Mortal Kombat 2 director explains why some kombatants had to die
Image: Warner Bros. Pictures/Everett Collection
Mortal Kombat is synonymous with death. Dozens of characters have met their doom in the video games from the series’ grisly signature Fatalities. The body count in 2021’s Mortal Kombat movie reboot featured a handful of shocking deaths, some of which were undone by this year’s sequel. While some fans certainly saw the fate of certain characters coming, there were still a few surprise deaths in Mortal Kombat 2. And maybe even one that some fans felt a little bad about in hindsight.
Speaking with Mortal Kombat 2 director Simon McQuoid ahead of the film’s Blu-ray release, he told Polygon that he and screenwriter Jeremy Slater wanted to keep audiences surprised — even if they saw a certain character’s death coming a mile away.
[Warning: The following story contains spoilers for Mortal Kombat 2.]
„We went into the story development of Mortal Kombat 2 with the approach [that], all through the film, we wanted the audience to feel like anyone could die at any point,” McQuoid said. „We didn’t want it just to feel like, Well, we expected them to die, we expected them to die… And we couldn’t not have people die. I mean, it’s Mortal Kombat, right?”
McQuoid said that Mortal Kombat 2 had an actual bracket of who faced whom, and who was going to perish. „It was like the World Cup,” he said. „It was actually quite a process to work through, but I always had to go back to this idea of Let’s keep every fight really surprising. It wasn’t just about who dies, but it’s also where [the fight is set], who they’re fighting against, and where it arrives in the film.”
McQuoid said that the fight between Liu Kang and Kung Lao, which takes place on a set modeled after the Blue Portal stage from Mortal Kombat 2 (the video game) was designed to deliver on that kind of surprise. It was crafted, he said, to be „very symmetrical, stylistically” and arrive and the midpoint of the film. But before that, there was a shocking, fan-service-focused death.
The death of Cole Young
„There was this sort of idea that anything’s up for grabs and what better way to show that than to have Cole Young (Lewis Tan) die early on,” McQuoid said. „It was an attempt to keep the stakes high and keep the tension ratcheted up so you feel like, ‘Wow. OK. So, anyone’s up to go out now.'”
Cole’s death in Mortal Kombat 2 was gruesome and unquestionably final — or as final as anything is in the Mortal Kombat franchise. It also seemed inevitable after Mortal Kombat fans turned up their noses at adding a totally new character to the franchise. So I asked McQuoid what the conversations were like between him and Tan when the Mortal Kombat newcomer’s fate was sealed.
„Lewis, he was great. He’s an incredibly talented martial arts actor, just phenomenal,” McQuoid said. „He’s like a Formula One car, that guy. There were conversations that we had [about Cole’s death, and] he was great about it. He understood why we were doing it, the spirit of all that and he was tremendous. All the actors understood that they were part of this bigger story, and what was required to tell that story.”
Image: New Line Cinema/Warner Bros. Picture
McQuoid likened the cast of Mortal Kombat 2 to a sporting team, where he’d explain to them, „You’re not gonna get as many minutes this game, but don’t worry, we’ve got plans [for you], things I can’t really talk about.”
Whether that means Cole Young might come back to the Mortal Kombat franchise for a third film or not, McQuoid didn’t say. But fans have been imagining ways for him to be revived, possibly as a more established Mortal Kombat character like Kenshi or Meat. In the realm of Mortal Kombat, anything is possible, especially when you have a necromancer on your team.
Mortal Kombat 2 is available to rent and buy digitally, and will be released on 4K UHD and Blu-ray on July 28.
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