My Thoughts on “Mortal Kombat II 🐉” (2026)

 

(This is the poster for Mortal Kombat II 🐉 (2026).)

Well, I just got done watching Mortal Kombat II 🐉 (2026), the sequel to the 2021 reboot. Now, I did actually start working on that Ghost in the Shell post that I was telling you about in the last couple of posts I posted on here. As well as in my YouTube Community Posts if you follow my YouTube channel. And I will get back to that, right after I finish this. Hopefully this won’t take me so long, like the Super Mario Galaxy Movie review. That one took me a whole week to write. Now, Mortal Kombat 🐉 (2021) had a rather mixed reception when it came out. It was supposed to be a 2020 release, but like a lot of movies that were meant to come out in 2020, it got pushed back because of the pandemic 🦠😷. So, it ended up coming out the next year, 2021. The same year as Godzilla vs. Kong, though I liked that movie more than Mortal Kombat 🐉 (2021). I wrote a review of Godzilla vs. Kong back when it came out, on DeviantART, and then I reposted it here on my blog. You can read it you want, just click on the link 🔗 that I provided. The link is in the “review” part of that previous sentence, just click on it, and you’ll be there. 

Some people liked Mortal Kombat 🐉 (2021), while a lot more people didn’t like it. I myself wasn’t a huge fan of the movie. I didn’t hate it like a lot of other people did, I just thought it was okay. It could’ve been a lot better. I haven’t written a full dedicated review of Mortal Kombat 🐉 (2021), I thought I did, but I didn’t. Maybe in the future, I’ll rewatch it, and write a full review of it on this blog. But, despite the mixed reviews, the movie was still successful. It grossed over $84 million 💵 against a $55 million budget 💵, and it became the most successful film launch on HBO Max. It beat Godzilla vs. Kong in terms of viewership, but again, like I said, like Godzilla vs. Kong considerably more than that movie. So, it was successful enough to get a sequel. When people heard that there was going to be a sequel, they hoped that it would be better. I myself was bit skeptical. Even when they put out that first trailer that wowed the Internet 🛜 🤩, I was still skeptical that the movie would be better than the first one. Especially since it had the same director, the same writer, and the same producers. Usually, when they have the same creative team on a movie, there isn’t that much change, and usually they just double down on all the things that people complained about with the previous one. Like with Michael Bay Transformers, or Bayformers as it’s sometimes referred to as.  

 

Even though a lot of people consider Transformers: Dark of the Moon 🌑 to be a vast improvement over Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, it wasn’t as if it was a completely different movie. You could tell it was by the same creative team, you tell it was directed by Michael Bay, written by Ehren Kruger (he co-wrote Revenge of the Fallen along with Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci RIP 😔) , and produced by Lorenzo di Bonaventura, Tom DeSanto, Don Murphy, and Ian Bryce, and executively produced by Steven Spielberg and Michael Bay himself. And Dark of the Moon 🌑 still had some of the same elements that people hated about Revenge of the Fallen and even the 2007 Transformers movie, the one that started it all. Reduced, but still there. Not that I was a hater of those movies, I loved all those movies as a kid. I loved Revenge of the Fallen, and I was excited for Dark of the Moon 🌑, and I saw it, and I liked that movie too. Even as an adult, I don’t hate those movies like a lot of the Internet 🛜 seems to. Though I have noticed a lot more people starting to warm to those movies, at least the first three with Shia LaBeouf as Sam Witwicky. Just like people warmed up to the Star Wars prequels. Mainly because the kids who grew up these movies are adults now, and can make the case for them. Though most of it is just them waxing nostalgic about them. Even between Dark of the Moon 🌑 and Transformers: Age of Extinction. 

 

Even though Age of Extinction was a bit of a soft reboot for the franchise, and it had a completely new cast and had over cosmetic changes, particularly to the designs of the Transformers themselves, it still tripled down (or I guess quadrupled down) on a lot of the same things people hated about the first three movies. And it indeed created new problems that alienated the fans of the first three. So, it was kind of a lose/lose, it didn’t appeal to anyone. Age of Extinction is really where the franchise started to lose people, particularly the Bayverse fans and the general audience, the people who liked these movies and always showed up for them. Even though Age of Extinction did gross over a billion dollars 💵, it would be the last Transformers to gross a billion dollars 💵. Thus far anyway. I actually saw Age of Extinction in theaters when it came out, in the very theater in which I am typing this part of the review. The Winrock Stadium 16 theater, which is a Regal theater. I wrote a review of that movie also, along with the Michael Bay Transformers movies except for Transformers (2007). But, I won’t link any of them 🔗 here because I’m not proud of how they turned out, and I want to redo them. I’ll post the links to the redone ones once I write them and post them here to this post. 

 

I also made more skeptical by the fact that they changed the release date, from October 24, 2025 to May 15, 2026. We still don't know why they did that, and we likely won't get any answers until years from now when these filmmakers aren't making these movies anymore, and they're free to say anything they want. But this movie, Mortal Kombat II 🐉 (2026) is one of the few instances, where a sequel to a disliked film or mixed received film had the same creative team, and was a legitimate vast improvement over its predecessor. The people who made the first one really did listen to all the criticisms for the previous one, and rectified them. This movie is a major course correction. Nearly every unpopular element from the previous movie was either removed or downplayed significantly, particularly the character Cole Young. Cole Young was probably the most unpopular element in the 2021 movie, the most hated character from that movie. I’ll admit, I wasn’t a fan of Cole Young either. But I didn’t outright hate him like a lot of other people did. The way people talk about him, you’d think he was like Jar Jar Binks from the Star Wars prequels, or Skids and Mudflap from Revenge of the Fallen, or Chloe from The Fairly OddParents (specifically Season 10 since that’s when she was introduced), but he’s really not. He’s not an annoying character or a frustrating character, he’s just kind of a bland character. It wasn’t as if I wanted him to die like I did Kano. Kano was the most beloved character in the 2021 movie, he was the one thing in that received any amount of praise from critics and fans, and yet I hated him 😤. I found him really annoying, and I was so glad when Sonya finally killed him at the end, and I was a bit disappointed that they were bringing him back in this one. I just wished that they focused on a different character than him. 

 

Like Sonya. I wished Sonya was the protagonist of the 2021 movie, especially since she hasn’t been the lead in any of the movies, or any of the games. She was supposed to be lead, or the co-lead in Mortal Kombat: Special Forces 🐉 alongside her partner and friend, Jax, when that game was initially conceived as a two-player split-screen game with a branching storyline that changed depending on the decisions the players made while playing the game. It was probably going to have multiple endings, with there being a good ending, a bad ending, and maybe even a joke ending. Some games with multiple endings do that, where they’ll have a joke ending, usually if the player makes all the wrong decisions or makes one really stupid decision that ends the game prematurely. Even when the game was switched to a single-player experience with the option to play as either Sonya or Jax, the branching storyline was still apart of it. 

 

But then after John Tobias and other people apart of his part of the Mortal Kombat 🐉 team left the project and left Midway altogether, Sonya was completely removed from the game and the branching storyline was scrapped, and it just became a Jax game with a strictly linear story. Which isn’t a problem necessarily, I like Jax and it’s cool in principle that he got a game all to himself even if the final product didn’t turn out that good, but Sonya was kind of robbed her chance to be a lead, even if it was just a co-lead. She is even mentioned in the game at all as far as I know. The only Special Forces characters Jax interacts with in that game is a new character named Gemini, and we don't even see her. We just see the text she writes in the messages she sends Jax, briefing him on his missions, and checking up on him every now and again. She's pretty much the Ingrid Hunnigan of the Mortal Kombat 🐉 franchise. But at least with Hunnigan, we actually see her face, when she’s conversing with Leon. They never show us Gemini’s face when she’s conversing with Jax. She’s just a faceless and voiceless character. A character we read, but don’t see. Even Jax would’ve been a preferable protagonist for the 2021 movie than Cole Young. But, I didn’t hate Cole Young. I didn’t revel in his role being reduced or the idea of him dying in this movie like a lot of other people did. Like, people were hoping that he would die in this movie before it came out, like they were cheering it on, and a lot of them said that if he didn’t die, or if his role wasn’t reduced, they’d hate the movie. Some people on the Internet 🛜 are just bloodthirsty 🩸 like that. And he does indeed die in this movie. 

