 Today we're going to review the new Mortal Kombat film available in cinema and for a limited time on HBO Max And we're going to compare it to its predecessor from 1995 to see exactly which film did Mortal Kombat better Major spoiler alert if you have not watched the film yet I am going to be talking about occasional plot points in a little bit more detail So if you haven't seen it yet go watch it come back and enjoy this video Otherwise if you want you can just skip to the timecode on the bottom If you want to jump to the end for a mostly spoiler-free general summary of the film So let's get started Anyone watching this and anyone familiar with 1995 film who got ramped up at that opening sequence when the first thing we heard was Mortal Kombat New length in the logo flying in the Mortal Kombat metal logo flying around the fire and in the titles it set the tone That sequence gave us a taste of things to come and we knew immediately What kind of a ride a movie we were in for this new movie does something similar now Well, it doesn't have the you know the EDM electronic dance music Vibe and beat that the first film had this film goes in a different direction. It's darker. It's grittier It takes itself more seriously and we see that we feel it in the opening sequence in which we go into the background of Scorpion and Sub-Zero's conflict and speaking of gritty That's one of the main differences between these two movies see in 1995 It was criticized for not having the gore and fatalities that are prevalent in the games But the problem though is back in 95 who was the core demographic 13 14 15 year olds They couldn't go see an R rated film So if they made that movie rated R it would have tanked because the core audience couldn't see it but fast forward to today where we're like what 26 27 something like that years later and That audience has grown up so we can handle it now. So this movie I think made the right choice going in that direction I mean there's fatalities ripped right out of the game. It's gory. It's bloody It does not hold back and it makes absolutely no apology as to what it's referencing. So as far as tonality goes I think both films were a fantastic job of Setting up our expectations the beginning and delivering and following through so in terms of tone both movies this round is a draw Story okay when it comes to the story, let's let's call this what this is We're talking about a movie based on a video game that was based on a series of movies The original Mortal Kombat is kind of a blend between Enter the dragon big trouble little China and blood sports all kind of mixed up into one So made into a game and not a movie space in the game So it gets kind of wiggy right there and I want to point out that it was an interview with the director He said that a lot of video game films They're afraid to commit they're afraid to pull the trigger on keeping faithful to the source material And when studios tend to break away from the source material you're breaking that connection with the audience So when I read this interview I was very hopeful thinking yes because that's what we need And that's what the first movie was and we needed a film that was faithful I feel that maybe we have a different definition as to what faithful to source material means There's a lot of changes that I felt were unnecessary Character backgrounds were written some of them the whole overall story doesn't quite congeal And it totally goes off the rails of the main plot of Mortal Kombat to the point where it almost serves as a Spiritual prequel of sorts I mean you have this film that's built around this core concept of the fate of the earth being determined in a Tournament between two different realms that is awesome Except when you consider the fact this film never gets to the tournament the story is more focused on Stopping the bad guys who are trying to cheat from preventing the tournament from even happening to begin with and that's just not what the game was So they cut I give them credit for trying to do their own thing But in my opinion they didn't retain enough of the original story to be all that faithful to Mortal Kombat far far too much Of the film went into justifying the character moves It was all about the characters finding their arcana their special powers when they get that Mortal Kombat dragon symbol either by birth Bright or by defeating somebody who has a symbol the thing with that there was so much in the film It's devoted to the main characters trying to learn their powers It kind of feels Harry Potter ish and starts to fly a little too close to mortal combat annihilation with the animalities And it really isn't necessary. I mean we're talking about a property of Mortal Kombat You don't have to explain the magic to us. You don't have to justify it We're going into it already accepting the fact that there is an interdimensional tournament with sorcerers and guys who can throw Spears from their hands and freeze people the magics are given we don't need to be spoon-fed or justified with a reason as to why it exists in their world and When that was special moves are done. They looked like they ripped it out of the game I'll give them that credit, but to be totally honest the movie feels a lot less of Being faithful to the story then it does the instruction manual It's just all about their special moves and almost feels apologetic as to why those moves are in the film and Realistically so they try to come up with this whole system to explain their powers. It's unnecessary It's got shades of midichlorians in Star Wars. We don't need the magic explained and just unfortunately It doesn't really dive into the mythos that much I mean those who know or are familiar with the entire Mortal Kombat storyline of the 11 main games It has a pretty deep and intricate story There's a lot they could have worked with and this time around this film pretty much feels like they give us all the Exposition that we need in that first title card. It doesn't really develop