#batman: he did get speared straight through but we fixed it

[confessedlyfannish]

DP x DC Writing Prompt #5

Damian does not glance back at Bruce when he knocks on the door. Instead they both wait in silence.

After a moment, the door opens.

"Hello," Jasmine, Jazz, Fenton greets politely, unsurprised to find the Waynes on her doorstep. Damian's expression grows ever darker at this revelation.

"Hello Ms. Fenton, are your parents home?" Bruce asks, placing a firm hand on Damian's shoulder, to ground as much as to restrain. To his credit he does not shake it off.

"No, they're out of town for a conference," the eighteen year-old says, opening the door wider. "But I think you'd better come in."

Bruce would normally decline, but Ms. Fenton is a legal adult and he has already, even unknowingly, waited 16 years. Damian makes the choice for him, striding past the threshold.

"Please take a seat," Jazz says as she leads them to the living room. She ignores Damian's swinging head as he takes in the home. It is deceptively large, a 90s style house filled with modern furniture. The walls are bright, with purple and green accents that would normally feel garish but somehow work. The stairs leading to the second floor are lined with family photos that Bruce yearns to take a closer look at. "Can I get you anything? Coffee? Water?"

"No, that's alright, thank you," Bruce says, taking a seat on the long plush couch. A men's windbreaker lies haphazardly thrown across one of the arms. A closed container of Oreo cookies sit on the coffee table next to a physics textbook open to chapter 16, half covered in highlighter and filled with sticky notes. There's a child's painting framed next to the tv, a handprint made to look like a thanksgiving turkey in bright blue.

For the home of experimental scientists, it is cozy and well lived-in.

Damian repeatedly glances at the stairs through the doorway.

Bruce clears his throat. "We were hoping to--"

"I've texted--oh, I'm sorry," Jazz says, having spoken at the same time. Bruce gestures for her to go on.

"I've contacted Danny, he should be here soon. He was out with some friends." Jazz explains. As she hadn't pulled out a phone in their presence, Bruce can only deduce they have some sort of camera at their front door. This also explains Ms. Fenton's complete lack of surprise at their appearance.

"So you know who we are." Damian says, the first words he's spoken since they arrived at the house and the longest sentence he's spoken since they arrived in Amity Park.

"I do," Jazz says, calm in the face of Damian's clearly simmering anger. Bruce trusts him not to attack Ms. Fenton, but he still watches him carefully.

"He told you about me," Damian says. It is the same question, but it is also not.

"He did," Jazz says.

Damian swallows. "I see," he grits out.

Jazz's neutrality slips and her face softens in sympathy. "Damian," she starts hesitantly, but before she can say anything else the front door opens.

A moment later Bruce's son walks through the doorway, and Damian is on him.

This is what Bruce hoped to prevent, but despite his numerous checks of Damian's luggage his son has still managed to smuggle a small dagger, which he now produces and swings in a calculated arc at Daniel Fenton's jugular.

Danny dodges cleanly, and dodges every swipe thereafter in a manner that speaks to continued practice long after his time at the League. Damian is a perfect product of his training, but it is up against Danny his flaws come to light. He is just as good as he always was, but Danny is better.

In a matter of seconds Damian grows frustrated and sloppy in his attacks, completely atypical for him. Danny takes Damian out at the knees and pins him down with one arm, pressing his face into the carpet.

"Calm down," he orders. His voice is deeper than Damian's at sixteen to his twelve, the accent that still traces Damian's words completely gone from his speech. Damian growls and thrusts his head back into Danny's face, meeting it with a sharp thunk. He rolls up as Danny recoils, putting distance between them. Danny glares at him from several steps away, hand to his forehead. Damian tosses the dagger into his other hand as he charges, and to Bruce's surprise Danny does nothing more than turn his face to the side, allowing Damian to draw a sharp line down his cheek.

Damian stops dead in his tracks.

"Are you done?" Danny asks, blood beginning to pool at the seam of the cut.

Damian's expression is stricken, eyes stuck on the blood starting to drip down his brother's face.

"I said, are you done, Damian?" Danny asks. His voice is cold.