 

Shao Kahn kills him, smashes his head with his hammer, and then throws his body into the Dead Pool, since they recreated the Dead Pool stage from the Mortal Kombat II 🐉 game from 1993 for this movie since it’s also called Mortal Kombat II 🐉, and loosely follows the same storyline. Not to be confused with the Marvel character, Deadpool of course. The way you can tell the difference is that the Dead Pool stage is spelt as two separate words, while Deadpool the Marvel character's name is spelt as one word. So people who hated Cole Young and wanted him to die got their wish. I actually liked Cole Young in this movie, what little of him we got. I thought they really improved his character, and then they just killed him off. So much for that. But, there is going to be a third one, it seems like it's going to focus on the surviving characters in this movie (including the newly introduced characters like Kitana, Jade, and Baraka) bringing all the characters who died in this movie back to life, including Jax, Liu Kang, and Kung Lao again. So, sorry Cole Young haters, he may not stay dead for long 😉. They better kill off Kano in the next movie if there one. It’s a fair trade I would say to bring back Jax, Liu Kang, Kung Lao, and possibly, Cole Young in exchange for Kano’s life. A blood sacrifice 🩸 if you will. They promised us that, and they better make good on that. Even if admittedly, I did find Kano a lot less annoying in this movie than I did the previous one. 

 

In retrospect, it was probably a good idea that they released this movie this year instead of last year, and that this was a summer release ☀️ and not a fall one 🍂. Even though I do think a Mortal Kombat 🐉 movie would still be good for an October release. Because the movie so far has grossed $101.2 million 💵 worldwide against a production budget of $80 million 💵. And the movie just barely came out. It's on its opening weekend at the time I'm writing this. It cost more, and it's making more than the previous one. But, it's hard to judge them fairly because Mortal Kombat 🐉 (2021)'s box office was hampered by the pandemic 🦠😷. And it seems Warner Bros. didn't judge that movie's success on its box office, but rather, how many people watched it on HBO Max. That's why it got a sequel, and its worldwide gross is why there's going to be a third one. I mean, it already seemed like they planning to make a third one anyway, even before the movie came out, because on the Wikipedia page for the movie, it said that a third movie is in development before the movie's release on Friday May 15, 2026. Maybe that's why they were so confident in setting up a sequel at the end of this movie, even though they didn't know what the box office turnout was going to be. 

 

It's the point where you think, "Why didn't they just start with this movie?" It makes the first movie look superfluous. I know that people make that argument about the Star Wars prequels, like they say that they should've started with Star Wars: Episode II – Attack of the Clones instead of Star Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace, like Attack of the Clones should've been Episode II and that The Phantom Menace is an unnecessary prelude, and I largely disagree with people who say that. But with these movies, everything people have said about The Phantom Menace is true about Mortal Kombat 🐉 (2021). There wasn't that much of a story to tell, and it is an unnecessary prelude. I understand they wanted to do one movie before they went into the Outworld tournament, and make that the plot of the second movie. Make it the big event that everyone get excited for the second movie to see, rather just start with that in the first movie right away. But there had to have been a better way of going about it. 

 

Like, they could've done Shang Tsung's island 🏝️, the tournament that takes place on Shang Tsung's island 🏝️ in Earthrealm 🌎, that's where the first game starts after all. It would've been the perfect introductory movie, you know, it would've a smaller cast, just like the game did, Shang Tsung would've still been the main villain, Goro would've still been in it, and Bi-Han would've still been in it and died by then to be resurrected as Noob Saibot in the next movie. But, I'm guessing that they didn't go that route because they didn't want to draw comparisons between it and the 1995 movie since the 1995 movie is still beloved all these years, a lot of people are nostalgic for it, and it's still seen by some as the best live action Mortal Kombat 🐉 movie ever made. So, they just went in their own direction, and made their own story that was still a prelude to the Outworld tournament, which would be the focus of the second movie, just as it was the focus of the second game. But, people ended comparing the two movies anyway, so if it was the reasoning, then it was kind of a fool's errand. And like I said, they didn't have to do the story that they told, and they didn't have to focus on the character that they did. They didn't have to create a new character to be the protagonist, they could've just used the characters that already existed in the canon. 

 

Like while I was watching the 2021 movie, I wanted Sonya to be the protagonist, especially since hadn't been the protagonist in any of the previous Mortal Kombat 🐉 movies (animated or live action) and I like this version of the character. I like the actress that plays her, Jessica McNamee, I think she did a good job. Sure beats the hell out of Ronda Rousey in Mortal Kombat 11 🐉. The only casting choice worse than that was casting Megan Fox as Nitara in Mortal Kombat 1 🐉 (which is actually the twelfth game in the series despite the title), she was so awful in that game. Megan Fox should definitely not do voice acting, she's not good at it. But, putting the voice acting aside, I just don't think she was good pick as Nitara, I think she was miscast and they only cast her for the sake of casting a celebrity voice actress, I don't like that her likeness is in the game forever (unless they do a remastered version or remake where they remove her but that's unlikely). It's one of the reason why I didn't buy Mortal Kombat 1 🐉 and why I still haven't played it to this day. 

 

And watching her just made we wish she was the main character instead of Cole. And I say this as someone who actually liked Cole in this movie, and liked what they did with his character in this movie minus them killing him off just to appease fans who didn't like him of course. It could've worked, she could've been our eyes into this world, our introduction to the more mystical elements of the franchise, especially as she starts out as Special Forces operative along with Jax, and they unveil the mystery of the Mortal Kombat 🐉 tournament, Raiden, Shang Tsung, and Outworld. They could've even met the same characters that featured in the 2021 movie, as well as other ones. Mainly Black Dragon members as it is their pursuit of Kano that leads to them discovering the mystical side of the Mortal Kombat 🐉 universe and being selected to participate in the tournament itself. 

 

Basically, I'm asking for a film adaptation of Mortal Kombat: Special Forces 🐉, or at least the original version of it that featured Sonya Blade. They could still do a storyline like that in this current live action film universe, like a prequel story focused on Sonya and Jax that takes place before the 2021 movie. They could either do it as a movie, or as a streaming show, either on HBO Max, Netflix, or Paramount+. Depending on who ends up getting Warner Bros., Netflix or Paramount, or if either company is blocked from acquiring Warner Bros. by international antitrust organizations (since the Federal Trade Commission, FTC, in the US 🇺🇸 isn't going to stop it so long as Trump is in office) and Warner Bros. is still allowed to exist as an independent company. I hope that latter is the case because frankly, I don't want either of those two companies owning Warner Bros.. But, I would've preferred it if this had been the first movie in 2021, instead of a hypothetical prequel film or series. Because as it is, the only thing that's carried over from the 2021 movie and actually progresses and makes making a first movie before this one worth is Bi-Han and Hanzo Hasashi's arcs. 

