Mortal Kombat seems to have been received positively enough by the majority of fans, and while it has now dropped to "rotten" on RT, it hasn't been hit with the critical mauling many of us expected.
It remains to be seen how well it does at the box office (and on HBO Max), but with a relatively modest budget, it shouldn't need to do massive numbers in order to convince Warner Bros. to green light a sequel.
While speaking to Collider, writer Greg Russo revealed that he always envisioned the story playing out as a trilogy.
"Movie one, we were always kind of setting this up as — well I was setting it up, it's basically in my head — I always saw [movie one] as pre-tournament, then [movie two is] hopefully tournament, then [movie three is] post-tournament. So the idea was that this was going to be a pre-tournament movie that would hopefully sow the seeds for the tournament, the final."
Russo is hopeful that he will get to work on more MK movies, and introduce some fan-favorite characters that were absent from the first film. Of course, right at the top of that list is Johnny Cage, who's debut is teased in the final shot.
"Johnny's tease at the end, the button, it changed different ways," the writer explains. "I remember there were different versions of it. That poster was something that the design team did, which I love. I picked 'Citizen Cage' 'cause I just thought that was hilarious. 'Fight For Your Rights.' So I picked that and put it in the script and then they designed an amazing poster. And then it had lived in other places, so it actually wasn't the button for a while, it was earlier in the story, like they were walking and you just see it in the background. And we felt like that just wasn't enough, 'cause you wanted to really hit on it."
"I remember there was a version for the end where they actually went to the lot," he continues. "So Cole and Sonya went to the studio lot. I forget what it even was, they pulled up, and they were going to the meeting. It was gonna be shot at Warner Brothers. But it just felt like, with the pandemic and everything, it got to a point where it was hard to do a lot of that. I love the way that it buttons and it's simple. And yeah, hopefully we can tell more of those stories."
So, does this mean Cage was actually cast? No - which is why we only see him from the waist down on that poster!
What did you guys think of Mortal Kombat? Would you like to see a sequel? If so, who do you think would make a good Johnny Cage?