Mortal Kombat writer promises R-rating, ample chances for characters to "finish him"

Once upon a time, the only way weirdo kids could only see violence onscreen was by sneaking into movies or playing Mortal Kombat, the video game that kept your terrified parents up at night. It’s nostalgic, honestly, to remember the days we huddled in the basement of our friend with the coolest parents, all gathering around a 15-inch TV to watch Sub-Zero rip out Scoprion’s spine. Well, we hope Joe Taslim’s been practicing, because the upcoming Mortal Kombat reboot will not only be R-rated, but will also feature the game’s signature fatalities.

“Since it’s already been stated by other members of the team, I’m gonna put this one to bed,” tweeted screenwriter Greg Russo. “MK WILL be R-Rated and for the first time EVER, FATALITIES will FINALLY be on the big screen (and no I’m not gonna say which ones). You’ll just have to wait for the movie & see!!! ;).”

The ‘90s Mortal Kombat films were famously light on gore and heavy on lore, which disappointed more than a few fans of the game. Of course, people still cared about shielding their children from gore back then; nowadays, you might as well introduce pre-teens to the joys of Dead Alive, lest they turn towards LiveLeak instead.

There’s not much out there about Russo and director Simon McQuoid’s vision for the reboot, but producer Todd Garner made it clear in a recent Collider Live interview that they’re not remaking the 1995 adaptation or adhering the plot of this year’s Mortal Kombat 11. “[T]here’s been a whole universe. It’s like comic books,” he said. “So we’re going back and looking at some of the older storylines and some of the mythology, being very very very very aware of each character’s origin, their nationality, being very sensitive to that, being authentic to that.” He also says the movie could incorporate characters from an as-yet-released game in the franchise.

Anyways, here’s some fatalities we’d like to see:

• Cyrax chewing bodies up in his chest-hole
• Mileena spittin’ bones
• Jax smooshing people’s arms into their bodies
• Shang Tsung stealing your soul, turning you into goo
• Bo Rai Cho farting
• Anything Sindel-related

Mortal Kombat will get over here on March 5, 2021.

[via EW]