 

You know, Bi-Han/Sub-Zero ❄️ kills Hanzo and his family, Hanzo come back as Scorpion 🦂 to avenge their deaths, he kills Bi-Han, and then in this movie, Bi-Han is brought back by Quan Chi as Noob Saibot and Scorpion 🦂 comes back to kill him again, which he does, with the help of Johnny, Kano, and Jade. Noob Saibot's name of course is the two creators, Ed Boon and John Tobias's last names spelt backwards. Ed Boon actually makes a cameo in this movie, as a bartender that interacts with Johnny Cage right before he gets teleported to Outworld to fight Kitana. His name is even Ed in the movie. That was pretty cool and funny. It would've been cool if they got John Tobias to do a cameo in the movie as well, but I can sort of see why he would decline to do a cameo in the movie because he's probably dissatisfied with the current state of the Mortal Kombat 🐉 franchise. He doesn't like the direction that Ed Boon took it in after he left the company. And maybe him and Ed Boon don't really get along. But still, it would've been cool to have both creators present in the movie, especially since the game this is loosely based on was made when both of them were still working on the franchise and were still working at Midway. Maybe in the third one, they'll get him to do a cameo somehow. 

 

Besides that, and Kano and Sonya's rivalry, nothing else is really carried over from the first movie. Not even that Arcana thing they introduced in the 2021 movie that was not apart of the Mortal Kombat 🐉 lore before that and was made up specifically for the movie. Sure, they talk about "unlocking your power," but they never say the word "Arcana" once. That idea has just been completely tossed out, because so many fans complained it in the previous movie. Everything feels like it's completely starting over. It's more of a soft reboot than a sequel really. They could have started here with Johnny being the protagonist from the beginning, since we're seeing this story place out from his perspective, and we're getting reintroduced to the world and the characters through him, by having Sonya and other characters explain everything to him. Stuff that was already explained to Cole in the previous movie, only Cole is now one of the established characters that Johnny is introduced to. 

 

Even when the title shows up at the beginning, it doesn't say Mortal Kombat II 🐉, it just says Mortal Kombat 🐉, cementing this idea that it is a soft reboot. They're kind of treating this as if it were a new beginning. So if you're someone who didn't bother watching the 2021 movie, mostly from bad word of mouth, you really don't need to have watched the 2021 movie to understand anything that happens in this movie. I can just jump into this one, and understand it perfectly fine. Yeah, there are things like Kano being resurrected and having Shinnok's amulet, Kung Lao being brought back as a Revenant, and Bi-Han being brought back as Noob and Kano and Johnny asking Scorpion 🦂 to help them get the amulet from Noob, who is of course is sworn enemy. But, it's not anything that isn't already apparent from watching this movie, or anything you couldn't infer. 

 

 

 

 

(This is the main theatrical poster for Mortal Kombat II 🐉 (2026). It's another one of these collage posters, when there show at the characters in the movie in a top down fashion. I talked about them in my Super Mario Galaxy Movie review, they really became popular and standard with the MCU. Once the MCU started doing all their posters like this, everyone started doing it because the MCU is quite possibly, the most successful film franchise in history. Breaking box office records left and right, making billions of dollars 💵 on each film. Everyone wanted in on that money 💵 🤑. I don't really like these kinds of posters. They're kind of ugly, they're not aesthetically pleasing, and they're too busy. And they're not unique, they don't stand out since every other major blockbuster does them. That's why I used that teaser poster with the dragon logo 🐉 as the top image and thumbnail for the review because I think it looks way better than this poster. I wish when movies would just have simple posters like that, and didn't feel the need to shove every single character into center. I mean, the posters for the two live action Mortal Kombat 🐉 movies in the 1990s by Threshold Entertainment, Mortal Kombat 🐉 (1995) and Mortal Kombat: Annihilation 🐉 had really simple posters that didn't show any characters. They just showed the dragon logos 🐉 for each film. Why couldn't this movie or the previous movie, Mortal Kombat 🐉 (2021)?) 

 

 

 

Since I mentioned him, I guess I should talk about Johnny Cage a little bit before this review is over. The main draw of this movie, the reason why people got excited for this movie and wanted to go see it in the first place despite not really liking the previous movie. I'll fully admit, I had my doubts when it was announced that Karl Urban was going to play Johnny Cage in this movie. Not because I hate Karl Urban, I love Karl Urban, he's a great actor, I just praised him in my Riddick (2013) review, and I'll probably praise him more when I get to my Chronicles of Riddick review, and if I decide to review the Kelvin Timeline Star Trek trilogy, Dredd (2012), and even Doom (2005) later on in the future. Say what you want about that film, believe me, a lot of people have already, but you gotta admit Karl Urban was pretty good. I even liked Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson in it (though he was credited as The Rock still in movies before he started being credited as Dwayne Johnson), as Sarge, it's one of his most fun and energetic performances. It was still time when he was new to the business, and he wasn't afraid to try different roles and step out of his comfort zone, even if the character he might be playing might be a bad guy, which Sarge ends up being. Him and Karl Urban's character, Reaper have a fight together at the end, in which Reaper defeats Sarge and kills him. 

 

I just didn't think he really fit the character all that much. Because Johnny is more of a funny character, he's always cracking jokes, insulting the bad guys, and not really taking the situation seriously. He's kind of like Deadpool in that way, though he doesn't break the fourth wall like Deadpool does. Usually Karl Urban plays serious characters, especially early on in his career. One of his most famous roles is Judge Dredd in Dredd (2012), and you really can't get more serious than him, that guy ♂︎ never smiles. Even when he does play a more jokey character like Bones in the Kelvin Timeline Star Trek movies, he has a more dry sense of humor. It's not like he's quippy, or he's cocky, or arrogant, or really exaggerated and zanny. Johnny is usually portrayed as much more quippy and arrogant because he's a movie star, he has an inflated ego as a lot of movie stars tend to do. Plus, Karl Urban is a much older man ♂︎, he's in his early 50s, he's a Gen Xer, or he would be if he were an American 🇺🇸. I don't know if New Zealand 🇳🇿 has the same generational categories that we do. 

 

If anyone from New Zealand 🇳🇿 is reading this, plus tell me, do you know use the same generational categories that we Americans 🇺🇸 do? Like, do you use Silent Generation, Baby Boomer, Gen X, Millennial, Gen Z, Gen Alpha, and Gen Beta? I know we Americans 🇺🇸 often like to assume that everyone does the same things that we do in the exact same way, but I know that's not the case. Not every country uses the same generations that we do. Like, South Africa 🇿🇦 categorizes generations based on whether you were born during Apartheid or after Apartheid, and then Russia 🇷🇺 categorizes generations based on whether you were born in the Soviet Union ☭ or in the Russian Federation 🇷🇺, or even whether they were born during the Yeltsin era or the Putin era, especially since there are Russians 🇷🇺 now that don't know a time before Putin. Putin has been the president, or rather dictator of Russia 🇷🇺 for so long, that an entire generation has born and come of age during a time when Putin was around, and don't know a time when he wasn't the leader of Russia 🇷🇺. They don't know what it was like before Putin came to office, and ruined the entire country after promising to save it. Sound familiar? So, New Zealand 🇳🇿 do you use the same generations that we do here in the United States 🇺🇸, or do you have your own generations? And if so, what are they? 

 

But after I saw the trailer, and I saw the direction that they were going to take the character in, I was convinced. The trailer may not have gotten rid of all of my skepticism surrounding this movie, and may have added to it in one instance, but it alleviate my skepticism when it came to Johnny Cage and Karl Urban playing him. He's playing an older Johnny Cage, a Johnny Cage that's washed up, and kind of lost everything. He's not young Johnny Cage, he's not Johnny Cage at his peak, as was portrayed in the original 1992 Mortal Kombat 🐉 game and throughout the Original Timeline games up until Mortal Kombat: Armageddon 🐉 which acted as a finale to the Original Timeline of Mortal Kombat 🐉, the 1995 movie, or in the 2011 reboot game Mortal Kombat 🐉 (2011) that's usually referred to as Mortal Kombat 9 🐉 by fans since it's the ninth game in the series, or even in Mortal Kombat 1 🐉 which is actually the twelfth game in the series and is another reboot as I stated before, he's Johnny Cage at his lowest. 