Damian hears him this time, and he flushes red. "I--you--"

Danny sighs. He looks at Jazz, whose expression is back to carefully controlled.

"Are you alright?" he asks her. She nods.

"You left me," Damian accuses, standing there holding his bloody dagger limply.

Danny turns back to him, raising an eyebrow.

"You left me," Damian repeats louder, rapidly blinking.

"Yes. I did." Danny provides no excuse nor any explanation. His stance is unyielding.

Damian's eyes bounce wildly, shifting to Jazz and Danny slides smoothly in front of her, protectively. He looks at Damian warily, not as if he is his brother, but as if he is a danger. Damian flinches.

Hope is the last to die, Bruce thinks, watching as that last bit of hope Damian had is extinguished, the knowledge working its way through every inch of his body like ice in his veins. His eyes darken. He turns and runs from the room, the front door slamming shut not a moment later.

Jazz stands up, pulling a few tissues from the box on the coffee table. She presses them to Danny's face, cupping his cheek until he holds it himself. "I'm going to go get the first aid kit," she says gently. It is a thinly veiled excuse to leave them alone, and Bruce is grateful for it as she heads for the stairs.

They both wait until her footsteps have faded, taking each other in. Bruce looks at his mother's eyes and the sharp turn of Talia's nose. Damian's everything, four years older.

"You shouldn't have come here," Danny says, throwing himself on the armchair Jazz has just vacated.

"You know who I am," Bruce says carefully.

Danny glares. "I've kept your secret. She nor my parents know."

"I know," Bruce says. "That's not what I meant. You know who I am. And who I pretend to be. So you know I am familiar with masks."

"And?" Danny asks, looking vaguely bored.

"And so I can recognize when someone is wearing one. Damian will too, once he's calmed down."

Danny's expression sharpens. "No, he won't. Because you are going to go to back to whatever bed and breakfast you're staying in, pack up, hop in your private jet and fly him back to Gotham immediately before the League realizes you've gone. If they haven't already," he mutters.

"This is about the League then," Bruce says. "Do you not believe I can protect you?"

"I don't need your protection," Danny snaps, and watches Bruce actively extrapolate with a dawning resignation. "So this is the World's Greatest Detective at work," he says, slumping bonelessly into his chair, the first teenager-y thing he's done.

"Damian's in danger from the League," Bruce says. Danny glares from his slump. It's almost cute. "And as long as the League doesn't know about you, he's safe."

"Draw your own conclusions," Danny says, baring his teeth. Damian often makes the same face. "As long as you leave."

"I can protect him. I can protect you both," Bruce says. "Let me help you."

Danny closes his eyes. He centers his breathing in an exercise someone has clearly walked him through in the past. Bruce would bet money on the adoptive sister waiting patiently upstairs.

"Mr. Wayne. You are not my father," he says. "My trust in you extends to the point that I left Damian in your care, but that is where it ends. And that was when it was sanctioned by the League. By coming here you have endangered those sanctions."

Bruce disregards the sting, doubling down on his analysis. Talia had left Damian with Bruce well after Danny had left the League. But Danny speaks as if the decision had been his.

Or perhaps, Bruce realizes, it is not that Danny decided upon it, but that Danny allowed it to continue.

Bruce takes a second to review what Oracle had gone over with him before they left for Amity. Daniel Fenton had by all accounts, since leaving the League, lived a fairly normal life. His adoptive parents were eccentric scientists dabbling in the occult but their findings that bordered pseudoscience circulated a very niche community of like-minded eccentrics. The bulk of their income came from alternative energy, a more viable source of study that they'd veered harder into in the past year or so, a government contract with the EPA currently in the works. This had in part funded a vacation to an all-inclusive resort the family had taken that past summer.

Danny received average grades in school, above average in science and mathematics, declining sharply in his freshman year and sophomore year before evening out around the second semester. He had gotten into fights repeatedly with one student in particular, suspended for two weeks following an incident that resulted in a the student receiving a black eye. Teachers reported him to be highly intelligent but distracted and removed. They had recommended he be evaluated for an attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder. He had no social media. He had missed multiple picture days. The ones he had attended he was sneezing, or a blur of movement, even going so far as to fall off his stool, legs flailing. Bruce had drank up every last one as Barbara had waited patiently.

