the Halls
Detroit Rock City
Die Hard
Dredd
The Eliminators
The Equalizer
Dirty Work
Faster
Fast and Furious I-VIII
Field of Dreams
Fight Club
The Fighter
For Love of the Game
Good Will Hunting
Gravity
Grunt: The Wrestling Movie
Guardians of the Galaxy
Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 2
Hell Comes to Frogtown
Hercules: Reborn
Hitman
I Like to Hurt People
Indiana Jones 1-4
Ink
The Interrogation
Interstellar
Jay and Silent Bob Reboot
Jobs
Joy Ride 1-3
Major League
Man of Steel
Man on the Moon
Man vs Snake
Marine 3-6
Merry Friggin Christmas
Metallica: Some Kind of Monster
Mortal Kombat
National Treasure
National Treasure: Book of Secrets
Not for Resale
Pulp Fiction
The Replacements
Reservoir Dogs
Rocky I-VIII
Running Films Part 1
Running Films Part 2
San Andreas
ScoobyDoo Wrestlemania Mystery
The Secret Life of Walter Mitty
Shoot em Up
Slacker
Skyscraper
Small Town Santa
Steve Jobs
Source Code
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Sully
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