 

We don't really see much of his life before he gets asked to participate in the Outworld tournament, we don't know where he lives or how he lives in his off time, but judging by that small convention booth he was manning and then the fact that after he leaves Raiden 🌩️'s Sky Temple he immediately goes to a bar to drown his sorrows in booze, he's probably not living the best life. He's probably not living in a multi-million dollar mansion 💵 in Beverly Hills, or living on a hundred acre ranch in Montana, Wyoming, or Utah, Nevada, Arizona, Colorado, or New Mexico. That ship sailed a long time ago for him. Maybe if there are deleted scenes for this movie, we can see if they delved into his personal life a lot more, and if they showed us his house. He's pretty much current day Jean-Claude Van Damme, but even current day Van Damme is better off than Johnny seems to be in this movie. Jeremy Jahns actually compared this version of Johnny Cage to Steven Seagal, another washed up martial arts action star that peaked in the 90s and started to decline in the 2000s, in his review of the film but I don't think that's an apt comparison. 

 

I think Van Damme is a better comparison. Mostly because Johnny Cage was inspired by Van Damme. They created that character in the original Mortal Kombat 🐉 game after they couldn't get Van Damme to lend his likeness to the game. But, they did get Van Damme to lend his likeness for a DLC skin for Johnny Cage in Mortal Kombat 1 🐉 in an almost full circle moment. Further cementing Van Damme's connection to the franchise. It's a shame that he didn't play Johnny Cage in 1995 movie, and instead went to go play Guile in the 1994 Street Fighter movie. But, Linden Ashby did a good job, his performance as Johnny Cage is iconic and nostalgic for a lot of people. Although Van Damme is not a perfect man ♂︎, and has done his fair share of horrible things, and has own inner demons that he's had to grapple with and come to terms with, he's still a better person than Seagal. I mean this version of Johnny Cage is not scumbag who betrayed his country and cozied up to a dictator like Seagal did with Putin. And also Lukashenko, the dictator of Belarus 🇧🇾 (which is referred to by some as the "last dictatorship of Europe" or as the European North Korea 🇰🇵), but Belarus 🇧🇾 is barely an independent country at this point and is nothing more than a vassal state of Russia 🇷🇺, Lukashenko is pretty much just a Putin puppet, and will probably get annexed by Russia 🇷🇺 unless Putin is removed from office. I mean, if this version of Johnny really was like current day Seagal, he would've joined Shao Kahn's side the first chance he got. 

 

I like Johnny, I think he works as a protagonist and as an audience surrogate, a window into this world, a reintroduction to this world since Johnny is seeing all this stuff for the time. This is the first time he's learned that there are gods and there is magic, and other realms and different creatures, and it's the first time he's learned about the conflict between Earthrealm 🌎 and Outworld, and the Mortal Kombat 🐉 tournament itself, and how it's a way for realms to resolve conflicts, and decide whether a realm stays independent or if it gets absorbed by another realm. Again, this is all stuff that was already explained to Cole Young in the previous movie, which is another reason why you don't really need to watch the first one to understand this one. Everything's explained to you again here as if it were the first time that you're being introduced to this stuff, so if you're a new person or if you're someone did watch the previous movie and barely remember anything about it because it's been 5 years and you only saw it once, you can understand it and go with it. That's if you don't already find the concept and world of Mortal Kombat 🐉 dumb like apparently the guys ♂︎ at Double Toasted 🍞 do 😒, but more on that later. 

 

I mean, he kind of plays him similarly to Bones from the Kelvin Timeline Star Trek movies, especially with how he delivers jokes, and he reacts to everything. That dry humor and almost grumpy attitude. It's very Kelvin Timeline Bones, only with more swear words since this is an R rated movie and not a PG-13 rated movie like the Kelvin Timeline Star Trek movies were. Quentin Tarantino was supposed to direct an R rated Star Trek movie, he talked about doing one, but that's never gonna happen. But, I think it works because this is an older and more burnt out Johnny Cage than what we're used to seeing. The Kelvin Timeline version of Bones also had a very burnt out energy to him since when we're first introduced to him in Star Trek (2009), he had just been divorced and lost custody of his kids. So he had no other choice but to join Starfleet and become a medical officer on the USS Enterprise. And I'm glad they contrasted him with Kano, and he kind of put Kano in his place. This version of Kano is a lot more jokey, and in my opinion pretty obnoxious, mostly because they got a comedian to play him, so I'm glad Johnny was there to bring him down a few pegs. 

 

But, he's not the main character, Kitana is. This is her story, and she's really the heart of this movie ❤️. Similar to Hanzo Hasashi/Scorpion 🦂 in the previous movie, only Kitana has way more screen time and is more important to the story than Hanzo was to the story of the 2021 movie or even to the story of this movie. Hanzo's really just here to fight Noob while Kano and Johnny retrieve the amulet. We're just seeing her story play through Johnny Cage's eyes. Similar to how in The Phantom Menace, we were seeing the story of Queen Amidala and the invasion and occupation of Naboo by the Trade Federation through the eyes of Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan. Or how in Star Wars: Episode IV – A New Hope, we were seeing the story of Princess Leia and the Death Star through the eyes of C-3PO and R2D2, which is what inspired George Lucas to tell the story of The Phantom Menace from the perspective of Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan despite it not really being their story. Because famously, he wanted both trilogies to rhyme with each other. She's the first we see in the movie. Similar to the previous movie, they do a prologue scene, which focuses on one character, and sets up the main villain and conflict of the story. In the first movie, it was setting up Hanzo and Bi-Han's rivalry, since a lot of the movie had to do with that rivalry, and Bi-Han was the secondary villain of the movie. Some would say he was the main villain of the movie, but really, he's the secondary villain and the real main villain was Shang Tsung. 

 

While, in this movie, it's setting Kitana's character, her arc, and it's also setting up the main villain, Shao Kahn, and establishing the main conflict, which is him trying to conquer all the realms under his empire, and the heroes of Earthrealm 🌎 needing to stop him from taking their realm and anyone else’s. It establishes the threat by showing Shao Kahn kill King Jerrod in the final Edenia tournament and him conquering Edenia. Which, I know the fighting game YouTuber, TheFightersDen has a problem with, he's always complaining about King Jerrod always losing and getting killed, but it's part of the lore. It's kind of unavoidable. King Jerrod has to always lose and die, otherwise it won't make why Shao Kahn was able to conquer Edenia and merge it with Outworld. If King Jerrod had won, then Edenia would've remained independent. That's something to explore in an alternate universe, like if Netherrealm Studios wants to do another reboot after Mortal Kombat 1 🐉 and they really want to create a timeline that's truly different, why don't you do one where Edenia is never conquered by Shao Kahn and King Jerrod never dies, Sindel isn't forced to become Shao Kahn's wife and essentially be mind-controlled by him, and Kitana isn't forced to become his daughter, and Mileena is never created to be her sister. 

 

I mean, Mileena's dead in this current live action film canonicity. She died in the previous movie, and she doesn't seem to have a connection with Kitana at all. In most Mortal Kombat 🐉 canonicities, Mileena is a clone of Kitana, created by Shang Tsung using some Tarkatan DNA 🧬, essentially mixing it with Kitana's DNA 🧬 to create the perfect daughter for Shao Kahn after Kitana started showing signs of disobedience. The idea would be that Mileena would more loyal to Shao Kahn than Kitana was, since Kitana still held some resentment towards Shao Kahn for conquering her realm, brainwashing/mind-controlling her mother, and killing her father. This is more so the case in the first reboot timeline, where Kitana was an adult and really started to have doubts about her loyalty to Shao Kahn when she got cloned, and Mileena was created by Shang Tsung in his flesh pits. 