far past that It's still a good martial arts film and I still recommend seeing it but overall I think a lot of the meat is missing so if you're a Mortal Kombat fan You're not gonna find the the meat of the story that you would probably hope would be there So I have to give this round to the 1995 film because they nailed it They captured the whole feel and essence and story of the game as simple as it was The special effects all right now when it comes to special effects We have to be honest that when the first film came out in 95 CGI was in its infancy I mean we're only talking two years after Jurassic Park and this movie had a very limited budget of about 18 million dollars and Yes, well CG is new. They didn't have the Jurassic Park budget to back it up So it doesn't look great. It has aged horribly and it was kind of cheesy then but now let's take a look at the new Movie the special effects are awesome I would say they're on par with your average blockbuster film the particle effects look gorgeous the fire in the ice in particular Fantastic the CG characters are good enough the overall effects and they hold up And I think these are gonna age a lot better than the original film So this round is gonna go hands-down to the brand new movie. They score with special effects Okay, let's talk about the combat which is probably the main reason anybody played the games to begin with And it's really interested in the movie is all about the martial arts in the fighting We have the 1995 film that really featured actors learning choreograph moves for the movie Whereas this time around they're martial artists that can act and then they're martial artists first So there's a big difference in fighting capabilities. So to crown a victor of this round I have to give it another draw mainly because both films do such a great job Staying within their own lane and the fighting and the action in the choreography Totally fit within the context of what they said Okay, the cast I'm gonna have to condense my thoughts here because I could easily talk for an hour just on this alone For the most part both films to the great job at saying faithful to the characters of the games You have the first movie from 1995 that pretty much sticks to the cast of the first game The main characters with Katana and a cameo by Jacks drawn in and it fits really well within that Those actors completely carry the film. There's great chemistry between the leads We have a very charismatic villain and shing sung played by Kerry who you get to gawa whose presence Felt in every scene that he's in and then we have the animatronic Goro, which even though he's a machine He's got a personality that comes across. He's pretty badass and he's a really fun character Now this new film does a pretty good job with the lead characters You know Sonya Jacks Scorpion some zero very faithful for the most part to their video game counterparts And then we have Kano who while I feel that the casting was better in the original film This Kano does a lot to carry the weight of this movie and he does provide Appropriate comic relief even as dark and gritty when it is he does provide some fun for this film and this film I think handles this characters of scorpions of zero fantastically whereas in the 1995 film They're pretty much, you know, just push off the side as henchmen characters and in the mythos of Mortal Kombat Their story is a huge part of the background and we see that here So we see them as human beings are not just palette swapped characters of each other They have their own personalities their conflict comes across and it carries a lot of the emotional weight of the film So I think scorpions of zero were fantastically represented in this movie, but the villains of Shang Tsung and Goro I was a little bit disappointed in actor Chin Han does a great job at portraying Shang Tsung But he doesn't have the presence. He doesn't we don't see him really do anything He's more of a sideline character He barks orders and observes, but he really doesn't do much here compared to what they you know in the first film And in Goro was in my opinion. He looked great, but he was a disappointment He kind of felt like they just threw him in there as another henchman So he didn't have the weight neither the main villains had the weight that they had in the original film Where the first movie kept to the cast of the first game this time around we have kind of a hand-pick Selection of characters from Mortal Kombat 1 through 5. So some of them kind of feel out of place They kind of feel weird because where we should be in the story. They're not really coming into play yet in those forms So it kind of felt like a lot of those characters were shoehorned in there Even though there are some fun nods to other characters we didn't get to see so there's fan service But sometimes I think they went a little bit too far with the fan service to include characters That didn't necessarily need to be in there and this includes Cole Young He's a brand-new character and he serves as the connection for the audience and he's the main character of the story Which is a weird choice because in a world of Mortal Kombat where you have a plethora of characters to choose from Why make a brand-new one and I know the director said that the whole idea was to give an audience Connection to a character who learned and we got to learn along with them the whole rules of the tournament I get that that's valid, but they did that with the first movie with Johnny Cajun, Sonya We learned through them and there's enough characters to choose from we could have done that with so might not have been that Necessary to create a whole new character, but that being said The character felt underdeveloped. He didn't have a whole lot of weight that he carried it for being the main lead It was a little bit bland of a character, but he's got potential and I would like to see him flesh out And maybe even see him show up in some future games Sadly characters like