Mortal Kombat - Annihilation (DVD 1999)

At the end of the first film, Liu Kang had defeated Shang Tsung and Earthrealm had narrowly been saved - until the sorcerer's master, Shao Kahn opened a portal to Earth and claimed the realm as his own. The first film is much more clearly defined plot wise than the second; indeed the second film only really makes consistent sense if the viewer already has knowledge of the Mortal Kombat universe. It can certainly be viewed as a superior action film to the first, although plot and dialogue wise it is distinctly lacking.

Cary Hiroyuki Tagawa's portrayl of Shang Tsung had a certain brooding majesty and dark danger about it, whereas Brain Thompson's Shao Kahn is distinctly Looney Tunes particularly given the oversized hammer that he poses with for most of the film. When Shao Kahn uses Shinnok's own admonishment on Rain before he kills him, the only real sense we get of Kahn is of a daddy's boy with inadequacy issues - not the sort of man you could imagine being Shang Tsung's superior. Not only Kahn suffers however. Many of the actors who proved their mettle in the first film are let down with poor scripting in the second. The romantic moments between Liu Kang and Kitana feel forced with Talisa Soto, who did a sterling job as the exotic and mysterious princess in the first film, feeling a little awkward and lost in the second. None suffer quite so badly from poor dialogue as Shao Kahn and Sindel. Their cartoon dimensions coupled with cringeworthy speeches make the power couple of Outworld laughable. Kahn does enjoy some clever one liners when fighting Raiden and Liu Kang, but they are lost amidst the sea of dross.

Sonya feels a lot more at home who coupled with Jax seem to make the most sense in this predominantly action film given their special forces history. Whilst it would have been good to see a little more of a mission driven Jax, the verbal sparring and fondness the characters share work well although it would have been interesting to see how Johnny Cage and Sonya's reaction to the merger would have brought the two into conflict once more and how their romance would have developed. As it is, the film does a good job of developing the two special forces agents given it's overriding action bias. Christopher Lambert's strong yet understated Raiden is replaced by the much more vocal James Remar. He again seems to suffer almost as much as Kahn, with his dialogue appearing trite, his very occasional attempts at humour missing the mark and his action scenes pointless. Cameos from characters are either understated, like Baraka and Sheeva or just plain unnecessary and uncomfortable, like Nightwolf.

Fans of the game will however be able to more than fill the plot holes with their knowledge of the game universe. In many ways it feels like the film has been made exclusively for Mortal Kombat fans, who need only the barest of intoductions to the plot before the action gets underway. The inclusion of animalities are pointless except for those who have played the game series and forcing as many characters in as possible seems to just be a head count exercise for fans rather than for justifiable plot reasons. If you can ignore the heinous interpretation of Kahn and the hammy writing, you get some superb action sequences that elaborate on the first film with weapons and fatalities that are instantly recognisable.