 

Whereas in the Original Timeline, they were kids when Mileena was created, and they grew up together, and Mileena developed somewhat of a bond with Kitana and did view her as a sister, even if the feeling wasn't mutual. And she was more mature, about the same level of maturity as Kitana did by the time the events of Mortal Kombat II 🐉 (the 1993 game) take place, unlike in the first reboot timeline where she's more childlike, immature, and almost more feral due to just being born. Unless they bring her back in the third movie, and do some retconning so that they do have a connection. It wouldn't be the first time. They did all kinds of retcons in this movie, which is yet another reason why the 2021 movie was made redundant by this movie and why it doesn't entirely matter anymore. 

 

But, I really did like Kitana in this movie. This is probably the best that Kitana has been in a while, because they kind of did her dirty in the last few games, I wasn't a fan of what they did with her in the reboot games. Her default outfit in Mortal Kombat X 🐉 was pretty cool, it kind of had a Chun-Li vibe to it. But other than that, I haven't been a fan of reboot Kitana. But this is Kitana in her best form I think. Kitana fans ate pretty good with this movie, I'm sure they were all happy to see their favorite Edenian princess finally be done justice in live action no less. Sindel was kind of a letdown in this movie. She didn't have that much screen time, and she didn't get much to do. Like, after she fights Sonya and Sonya defeats her, we hardly see her again until towards the end of the movie where Shao Kahn threatens to kill her again if Kitana doesn't give him the information he wants about where she went. And then after that, she's never seen again, or at least I don't remember seeing her. We don't even see her after Kitana defeats Shao Kahn, and Edenia is freed. So while Kitana fans were satisfied by her portrayal, Sindel fans were not. I guess I'll have to get a better sense of this actress in Primitive War, even if she has a big role, which I sort of doubt. 

 

Baraka was the one thing that I hated from the trailer. I hated his design, and I thought the special effects were pretty bad. He was the one thing in this movie that was take the most convincing. Which is bad because Baraka is my favorite character in Mortal Kombat 🐉. Most other people's favorite character is either Scorpion 🦂, Sub-Zero ❄️, Liu Kang, Johnny Cage, Sonya Blade, Jax, Kitana, Jade, Mileena, Raiden 🌩️, Shang Tsung, Shao Kahn, Kano, Noob, Smoke 💨, Sektor, Cyrax, or even Havik, but mine is Baraka. Ever since I first played Mortal Kombat: Deception 🐉 on the GameCube, he's been my favorite. So they had to get him right. It kind of a make or break for me in terms of whether or not I would like this movie or not. To put this into perspective, while everyone was complaining about Jade being bald, I was complaining about Baraka's design, and the quality of the mask they used on his face, which didn't look very good. 

 

And while I'm still not a fan of the design and the practical effects they used for his face still don't look good, it's a mask and you can totally tell it's a mask because it looks rubbery when he talks, I actually didn't mind his character in this movie. I liked his portrayal a lot more than I thought I was going to going in. And I didn't expect him to become a fan of Johnny Cage. He's not a villain. I mean he's not a hero, he's not good guy, he's still kind of evil and pretty dangerous, but he's not working for Shao Kahn. I would say this version of Baraka is more neutral than anything else. In this movie's universe, Tarkatans are an oppressed under the thumb of Shao Kahn. Reduced to living in small tribes. They aren't even a lot to be in the castle, which Shao Kahn stole from the Edenian royal family after he took over. And Baraka is simply the guy ♂︎ that the Earthrealm heroes 🌎 ask for help to get into the castle using an underground tunnel that only he can access so that they can steal the amulet. Because with the amulet, Shao Kahn is invincible, and he cannot be defeated. Once the amulet is destroyed, Shao Kahn loses his invincibility and power to regenerate and heal from any injury, and he can be killed. 

 

So, it's vital that they get in, and only Baraka can show them the way. But only after he fights Johnny Cage, and Johnny defeats him and not only earns his respect but also his admiration. He actually wants to be trained by him, and we see the beginnings of this at the very end of the movie, when it's revealed that Johnny is telling the whole story of the movie to him and a couple of Tarkatan children at a campfire 🔥. I did not expect them to take that direction with his character in this movie, but it works. It works for this movie, and it works for Johnny's character arc, as it's only after the fight with Baraka, and Baraka expressing admiration for him that he's fully reinvigorated and decides to really get involved and join the fight against Shao Kahn. He really starts believing that he can do this. Even if he's not the one who defeats Shao Kahn, Kitana is. But he helps defeat Noob and destroy the amulet, so that's something. He played his part. 

 

I have noticed that, lately in the franchise, they have been trying to make Baraka more sympathetic and move him away from his villainous portrayal. Because Baraka started out as a villain, and remained a villain up until the more recent games. He was just a ravenous killing machine, a monster ready to kill anyone he sees and willing to serve whoever the big bad guy of that particular game. Whether it be Shao Kahn, Quan Chi (he worked with him in Mortal Kombat Gold 🐉, the expanded version of Mortal Kombat 4 🐉 released exclusively on the Dreamcast), or Onaga. It wasn't until Mortal Kombat 11 🐉 that they tried to make him somewhat sympathetic, and show that he wasn't fully on board with everything Shao Kahn was doing, and then in Mortal Kombat 1 🐉, they made him a fully heroic character. Which was aided by the fact that they made the Tarkatan people infected with a disease rather than their own race. Which, I was worried that was the direction they were going to go with this movie, making Tarkatans a disease rather their own race, especially since not all the Tarkatans that we see have the same features as Baraka, like some of them don't have the arm blades. 

 

But no, they are an actual race in this movie as far as I know, which I'm glad because I wasn't a fan of them retconning Tarkatans to be a disease in Mortal Kombat 1 🐉. Especially since this is still supposed to be the same universe, just with different timelines. Unless you subscribe to the theory (or rather hypothesis) that parallel universes are just alternate timelines, or every time there's an alternate timeline a new parallel universe. Like if you tried to alter the timeline, it wouldn't actually alter the timeline, it would just create a new timeline and that timeline would be its own universe. I don't subscribe to that theory/hypothesis, but a lot of people do and genuinely believe that it's how the universe and time actually work (they really do believe that we live in a multiverse and that time travel ⏱️ is possible), and it's often how parallel universes and alternate timelines are often written in fiction. The functionality of them I mean. 

 

I'm still not a fan of the bone blades, I wish they hadn't got rid of the metal blades and still kept them like in the Original Timeline and in the first two reboot games, Mortal Kombat 🐉 (2011) and Mortal Kombat X 🐉, although Baraka was not a playable character in that game and was killed off in the Story Mode during one of the cutscenes. The way Jeremy Jahns feels about Wolverine having bone claws is the same way I feel about Baraka having bone blades. It just doesn't look right, and it isn't as cool. It makes Baraka and the Tarkatans as a whole less otherworldly creatures. Like maybe, since they were from another realm and this is a fantasy universe that isn't bound by the same natural laws as our world (our universe), they evolved to have metal skeletons. Like, it's just a natural part of their biology, and it doesn't weight them down, and it doesn't do anything that the Laws of Physics says it would. But, with the bone blades, they're just like any other creature, in a fantasy setting or otherwise 😒. It makes them seem otherworldly. 