Natara, Molina, Raco, Cabal, Reptile, and even again Goro were just dropped in this henchman And they really feel the role and they completely feel like they were just there for expendable characters Which just flies too close to Mortal Kombat in isolation So when it comes to the cast the victory has to go to the original 95 film because even though they had less to work With that it was solid They stayed within the context the characters felt fully developed whereas this time around we had some really well Developed characters, then we had a whole bunch that were just kind of there taking up space We're just used as expendable characters, and I think it kind of weighs it down because of that Locations, okay This is one of my bigger gripes of the film too to be quite blunt The locations of the new film are dull and bland the first movie takes place on an exotic island just like the video game and They built these fantastic set pieces even on the limited budget and those set pieces feel like they came from the Universe of the game you can go into just about any single fight in that first movie and take a screenshot And it looks like it was ripped right for Mortal Kombat this time around the movie was filmed in Australia And it looks like it was filmed in Australia, and absolutely no disrespect to Australia I love you guys, but you don't look like outworld it doesn't feel like Shang Tsung Island And at no point did the set pieces really feel like they came out of that Mortal Kombat universe Most of the fights take place in rocks Desert or dirt they do change it up sometimes You know we do get a trailer park we get some urban settings and we get a mobile home bathroom because that was everybody's favorite level from the game Right, and then there was one fight one scene that did take place in the Mortal Kombat Environment, and it was the pit. I saw it come on screen. I was like, oh, okay. There we go It felt like Mortal Kombat. It looked great beautifully designed. It had the whole you know the pit with the spikes in it I was excited. I'm like, okay. Here we go Mortal Kombat, but they didn't use the pit They had a fight on it and they did a fatality, but nobody went down the pit And that just seems like a weird choice because that's the whole gimmick of that level in the game Is that at the end of the the loser gets knocked down into the pit And they didn't even do that although the last scene with the frozen MMA ring was it was a nice touch So overall locations the victor hands down Mortal Kombat one because it just feels and looks like Mortal Kombat This looks like Mortal Kombat in Australia When it comes to the music, I think that both films have great soundtracks that fit within their context That first film no one can deny that when you hear that Mortal Kombat yelled out with the New Line Simon logo and then we saw the metal Mortal Kombat logo in the fire and the electronic dance music kicking in with techno syndrome It was an experience in itself and it set the tone for the movie and that whole first movie's got like a rave You know the electronic dance music vibe, but it worked for it at its time That's not appropriate for this film. This film has more of a traditional score, which fits it much better You know, it carries the emotion better. It sets the tone better because the movie is darker and it's grittier But that being said though, they still pay homage and respect to the the techno syndrome original MK song and We get a whole new pretty cool remix version for the end credits and you hear a little hints of it throughout the score So I think both films did a tremendous job with the music But even that being said I still have to crown winner of the original film because the music was so iconic in that Original movie is that it was almost a character in its own right Okay, so in a nutshell Mortal Kombat 2021 Overall, I think it's a pretty fun martial arts film. It's got great fight choreography It's got some pretty strong lead characters for the most part. The special effects are really impressive and they're fun to watch So it's still a fun viewing experience But that being said I do feel that it suffers from wasted characters bland scenery And it was a really good effort and I still think it hits the dartboard, but it's more along the outer rim It's just that for those who are Mortal Kombat diehard fans I don't think they get into the midfills enough And there's not quite enough meat there to be satisfying in my opinion when it comes to the story and unfortunately in the end I think it comes down to feeling like what it actually is a Stepping stone to set up a franchise. So when it comes to the victory I have to crown the original 1995 film mainly because I left that theater feeling pumped I was excited. I felt like I'd watched a Mortal Kombat film this time around It was still a fun movie was still a fun experience But I felt like I was watching Mortal Kombat characters in a generic martial arts film It didn't quite capture the same spirit So I have to give that to the first movie for being truer to the source of feeling more like a Mortal Kombat movie But I do still recommend seeing this new one It is a far far cry better than Mortal Kombat Annihilation is by by light years But I just don't think it quite hits the elevation of where the first one hit So what did you guys think of the film if you haven't seen it yet as of the release of this video? It's still available in theaters and also on a premiere on HBO Max until May 23rd And it's my understanding that after that day it'll go away But then come back when it's released for home home release So if you haven't seen it, I do recommend it is still a fun martial arts film But let me know what you think did you agree with my analysis or do you think I'm totally full of it Either way, let me know in the comments down below Thank you guys so much for watching and if you're gonna talk about the plot just put a spoiler alert So just be courteous to others. So thank you so much. We'll see you next time