It appears that videogame movies are having another attempt at a resurgence, what with 2016 seeing Warcraft and The Angry Birds Movie, and Assassin’s Creed and Resident Evil: The Final Chapter due out next year. Now, we can add Mortal Kombat to this list, as its reboot now has a director in the form of Simon McQuoid.
If you haven’t heard of him then it’s probably understandable – this will be his feature-film debut, having cut his teeth on a number of advertisements (mainly for videogames), and we’re sure he’ll be chomping at the bit. In any case, he must have something about him for Warner Bros to display this level of faith in him.
This marks the latest instalment in a series that in addition to its many videogames has numbered two films (Paul WS Anderson’s Mortal Kombat in 1995 and John R Leonetti’s Mortal Kombat: Annihilation in 1997), 1996 animated children’s TV series Mortal Kombat: Defenders Of The Realm, and live-action web series Mortal Kombat: Rebirth in 2011, which was in turn inspired by Kevin Tancharoen’s 2010 short movie of the same name.
Clearly, McQuoid has a big challenge on his hands. In the pantheon of videogame adaptations, it can be argued that Mortal Kombat has actually been one of the better examples in terms of quality (if we ignore the widely panned Annihilation).
Sure, no videogame movie has actually won the distinction of being unambiguously classed as ‘good’, but we saw enough positive signs in Warcraft and notice enough potential in Assassin’s Creed to hope that this moment isn’t too far off. While our hopes aren’t exactly sky-high for this, we will keep our fingers and toes crossed nonetheless.
A release date for the new Mortal Kombat movie is yet to be announced. For all the latest movie news, pick up the new issue of SciFiNow.