 

So, I didn't like seeing those bone blades whenever they were on screen. But this is something they can correct in the third one, and maybe make a better mask, or do an animatronic face instead of just a rubber mask. Just anything to improve the practical effects and make them better than this. Maybe you could even touch it up with CGI if you'd like, sort like what had to been done in Jurassic World, Prey (2022), Predator: Badlands, and even The Substance. In fact I wouldn't have minded if Baraka had been a fully CG character. Possibly with motion capture. Just like the apes in the newer Planet of the Apes movies, or like Goro in Mortal Kombat 🐉 (2021). I know a lot of people thought the CGI on Goro in that movie wasn't good, and they prefer the puppet/animatronic one from Mortal Kombat 🐉 (1995), but I thought it looked fine. That was just the nostalgia talking for those people. 

 

They did a practical Baraka in Mortal Kombat: Annihilation 🐉, and it didn't look that good. I believe it was also a mask that they used, and it looked just as fake as the one in this movie. So to me, Baraka's a character that you either have to do full CG (possibly with motion capture) or if you do him practical you have to heavily augment him with CG. Because if you just do him practical, with make-up, or prosthetics, or even a full mask, which is what they've been using for him in the live action movies so far, it's not going to look as good, and I want it to look good. Hopefully, in the future, they'll correct it, but for now in this film, we're stuck with an imperfect Baraka. Good in terms of personality and performance, but not so good in design or effects. 

 

There are a few more things I want to cover before I finally wrap this review up. First, I was unimpressed with Double Toasted 🍞's review of the film 😑. I don’t know, they just seemed rather dismissive of not just this movie, but of Mortal Kombat 🐉 as a whole. They were dismissive of the story and the lore, with attitude of “no body cares about this stuff,” they seem to think whole idea of this franchise is stupid. And even they supposedly like this movie 👇, they seemed to like more in a guilty pleasure movie or a “so bad it’s good” kind of way, and the reason why this movie is better than the first one is that it takes itself less seriously and it’s stupider. And Martin in particular said that he only liked the parts with Johnny Cage and Kano and didn’t care about the other 98% of the story. Again, this idea that Mortal Kombat 🐉 is stupid, and there’s no way you can tell a serious Mortal Kombat 🐉 story, or enjoy it in an unironic way. It’s always in an ironic way, to them, Mortal Kombat 🐉 franchise is just dumb turn your brain 🧠 off entertainment, and that just rubbed me the wrong way. Especially since they are hypocritical when it comes to movies having lore, and specifically, movies having lore from its source material. 

 

Like, they always complain about video game movies having lore and having too much lore, but yet, they never complain about that sort of thing when they talk about comic book movies, particularly Marvel movies. It’s never too much lore when Marvel does. I think it’s less of them disliking lore in movies in general, it’s more of an issue of them not understanding the lore. They don’t really play video games that much, they’re not hardcore gamers, and they are not specifically tied to one franchise. Korey plays more video games than Martin does, he knows more about video games than Martin does, he respects them a lot more than Martin does. But, he doesn’t know or respect them nearly as much as Julien Hemmendinger, and once again he always complains about video game movies having lore. Especially if it’s from a game that he didn’t personally play, or bother to do any research on 🙄. But, him and Martin know comic books. They love superheroes. So, they’re more knowledgeable about not just the characters and lore of these comic books, but also about the history of comic books, and of course comic book movies. Because they understand it, they don’t complain about comic book movies having “too much lore” or “too many references that supposed general audiences wouldn’t understand.” Once again, showing their Marvel bias, whether they’re conscious of it or not 🙄. Or I guess comic book movie bias, since they like comic books and comic book movies in general and respect them a lot more than video games and video game movies. 

 

I don’t know why they even bother to cover video game movies, they clearly don’t care or enjoy it. I know it’s their job, but they didn’t have to cover this movie or cover any video game movie. Korey said it himself, they’re very selective about the movies they cover on their channel because they’re all about the algorithm, they’re all about what will get the most views, what will get the most clicks, and most importantly, what will make them the most money 💵 🤑. Korey treats Double Toasted 🍞 as a business, it’s his main source of income, it’s how he pays the bills and puts food on the table, and how he’s able to live remotely comfortably. And every decision he makes in regard to the channel and what he decides to cover is a business decision. It’s just how in movies, characters always say, “it’s not personal, it’s just business,” only for Korey, it’s for real. It is just about business for him, which is isn’t particularly hard on studios whenever they make a stupid decision or interfere with a filmmaker’s vision based on business considerations because in a way, he’s just like them. He’s just like those studio executives, only on a much smaller scale. So, it’s clearly while they’re not fans of Mortal Kombat 🐉, while they’re not that well versed in video games, and don’t care about lore or storytelling in video games, just did it for the views because this is a very popular topic right now because the movie just came out, and they wanted in on the conversation. Even if they had nothing of value to say. 

 

Okay, if Korey really had to do this movie, he could’ve at the very least gotten someone who was a genuine fan of Mortal Kombat 🐉, and could’ve told him who the characters are, what the realms are and how they work, who and what the Elder Gods are (even if the Elder Gods are not directly mentioned in this movie and are just referred to as “the Gods”) and what makes them different from Protector Gods like Raiden 🌩️, Fujin 💨, and Argus (who did end up becoming an Elder God himself), and what certain things mean. Like Shinnok’s amulet, they don’t know what that was, and they didn’t care. They didn’t even know that it belonged to Shinnok, a fallen Elder God who was cast down and imprisoned in the Netherrealm for his transgressions, and then took over the Netherrealm ruled over it, overthrowing the previous ruler of the Netherrealm, Satan. Like, actual Satan. Satan actually exists within the Mortal Kombat 🐉 universe, and Shinnok overthrew him to rule over the Netherrealm himself. 

 

Granted, the movie mentions that either, they don’t even specifically say that it’s Shinnok’s amulet, they just call it “the amulet” throughout the film. But if you look at the design and the functionality of it, it is basically Shinnok’s amulet. They also didn’t know that Shinnok was the main villain of Mortal Kombat Mythologies: Sub-Zero 🐉❄️, Mortal Kombat 4/Gold 🐉, and Mortal Kombat X 🐉, since Mortal Kombat X 🐉 is essentially a retelling of the same story as Mortal Kombat 4 🐉 since Mortal Kombat 🐉 (2011) was a retelling of the stories of the first three Mortal Kombat 🐉 games, all wrapped into one. Someone who was an actual fan and expert on Mortal Kombat 🐉 and Mortal Kombat 🐉 lore could’ve been there to explain all this to Korey, and set him straight when he says something out of pocket about the franchise, which he did several times through the review. And if not an actual Mortal Kombat 🐉 fan, at least Korey could’ve gotten Billy Brooks since his brother, Mehcad Brooks is in it. He plays Jax. That way he could disprove the conspiracy theory that even Korey subscribes to that Billy and Mehcad are the same person, which they are not. They look very similar, you can tell they’re brothers, but they are different not the same person. Mehcad sounds a lot older than Billy. I don’t if he actually is the older brother or if Billy is, but he definitely sounds a bit older and more mature. Billy still sounds very youthful even though he’s around the same age as Korey.

 

There is no reason at all why Martin had to be there, since it’s clearly he doesn’t like video games or Mortal Kombat 🐉 and has zero respect for them from the way he talks about them. You watch it, and you’re listening to him, and you’re like, “Why are you even here? If you really don’t like video games and video game movies, then don’t play them or watch them. Just don’t participate in the review. You don’t need to present for ever single review Double Toasted 🍞 does.” They have done reviews without Martin and even without Korey (usually because Korey was out of town, doing a standup comedy show or live episode of the series, a movie review in front of a live audience, in some other city in other state), I don’t see why they couldn’t have done it here. Let the actual gamers on your team cover these things, you don’t have to cover them. You can sit these ones out. 