A normal life. A family vacation to Bermuda. Average grades.

His freshman year, distracted and removed. The same year Damian had arrived at Bruce's home. Masks upon masks.

"You have informants within the League," Bruce says. Danny, to his credit, has no discernible tell. But there is no other explanation. "What will you do, if they find out you are alive?"

"That is none of your concern," Danny says, but he might as well be saying whatever I have to.

He never stopped practicing, after all.

"If they go after Damian, it is my concern."

"And that is why you need to take Damian back to Gotham before they do." Danny says. "I will take care of it."

Damian had barely spoken since he had realized Danyal was alive. But Bruce had seen the reverence in his eyes as he looked at the file.

"الوريث الصحيح" he had murmured. The rightful heir.

"You are proposing going after the entirety of the League with no backup," Bruce says. "Even if you think they won't kill you, you won't win either."

"Maybe they will," Danny says lightly. "Kill me. That would also work."

Bruce inhales sharply. "Danny," he starts.

"Go home, Mr. Wayne," Danny says, pushing himself up with one hand. The other still clutches the wad of tissue to his cheek, partially soaked with blood. "Go take care of your son."

"I'll go," Bruce says, "I'll take him to the Watchtower. And then I'll come back."

"Mr. Wayne-"

"I should've come for you," Bruce interrupts. "Sixteen years ago. I should've come for you."

Danny's brow furrows. "You had no idea I existed."

"But if I had. I would've come. I never would've left you there. And now that I know, I am not leaving you now."

For the first time Bruce watches Danny be completely caught off guard. He openly gapes at Bruce.

"You would've died," Danny lands on, voice thin. "They would've killed you."

"Unlike you, I would've brought backup." Bruce says, mimicking Danny's lightness.

He's lying. Sixteen years ago he would've thrown himself at the League to save his newborn son without a plan, without a thought beyond rescuing his baby.

Danny barks out a laugh. "You would've laid siege to Nanda Parbat with The Big Blue Boy Scout?" he looks wistful. "That would've been rad."

Bruce sees his opening. "Danny," he stands, eye to eye with his son. "Let me help you."

Danny evaluates him. "The Batman," he says softly. "I didn't want you to come, then. I didn't need one more person I had to prove myself to. All I wanted was to live amongst the stars, in the quiet of the cosmos."

"You want to be an astronaut," Bruce says. At Danny's cocked head, he says without shame, "I read your essay on personal heroes. You wrote about Edward White. Ad Astra Per Aspera."

Danny smiles slightly, sadly. "It is a rough road."

"You can be whatever you want to be," Bruce says. "I won't stand in your way."

"Even if I want to be Danny Fenton?" he asks.

"Even then."

Danny sighs. "I don't need your help Bruce," he says. "No," he says as Bruce opens his mouth. He pulls the wad of tissues away from his cheek. Underneath the splotches of dried blood the gash in his face has cleanly knit itself together, a faint white line now all that remains.

"I don't need your help," he says clearly. He holds a palm forward, and a green fire grows from its center, until the flames are licking delicately up his fingers.

"I know The Batman does not kill. But I am not a Robin. I am something else entirely," Danny says, his eyes reflecting the green of the flames. Or not, as he looks up at Bruce, his eyes green all on their own. They are sad. This is why he stayed away, Bruce realizes. Not out of fear. Danny is not afraid. Danny is tired.

But for his brother, Danny will wake up.

"And If the League takes one step towards Damian, I will raze them to the ground."

