When the fighting happens, as with the acting, it's competent, but that still ends up being a bit of a letdown. If you don't enjoy Kano's swagger, you'll at least get a kick out of Mortal Kombat's actors finding moments to drop series lines like "flawless victory" and "get over here!" which are exactly as dumb as you'd expect in a movie that otherwise tries to play it straight. He keeps the first half of the film fun and breezy in between fight scenes. Actor Josh Lawson plays up Kano's brash, obnoxious asshole persona so well he makes everyone else look flat by comparison. Kano is the reason I laughed with Mortal Kombat more than I laughed at it.
I appreciate that it wastes little time, not unlike the story modes of the last few games. After the first half hour, which eases Cole and other Earthrealm normies Jax, Sonya and Kano into the wider world of Mortal Kombat's magic and monsters, the sketch of a plot pretty much just jumps from one excuse for a fight to the next. Still, thin as they are, there's a real pleasure in seeing characters I've known for 20-plus years put on screen and acted competently, even when what's happening doesn't make much sense.
It's only been a couple hours and I've already forgotten their names. In a better action movie, Cole's family would have enough screen time for us to get to know and care about them, but here they exist purely as motivation fodder. (I could've told you that and saved you the training montage, Cole!) That justification is fine, but as with most of its other characters, Mortal Kombat's script is doing only the bare minimum to make its fighters feel like people instead of stuntmen. Mortal Kombat relies on the usual character beats you expect from an unlikely hero story: Cole struggles to unleash his true fighting potential until he finally realizes that the key all along was his love for his family.
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