 

And don’t give me that bullshit that you’re trying to be unbiased, there’s no such thing as being unbiased. Everyone has a bias, including you 🫵. I already explained that you have a Marvel/comic book bias, and it clouds how you judge movies, especially these geek property type movies. You fault other geeks for enjoying something geeky, and then you go and geek out about your own geeky things. Whether it be Marvel, superheroes, comic books in general, and of course, He-Man, the thing you geek out over the most. I saw you, you geeked out over the trailer to Masters of the Universe (2026). You said that it’s your most anticipated film. And of course both you and Martin geeked out over Michael Jackson when you reviewed Michael (2026), I didn’t hear a single peep from you guys ♂︎ about it being catered to a specific audience or having too many references that only Michael Jackson fans would understand. So don’t sit there and act like you don’t like bias, and you don’t geek out over stuff. 

 

I had wanted to see this movie in IMAX, I planned it out. There was a showing at 4:30pm, and I was hoping we could make it to that one. But we ended up taking so much time at the restaurant we went, this Italian place 🇮🇹 I had never been before called M'Tucci's, and then we went to this floor decor store to look for carpet for my room (because we’re going to redo my room now that we have money 💵, including my carpet, I need a new carpet), and that took time, they didn't have any carpet, so we went to the Home Depot and they have carpet, the kind of carpet I want. I want office carpet in my room because I use my computer 💻, I have a desk, and I have one of those rolling office chairs, and it just wears out the regular kind of carpet that you usually have in your house. So I need office carpet, the kind of carpet that’s suited for having a chair like that. And the Home Depot we went is on Renaissance, and the Winrock theater was on the other side of town, it was a pretty long distance away. So, by the time we got there, and we got the tickets for our movies, we didn’t have the time, the movie had already started at that 4:30pm showing. 

 

The next IMAX showing was going to be until 7:30pm, and neither one of us didn’t want to wait that long. We didn’t want to come back too late. So, I settled with seeing the movie in a standard format at a more reasonable 5:30pm showing. It was fine, the screen I saw it in was pretty big. Not as big as the IMAX scene, but it was still bigger than the ones at the Cottonwood Mall theater. It’s just that I really wanted to see this particular movie in IMAX. There aren’t even any other movies this year coming out that I actually want to see in IMAX. Maybe, Masters of the Universe (2026), but I’m still not sure if I want to see that, even if my grandma wants to. But definitely next year, I’m gonna see Godzilla x Kong: Supernova in IMAX. That is a must for me. And maybe The Simpsons Movie 2 too if that movie’s in IMAX, though I highly doubt it. My grandma didn’t see the movie with me. This was the first time in a while that we didn’t see a movie together, and we saw separate movies. She saw The Devil Wears Prada 2, which started at 6:00pm, about 30 minutes or so after my movie. She didn’t like it, she just said it was okay, and she likes the first one better. That’s legacy sequels for ya 🤷‍♂️. They really should’ve never made a second Devil Wears Prada movie. It just wasn’t a movie that warranted a sequel, it worked perfectly fine as a stand alone movie from what I understand. 

 

Now they’re making a second Practical Magic movie, the witch movie starring Sandra Bullock and Nicole Kidman, though I don’t know if Nicole Kidman’s even going to be in it. I didn’t see the trailer. They’re just making legacy sequels to all the mom and grandma movies. What’s next? A 28 Dresses movie? When it comes to the restaurant we went to, M’Tucci’s, the part that took the longest was waiting. We didn’t take long eating, obviously we took our time eating to enjoy our food, it was the wait. They took long to seat us. Because it was a Saturday, and there was a lot of people there at the restaurant. All of the restaurants were packed, a lot of people bringing huge parties of 5 or more people with them. It seemed like everyone that was at the restaurant with us was having a birthday party 🥳. The wait staff brought about three birthday cheesecakes with lit Sparkler’s on top to three different tables, all of them had a bunch of people. 

 

Our waitress was holding one of these cakes in her hand when she handed us our ticket 🧾, and I was worried that she was going to accidentally burn it 🔥 with the Sparkler on top of the cake. Luckily, that didn’t happen otherwise I would’ve been pissed 😤. I liked the food, I thought it was good. I could tell my grandma wasn’t that into it, she just told me she thought it was okay. To be fair, I ordered a pizza 🍕, like a Neapolitan style pizza 🍕 with pepperoni, green chili, and some other kind of sausage, while she ordered a more exotic pasta dish with porcini mushrooms 🍄‍🟫. Maybe if we go back there again, and she orders something else, she might like it more. We’ll just never know until we actually go back there and try it again. I’m already sold on the restaurant, but my grandma needs more convincing. 

 

But, the most memorable part of the experience of me was this one waitress that I saw. It wasn’t our waitress, it was a different waitress, who was serving different tables. She had one amazing butt, I couldn’t believe it 😍. I couldn’t take my eyes off of it, I tried not to make it obvious that I was looking at her. It was pretty big, but not too fatty. It was a perfect butt, the kind of butt you would want on a woman ♀︎ if you’re a butt guy ♂︎ like me. I even saw her panties underneath her pants, like the outline of her panties. It looked like a basic women ♀︎’s briefs, nothing too fancy. She is at work after all. She’s trying to look sexy necessarily. She just naturally is 😘. She may have been serving cakes (she was serving the birthday cakes with the Sparklers at the other tables with the huge parties), but had some serious cakes back there of her own. Looked good enough to eat 😏. But before I get too nasty, I will say that she had a pretty face too, ponytail, the whole package. She was just a perfect woman ♀︎, at least in my opinion. I wouldn’t mind dating her or a woman ♀︎ like her. Maybe if I go back there, I might see her again 😊. 

I did finally see the trailer to Resident Evil (2026), which is the upcoming Resident Evil movie directed by Zach Cregger, the acclaimed director of Barbarian (2022) and Weapons (2025). Two horror films that I have not seen, and have no interest in seeing, especially after watching this trailer. It is the first live action Resident Evil movie since the disastrous Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City, and it’s from an apparently visionary director who people seem to like. Everyone who watched this trailer, and did videos on it seems to have been impressed with it, but I wasn’t. It just didn’t look like Resident Evil. It looked like a completely unrelated horror film that they just slapped the Resident Evil name onto for name recognition. Sure, that may impress guys like Korey and Martin, who don’t really like video games and don’t like it when video game movies are made to please the fans, but it doesn’t impress me, someone who actually is a fan. I know Korey’s going to love it probably because he has bias towards the director. He interviewed him on the show, Double Toasted Interviews 🍞, which has its own channel separate from the main channel which is just for reviews and political news videos. And apparently he’s good friends with the director, especially after doing that interview. I know he’s going to try to do the review as if he isn’t biased when the movie comes out in September, but he is. Like I said, everyone has a bias. 

 

Why are so many Resident Evil fans going along with this? I don’t understand it. Sure, it’s directed by a guy ♂︎ who directed a popular movie that a lot of people liked, but so what? Just because a director directs a popular movie people liked doesn’t mean their next movie will be any good, or be what you’re expecting or hoping for. This looked more like an Evil Dead movie than a Resident Evil movie. It’s like Zach Cregger wanted to make an Evil Dead movie, but got stuck making a Resident Evil movie instead. Or he’s trying to make Resident Evil more like Evil Dead. But, Resident Evil is not Evil Dead. They might both have the word “evil” in their titles, but they are not in any way the same. They’re two completely different things, and they should be approached as such. The Evil Dead comparisons are even more apparent because they showed the trailer to the next Evil Dead movie, Evil Dead Burn 🔥 right after. They looked very similar, I couldn’t even tell them apart. They didn’t show the Capcom logo anymore, they didn’t say that it was based on a game made and owned by Capcom. Granted, this movie, Mortal Kombat II 🐉 didn’t show the Netherrealm Studios logo at the beginning. All it said was that it was based on a game created by Ed Boon & John Tobias, which was nice to see. It was nice to see John Tobias be acknowledged after all these years even though he doesn’t work on the franchise anymore. Especially since there was this huge controversy over them removing John Tobias’s name from the credits on Mortal Kombat: Special Forces 🐉 when the game came out in the year 2000. 

