Mortal Kombat Legends: Battle of the Realms

Furious over Outworld’s loss in Mortal Kombat, Emperor Shao Kahn declares war on Earthrealm.  The only way to stop the invasion will see Liu Kang and his allies travel to Outworld itself for a new Mortal Kombat.  Here, they face enemies far more dangerous and bloodthirsty than before in a land soaked in death and chaos.  Should they fail, Earthrealm will fall and Shao Kahn will be unstoppable.  Once again, the fate of all existence shall be decided as it always has been…in MORTAL KOMBAT!!!!

When any movie project becomes a hit, it can be easy to jump the gun on the sequel and include everything and anything it wants because it feels it can do no wrong.  That’s how we ended up with Mortal Kombat: Annihilation and, ironically, that’s the same feeling I get with Battle of the Realms.  As a direct sequel to the pretty awesome Scorpion’s Revenge, Realms decides to ratchet up everything from characters to plots to scope to violence to just about everything.  The end result is an absolute mess of a feature that, unlike Annihilation, isn’t without its strong points.  But woof, this is when you think fan service and overabundance will save the day and it does not here.
 
Battle of the Realms could have gotten by with simply being everything from Mortal Kombat 2 The Game: a second tournament in Outworld with Liu Kang, Sonya and others facing Shao Kahn and his team.  But no.  It has to continue Scorpion’s story, introduce the new Sub Zero (Kui Liang) and the Lin Quei’s Cyborg Ninja Unit, Shinnok’s quest to resurrect an old deity to destroy everything, and maybe, if it has time, shoehorn in Kitana’s wish to rebel against Shao Kahn for a better Edenia/Outworld.  As you can imagine, with all that going on, plots are fighting for screen time worse than any actual action on screen.  We practically breeze through much of the tournament stuff in favor of watching Scorpion and Sub Zero getting their asses continually handed to them by Smoke, Cyrax and Sektor.  Was there a fear there weren’t going to be more Legends movie after this so they decided to just rush and cram everything into one 80 minute feature?  Cause there’s two more movies after this so there was no danger of that. 
 
The Outworld Tournament is the greatest causualty of this and yet still remains the source of the movies best moments.  It’s fine to introduce new characters to the mix like Kung Lao and Stryker (of all people, Stryker?) but they aren’t given the same character care that the others receive, mostly just there for fan service, fighting and maybe a gruesome fatality or two.  Sonya still gets some of the best action and having Jax more involved is welcome.  We also get to explore the father/son dynamic between Raiden and Liu Kang which adds a much needed and welcome emotional core.  Sadly Johnny Cage hasn’t been dialed back and probably the biggest crime of the movie is that Devora doesn’t finish him when she has the chance and spare us from his inane babble and weak attempts to woo Sonya.  There’s also zero time to properly develop Kitana and her wish to rebel against Shao Kahn and hook up with Liu Kang.  Like I said above, this could have been the whole movie right here.
 
On the Scoprion side of things, it just reinforces my complaints from Scorpion’s Revenge that this could have been part of its own movie.  We have Scorpion looking for redemption while facing a rightfully peeved younger Sub Zero while having to save all of creation from Shinnok and battling cyborgs…and even then that sounds like too much.  Smoke, Cyrax and Sektor are here mostly for fan service and look absolutely terrible.  The overall character designs of the Legends cast have been hit or miss but the Cyborgs look so plain and boring, nothing like their game counterparts which are fine as is.  Scorpion and Sub Zero do share some good moments together as their quests for revenge and redemption collide and it’s a good follow up to previous events involving the pair.  But when their tale intersects with the others, that’s when things go off the rails so badly it makes you wonder…why?  Why is Mortal Kombat suddenly doing Crisis on Infinite Earths?  Why is this movie still going on when it could have ended 10 minutes ago?  It’s a bonkers finale that feels like its doing its best to ruin all the goodwill built up in Scorpion’s Revenge about animation being MK’s potentially dominant outlet.
 
That all said, this is still Mortal Kombat and the movie does deliver some solid action scenes, the ones that last more than a minute and have some emotional resonance to them…and all of its on the tournament side again.  As this is the culmination of events from the previous film, we have that personal connection to the rivalries had between Liu Kang and Raiden with Shang Tsung and Shao Kahn and their fights don’t disappoint.  I’d argue these are some of the best throwdowns in the franchise period with how hard, violent and over the top they go.  And, as previously stated, Sonya’s no pushover and Jax gets a nice bit of revenge in his own fight with Kintaro.  It’s these little nuggets of joy that keep Battle of the Realms from falling into the Spike Pit as hard as Annihilation.
 
Mortal Kombat Legends: Battle of the Realms is a sequel that is rushing to conclude a story that could have been played out in another feature, maybe two.  Instead, it smushes everything into 80 minutes with little room to breathe and little room to enhance or better everything from Scorpion’s Revenge. Some character arcs do get a proper resolution but when story arcs are fighting for screen time and there’s a finale that feels like a last minute add on for fear of future cancelled projects, this movie might not deserve a Fatality but it sure as heck aint a Flawless Victory either. 
 
4.5/10
 
Next Week, a new generation of warrior takes on the mantle of Earthrealm Defender as we check out Mortal Kombat Legends: Snow Blind right here at the Gundam Anime Corner.