Mortal Kombat Rebirth

These eyes have seen a lot of love

 

I’m sure all of you out there have been made aware of the rumblings regarding a teaser trailer that appeared on Youtube yesterday of a new Mortal Kombat movie. Actually, it’s a short film in the vein of Batman: Dead End that director Kevin Tanchareon has organized in order to sell WB on the idea of a re-imagining of the film series, which has been dormant since Mortal Kombat Annihilation in 1997. So how does the short (it runs almost 8 minutes) hold up? 

First order is that it is definitely grim and gritty; and this is what we are handed here with Michael Jai White portraying Jax (remember, the dude who had the metal on his arms) interrogating a suspect regarding several other maniacs. Reptile, Baraka, Shang-Tsung and Sub-Zero (who are seen in photographs, but referenced heavily) are featured in case files, with Johnny Cage and Sonya Blade both put in appearances as well, portrayed by martial arts champion Matt Mullins and sci-fi goddess Jeri Ryan. The main impetus is pushing towards a hard “R”-rating for the film, and let’s face it: R-rated movies have fallen a bit in recent years, particularly grim and violent ones. Imagine what would have happened if The Dark Knight had scored that rating and Nolan kept in all the really cool stuff that inevitably got cut? 

Yum Yum eat em up

 

This definitely does not look like a fanmade trailer (just check out the link at the bottom). As good as Batman: Dead End was, there was still an almost-professional quality to that product but at the same time you could tell the limited budget that Sandy Collora was working with, even though he pulled it off remarkably well. Mortal Kombat Rebirth lives up to its name by presenting the MK universe in a realistic urban setting, taking a cue from the way Christopher Nolan shed the camp qualities of Batman and Robin and reinvigorated the series with Batman Begins and in a major way with The Dark Knight. I grew up with the original MK games and movies, and, when video games were big business in the mid-90s, the first Mortal Kombat was probably the most faithful, and most livened of the video game movies that have come out before or since. But Tancharoen recognized that this isn’t the 90s and what was cool twenty years ago, is pretty ridiculous by the standards set by the new kids coming out of Silicon Valley. 

This is just cool just for coolness sake

 

One fact that does lend credence to the possibility that this trailer is more than a short film: there were plans and even a brief production of a third Mortal Kombat film from several years ago. Titled “Devastation”, it got a lot of press writeup with Linden Ashby (who played Johnny Cage in the original film) and Chris Casamassa (Scorpion in the original) expressing interest in returning to the franchise, along with Robin Shue, probably the only man in the world who could do Liu Kang  justice. The last bit of news generated from the Devastation project came from news site Bloody-Disgusting.com in January, when it was reported that Oren Uziel had been tapped to write the script, although Uziel later said in a May interview with G4 that he was not attached to the project, nor had WB contacted him in any way regarding the film. 

"Ice" to see you

 

Are you one of the teeming masses who has yet to see the trailer? Fear not, for you can check it out here at the bottom for all your perusing needs! 

If You Want Blood, You Got It!

There’s always an Elm Street…

I remember sitting in 5th period Journalism in high school, in the back corner with Darby and Thomas and we were discussing slasher villains. It was joked that of the big three (Michael Myers, Jason Voorhees, and Freddy Krueger), Jason would be a metalhead, Freddy’d be into disco, and Michael would be the sophisticate, with his smoking jacket and fez hat shaking his head at the children he gave birth to. I also remember the end of Jason Goes to Hell vividly; it’s the one where it was revealed that this whole time, Jason Voorhees was the product of some demon worm, for those playing the home game. Anyway, at the end of the film, when all is said and done and Jason has been dispatched for the last time (until Jason X), Freddy Krueger’s gloved knife hand pops up out of the ground and, laughing maniacally, grabs Jason’s mask, bringing it down to hell with him. Along with several references to Sam Raimi’s Evil Dead series, this set the peice for not just 2003’s Freddy vs. Jason, but also the immensely popular Freddy vs. Jason vs. Ash comic books from Wildstorm, Dynamite Entertainment, and DC Comics.

What does all of that mean? It means that the stuff nightmares are made of, Freddy, Jason, along with Chucky (Child’s Play), Ghostface (Scream), Michael Myers (Halloween), Ash Williams (Evil Dead/Army of Darkness), Pinhead (Hellraiser), that fiend Dr. Herbert West (Re-Animator) and more come together in a PC-fan game entitled “Terrordrome: Rise of the Bogeymen”. The game’s creators, HUR4C4N, Fabien Rixens, and Mike Tibo, have brought together some of the biggest names names in horror for a Mortal Kombat/Street Fighter style one-on-one fighter (using an engine that looks similar to the polygonal one used for Mortal Kombat 4). In a nod that could only come from fans of the old MK games, the announcer either appears to be an appropriation of the one that shouts “FIGHT!” or it is the same guy.

Is it 1984 yet?

Terrordrome is populated with all your usual fighter moves: grab, punch, kick, and dodge, and also throws in some special goodies that hark back to specific scenes from the films the characters come from. What this means, according to the game’s creators, is that if “You’re an unconditional fan of Japanimation style video game, pose to pose animated characters, and epileptical moves happening in the blink of an eye, you may not be seduced by Terrordrome. The game is more about realistic characters and animations with even more violent and lethal moves than any ninja or karate master!“: in the case of Ash, who is designed according to his classic Army of Darkness look, you have moves that allow him to open up the Necronomicon for Spell (down, right, K), another for use of his shotgun (down, right, S), which can also be augmented with an air shotgun move using the same combination. Sadly, I was not able to use much of Ash’s chainsaw when I was playing, but I am looking in the future to figure out a combo for it so that I could. Leatherface, however, is able to use his fully functional chainsaw for all moves, including the Thunder Saw, which provides some devastating damage that allowed me to dispatch Freddy before he went wormy on me. Each level is also a specific scene from the killers movies, allowing you to chose where you want to do battle. We’ve got Crystal Lake, Elm Street, even the old Myers place in Haddonfield puts in an appearance.

Good, evil, undead, it don't matter, as long as I'm the guy with the gun

What also makes the game ideal, besides the plethora of slasher/serial killer legends, is that the game is free for download. Yes, that means that all it takes is just the click of a button, cleaning out the 4gb’s of porn that you probably have to make room, and then downloading Terrordome to start enacting all the ideas you’ve written down for fanfictions; wanna have Maniac Cop take on Candyman? It can happen. Jason in his many different looks beat the crap out of Chucky? You got it. While there is no definite storyline, it’s probably appropriate; I mean, what slasher film has ever had a clear, cleanly defined storyline in their series? After all, Jason’s made it through ten sequels and a remake without anyone knowing what the heck’s going on. In effect, by taking out that pesky element, that leaves the gorehound to sit back and enjoy the fights without anything in between.

Shapes and Masks

Check out the game site for more news and for the free download. Not sold yet on whether you wanna play? Take a look at the bottom for a sample clip.