 

So sorry, but I think I’ll pass on this little adventure into the Resident Evil universe by Mr. Cregger, and I’ll just stick with the 3D animated Resident Evil movies, you know the ones done with motion capture? Those are true Resident Evil to me. Not just because they focus on characters from the games, but because they are canon to the games and fill in the gaps in between each game. Like, Resident Evil: Degeneration fills in the gap between Resident Evil 4 and Resident Evil 5, Resident Evil: Damnation fills in the gaps between Resident Evil 5 and Resident Evil 6, and both Resident Evil: Vendetta and Resident Evil: Death Island fill in the gaps between Resident Evil 6 and Resident Evil 7: Biohazard ☣️. The miniseries, Resident Evil: Infinite Darkness is also set in-between Resident Evil 4 and Resident Evil 5, and it shows what Leon did after he rescued the president’s daughter, Ashley Graham. President Graham is even still the president when this series takes place. I wish I could tell his first name, but he doesn’t have one. He’s just called Graham, I know because I checked the Resident Evil Wiki page on him. And it also shows that Leon took a little excursion into China 🇨🇳 before he went to Lanshiang with Helena in Resident Evil 6. 

 

But hey, at least that Furious movie that they showed the trailer for before the movie looked pretty good. We get two movies with Joe Taslim in one year. And before you ask, no, it is not a Fast & Furious movie. It's a completely unrelated movie called The Furious. It's a Hong Kong movie 🇭🇰, and it's an original concept as far as I can tell. It originally came out last year, in 2025, but it's just barely getting a theatrical release here in the US 🇺🇸 this year in June. So, it's being distributed by Lionsgate, so another Lionsgate movie to add to the category here on my blog. It's basically about this guy ♂︎ who employs the help of a journalist to rescue to his daughter after she gets kidnapped. Basic plot for an action movie, especially for a martial arts action movie 🥋. It's either about someone going to rescue someone who got kidnapped, or it's about getting revenge on someone who killing someone or something that they loved. Most action movies, especially post-Taken and post-John Wick, are either revenge flicks or rescue missions. 

 

Even Jason Statham's second movie this year, Mutiny (2026) is about him boarding a cargo ship that turns out to be involved in an international human trafficking operation, and it's transporting a bunch of people being trafficked. It's pretty much just like the ship in Lethal Weapon 4, only Jason Statham's character tries to rescue all of these human trafficking victims before the ship docks at its destination. Of course, the whole reason he boarded that ship is that he was framed for his Thai billionaire friend 🇹🇭's murder, and he was trying to track down his friend's real killer. But, once he discovers all the people (mainly women ♀︎ and children) being trafficked on this ship, the plot becomes about rescuing them, and killing all the crew that are involved in this operation. Though, I'm sure they'll tie into the plotline about him trying to find his friend's killer, by having his friend's killer be the leader of this human trafficking ring, or at least, the captain of this ship that's transporting these human trafficking victims. 

 

I actually thought that it was a sequel to The Night Comes for Us because it looked very Night Comes for Us esque, especially because of the violence and the presence of Joe Taslim in one of the lead roles, until it showed the title, The Furious. But, writer and director, Timo Tjahjanto said that he is planning on a sequel, or he's working on a sequel to The Night Comes for Us. One that will focus on the Operator character. I don't know when, but whenever it comes out, I'll check it out. I wrote a review of The Night Comes for Us if you're interested. Why isn't Timo Tjahjanto directing a Mortal Kombat 🐉 movie? He'd be perfect for it. If you watched The Night Comes for Us, you would know. Instead they got him directing sequels to Nobody (2021) and The Beekeeper 🐝. Not that I'm complaining. The more Timo Tjahjanto the better. I still need to watch Nobody 2, but I still haven't gotten the chance. I need to order the 4K edition 💿 on Amazon. But for now, I think I'll go see The Furious when it comes out in theaters if I have the time. If I got nothing else to do. 

 

I also want to check out the new Guy Ritchie movie that just came out, In the Grey starring Jake Gyllenhaal, Henry Cavill, and Eiza González. I didn't know that movie existed or that it was even out in theaters until recently, when we were to go to the movies. It just shows how poorly they're advertising it. I have a feeling that it'll probably bomb 💣 at the box office, especially when you have movies like Mortal Kombat II 🐉 (2026), Michael (2026), The Devil Wears Prada 2, and Obsession (2025) out right now. Yes, Obsession technically came out in 2025, but it's barely getting a wide theatrical release this year, I know it's confusing. But, I saw the trailer on YouTube, and it looks pretty good. It's basically about this woman ♀︎ named Rachel Wild (Eiza González) who hires these two extraction specialists named Bronco Beauregard (Jake Gyllenhaal) and Sid (Henry Cavill) to retrieve a billion dollar debt 💸 from this crime boss (I guess) named Manny Salazar (Carlos Bardem). The Wikipedia on the movie isn't very specific about what Manny Salazar is, if he's a dictator or a crime boss, and it doesn't say what Rachel's job is and why she needs to hire Bronco and Sid to do this job to get this money 💵 from Salazar. Though, I'm sure the movie will answer most of those questions...hopefully. It's basically an action thriller with some comedic elements. Typical Guy Ritchie stuff. But, I like Guy Ritchie, so I'm interested in check this out. 

 

I don't know if I'll catch it in theaters, but I want to because this seems like a movie that both me and my grandma would enjoy, just going off of the trailer. What's interesting about this movie is that it's the second time that Jake Gyllenhaal and Eiza González have worked on a movie together since Ambulance 🚑 (2022), it's the second time Jake Gyllenhaal's worked with Guy Ritchie since Guy Ritchie's The Covenant, it's the third time Henry Cavill's worked with Guy Ritchie since The Man from U.N.C.L.E. (2015) and The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare, and it's the second time Eiza González has worked with Guy Ritchie since Fountain of Youth, which was not a theatrical released film but a straight-to-streaming movie released on Apple TV+. I still to check that movie out too, I have it on my list, as well as The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare. I put that movie on my Christmas list 🎄 in 2024, and I didn't get it. So, it's up to me to get it on my own with my dad's money 💵, but it's all of our money 💵 and my aunt's in charge of it, so it's okay. 

 

I also plan on reviewing The Man from U.N.C.L.E. (2015), but I want to get the 4K 💿 that Arrow Video put out a while back first before I review it. I don't want to just watch it on streaming. I don't even know if it's available on streaming. It probably is, but I still don't really want to watch it on streaming. I try to watch movies on physical media when I can, because it is a better way to watch movies or TV shows. You don't need Internet 🛜, and there's no ad breaks. Sure, there might be some previews that play before the main menu comes up, but at least there are no ads while you're watching the movie, and at least the picture quality doesn't dip because of your Internet connection 🛜. 

 

 

(These are all the posters for all the specialty formats that you watch the movie in. You got the IMAX poster up top, the 4DX poster in the middle, and the ScreenX poster on the bottom. The Winrock theater in Albuquerque offers all three of those formats. I actually saw Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire in a ScreenX theater, and it was cool, but I think when I see Godzilla x Kong: Supernova next year, I'll see it in IMAX instead. Of these specialty theater formats, my favorite is IMAX, and if I choose what format I could watch the movie in again, it would be IMAX. It's too bad that I'll probably never get the chance to watch this movie in IMAX, since I'll probably never see it again while it's in theaters. Only when it comes out on DVD 📀, Blu-Ray 💿, and 4K 💿. And there are no other movies coming out in IMAX this year that I want to see. If there are, I'll let you know.)