By and large, the reaction to Mortal Kombat II has been much more positive than its 2021 predecessor. The movie’s fights are fun, bloody, and campy, and, for better or worse, it sidesteps the first movie’s original protagonist to focus on the characters people know and love from the games. Why is the sequel landing better than its more divisive predecessor? Well, it sounds like this time around, the folks at NetherRealm were much more involved.
This might not come as a huge surprise to anyone who’s already seen the movie. Series co-creator Ed Boon even appears in the film as a bartender early on. But in an interview with Forbes, Mortal Kombat II writer Jeremy Slater explained the more collaborative approach at length. He said the team working on the sequel wanted to “rectify” having not had the NetherRealm developers weighing in more on the first film, including both Boon and writer Dominic Cianciolo, who this time around read every draft of the new script and offered notes.
Slater said:
You can go on Wikipedia and ask, “What are the most popular stages? What are the best finishing moves,” but it’s so different to be able to go directly to the horse’s mouth, the guy who has been interacting with the fan base for 34 years, and say, “What is the one stage the fans have always asked to see in a movie? What are the finishing moves that would get the theater on its feet and screaming?”
We always had this sort of cheat sheet available anytime we had questions about the lore and mythology. Ed and Dominic were the best creative partners you could ask for through the entire process. They were so supportive. I think they’re so proud of the movie and happy to see the fan base reacting the way it is. My dream is that they will be this creatively involved with every installment of Mortal Kombat going forward because they are the lifeblood of what we’re doing here.
It’s good to hear that one video game adaptation is treating the original creatives like they’re an important part of the whole process. Adaptations can live or die by how well they capture the spirit of whatever it is they’re pulling from, and having people who worked on the original story is an obvious way to try to pull that off. However, even as video game adaptations are becoming more common, that collaboration with the developers isn’t always the case. Larian Studios was vocal about how it isn’t involved in HBO’s upcoming Baldur’s Gate show, which was met with pushback both from fans and the developers themselves.
“Only hope is that [Larian’s writers] get both the credit deserved & the characters are represented at the same level as the game,” Larian publishing director Michael Douse said in February. “I genuinely don’t think anyone can trump our writers. Our stories are built by fierce camaraderie and resolve. I have watched them write and write and write and, through respect for audience & material, come up with some of the finest shit I have ever played. I hope TV allows for the same thoroughness. Don’t abandon hope, but do expect the world. That’s the job.”
Slayter is set to return for a third Mortal Kombat film, so hopefully Boon and Cianciolo will also be along for the ride.