Mortal Kombat: Conquest (1998 – 1999)
People might not be familiar with this particular series, but they definitely know the property. Mortal Kombat 11 just recently came out not too long ago… ELEVEN. And there have been a number of live-action and animated movie adaptations as well.
Fixing this is simple: Better choreography and more violence. Throw in some well-deserved graphics for the finishing moves and powers as well.
The sin of all past live-action Mortal Kombat attempts (excluding maybe the gritty attempt at a reboot on YouTube that had Michael Jai White cast in it — I still want that version) is that they tried to make them for a general audience instead of embracing an “R” or “TV-MA” rating.
People who play those games are looking for violence and blood and dope martial arts. Give them that!
I don’t think people really care about the stories here (although the lore is expansive enough that it could be interesting to seriously play with), but they do want the fights to be amazing and the violence to be entertainingly brutal.
Mortal Kombat isn’t a series for kids… Or at least, it shouldn’t be. Any showrunner who really understood the source material would understand that.