Shao Kahn Crushes His Foes in Fantastical New Mortal Kombat Episode

[Logan Westbrook]

Shao Kahn Crushes His Foes in Fantastical New Mortal Kombat Episode

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You don't need guns or cyborgs to take over a realm, not when you've got an army of blade-armed monsters.

The world of Mortal Kombat isn't just cops and movies stars; heck, it isn't even just one world. The latest episode of web series, Mortal Kombat: Legacy sloughs off the humdrum familiarity of Earthrealm, and instead heads to the picturesque realm of Edenia. Well, it starts off picturesque, but then Shao Kahn's armies arrive and everything very quickly goes to hell.

This episode is the first proper foray into the more mystical and magical elements of Mortal Kombat. It shows both how Shao Kahn became ruler of Edenia, and reveals the back story for Kitana and Mileena. The episode clearly assumes that you have no prior knowledge of the Mortal Kombat lore - not a bad position to take when you're rebooting a franchise - so is rather exposition heavy. Unfortunately for fisticuffs fans, it means that there's a lot of talking and not a great deal of fighting. There's also a few interesting changes, too: Shao Kahn - played by Alecks Paunovic - isn't wearing his usual helmet, so you can't tell who he is at first, and Baraka isn't quite as toothy as he is in the game, presumably because actor Fraser Aitcheson doesn't have a freakishly large mouth.

Mortal Kombat: Legacy is proving to be an interesting series, because there's so much variety in the content. The first two episodes seemed to take the straight action movie route, but then the third episode went in a different direction with the documentary footage and the sharper focus on Johnny Cage's character. Now, this new episode has done something different again, with animated sections and a focus on storytelling. What will be really interesting though, is how director - and often, writer - Kevin Tancharoen is going to bring all these different elements together at the end of the series.

Source: Machinima [http://www.machinima.com]



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[manythings]

Sucks for Edena, I guess. The animation/live action change up seems like an odd choice.

 

[Aiddon_v1legacy]

well, that was weird. Can't say the director can't mix things up, even if the animated scenes look like something straight out of something on NewGrounds

 

[War-hamster]

While I do like the series, this is still the classic mortal kombat everyone knows and loves. I was hoping they would go for a realistic approach this time like they showed in "rebirth"
Still a cool episode.

Edit: It's Mortal Kombat, not Combat. When will I learn?

 

[Yossarian1507]

This episode reminded me, why I was all for the 'Mortal Kombat, real world, no fantasy/sf bullcrap' idea. The ep was fine, but God damn it, that Edenia subplot is so dumb.

Also, here's hope, that we'll see a storyline soon enough. For now it's just a character exposition. This is supposed to have 12 episodes (or so I heard), and out of four available, at least 2 (and due to 'to be continued', probably 3) are a waste of space. Enjoyable waste of space, but still...

 

[JWRosser]

Not sure if I liked the arty-style back story. Or, no, not that I didn't like it, as such, but I think it's a bit odd to include it in the fourth episode and none others.

I mean, I'm not sure if there's a different director for each episode, but it's all the same series, so it should use the same conventions, I think. Like the first two episodes were very much linear, quick shots, cutting to different scenes etc, whereas the Johnny Cage episode used the whole E!-style documentary, and then this one uses images? Hmm...

Still, was interesting to see the new characters. Even though Shao Kahn is known for his skull helmet, I think they made the right choice in excluding it, or else it can look a bit silly.

[http://img830.imageshack.us/i/220pxshaokahnannihaltio.png/]

Milenna is one of my favourite characters as she is so fucked up, so I just hope they get it right.


Personally, I think that, in the end, these episodes should be converted into 45 mins - hour long episodes, as opposed to a film.

 

[Verkula]

Damnit, i was hoping to see an accurate Shao Kahn that looks just like in the game. But nope again.
Meh, maybe next time.

 

[evilstonermonkey]

Hmm... Not sure if I like the animation... Ah well. I am enjoying this series so far. My only real complaint so far is that Baraka lloks like he's come straight off the set of Lord of the Rings. I'm looking forward to Scorpion and Sub Zero being introduced too, and wondering if Kabal will be anywhere.

 

[Soxafloppin]

Damnit, i was hoping to see an accurate Shao Kahn that looks just like in the game. But nope again.
Meh, maybe next time.

Watch Mortal Kombat: Conquest, the TV show from the 90's. He was awesome in that.

Im loving this series but this is the worst episode so far, Baraka looks like a generic LOTR Orc, and Shao Kahn looks awful

 

[David Bray]

Awful, awful, awful episode. I think i'll give it til 6 then give up. Hopefully, it will win me around

 

[ANImaniac89]

it was not the best, I'm starting to get worried every episode since 2 seems to be going down in quality. I'll keep watching but I'm still worried.
Also Kahn should have had his skull mask
they really fucked up on Baraka, he looked nothing the he does in the games. Granted he looks better then he did in Annihilation but that not saying much.

I did kind of like the animated parts.

 

[-Samurai-]

Wait wait wait wait wait wait wait. What happened to awesome dread-locked failed surgeon Baraka that used Capoeira?

I'm officially done with this series. I really hoped it would be different.

 

[mindlesspuppet]

I thought this episode was terrible. It's like the first two episode were going off the "Rebirth" trailer and episodes 3 & 4 are trash that Warner Brothers wanted.

 

[capacollo]

Don't think you could have a MK without the mystical aspect side of it. It would be interesting though if this was the direction the director/writer wanted or the studio because in Rebirth Barack's back story was more "real world".

In any case I liked it and didn't mind the different art style they did. Again curious to see if it was more of a budget issue or just a creative decision.

 

[Scarim Coral]

I thought the animated parts were cool, sort of like motion comic book like. I wonder how this will tie in with the live action part.