#Danny I AM RETIRED FROM MURDER Fenton #the informants are ghosts #the thing about deductive reasoning is sometimes you deduct incorrectly #particularly when you don't know about the ghosts #danyal al ghul #damian wayne #danny phantom #batman #dp x dc au #dp x dc crossover #dp x dc #dp x dc prompt #bruce wayne #this is an au where damian doesn't get blown up and lose most of his vital organs #like bruce still isn't a super responsible parent but no nine year olds blow up so that's something #danny: he only blew up once so he can stay with you #batman: he did get speared straight through but we fixed it #danny: he wHAT #i wrote this instead of eating dinner #because drafts are for the mentally healthy #tbh i don't think his name would be danyal al ghul in this one #he's trying really hard to stay under the radar I don't think he would choose essentially a homonym

[skinks]

I see your “fake/pretend dating” scenarios and I ask instead of you: “we’re secretly together and desperately trying to hide it” scenarios

Richie and Eddie finally get their shit together a week before Bev and Ben’s wedding, and after a whole lot of arguing and contingency plans and naked, sweaty discussion, they decide that if they don’t wanna steal that hetero thunder, they have to try their hardest to act like they’re not a Thing

and it’s a mess. They spend the whole week of bachelor parties (Losers plus Patty sans Bev get sad drunk and wish Bev was there) and bachelorette parties (Losers plus Patty sans Ben wear feather boas and get sorority drunk with Bev’s fashion friends, gossip about Ben and sing karaoke) pretending they’re not sneaking off to bone in every unoccupied room they possibly can

It’s a MESS. Richie figures the years of practice at pathetic, secret longing mean they should be better at this than they are. Like yeah, they’re still hovering in this awkward limbo stage where it’s both terribly exciting and horribly embarrassing to be crossing meat swords with your long lost best bro, while knowing you’re both totally into it, but they already acted so couple-y beforehand that it’s probably WEIRDER if Eddie stops smiling all fond and fixing Richie’s hair, or if Richie stops slinging his arm around Eddie at every opportunity. But that’s letting their guard down, and they keep freezing and jumping apart in the middle of casual conversation. They’re standing with Bill and Audra and Patty and Mike in some hotel function room, discussing whether or not stealing Ben’s yacht is feasible when Richie oh-so-gently says “hey—c’mere,” and wipes a smudge of chocolate fondue (contains nuts!!) from Eddie’s mouth with his thumb. Everyone stops talking. Everyone stares. Eddie stares. And Richie needs to duck and cover so he sort of - slaps him? Not even hard enough to make a noise, it’s more of a tap-then-push. He pushes Eddie’s face. “Is that Staniel I hear,” Richie says, after a moment.

“I don’t hear anything,” Patty says.

“No no, that’s definitely Stan,” Richie says, backing swiftly to the door. Eddie’s eyes are on him accusing and hot, dark brown like the chocolate smeared on Richie’s thumb. Later, Eddie will suck the taste off where it’s stuffed in his mouth to keep quiet as they fuck below deck in Ben’s stolen yacht, Mike and Bill fighting overhead about who gets to wear the blue and white captain’s hat. Eddie’s pants are barely even pulled down. Richie does his Quint From Jaws Voice and goes duh-dun, duh-dun as Eddie pushes inside so Eddie will bite his thumb and fuck him harder. It’s all very undignified, and illicit, and stupid. Eddie loves it. “I have great ears, Pattycake, and Stanley makes this sort of, uh, echolocation type noise when he’s having issues with hotel staff. I should know, I went on vacation once with his family, to the Catskills? Stan spilled soup on a waiter and every bat in the fuckin’ place came right outta the forest and flew into the buffet. Don’t ask him about it though, one man’s vigilante origin story is another man’s traumatic childhood. Okay bye.” Richie definitely doesn’t run, but running away is more about aura than gait.

Audra frowns. “Did he just imply Batman didn’t have a traumatic childhood?”

“Haha,” Eddie deflects, stuffing his hand in his pocket, and missing. “He must’ve had the shrimp. Fucked up that he’s the one with the actual shellfish allergy, right? Isn’t that irony, or something?”

“That would be ironic, if you didn’t know everything we’re all allergic to by heart and would never let Richie eat shrimp,” Bill says, still staring.

“I would,” Eddie says immediately. He can’t find his fucking pocket. “I would totally let Richie eat shrimp.”

“You slapped his slice of pizza out of his hand last week because there was oyster sauce in the marinara,” Mike says, but Eddie is already actually running away. Wow, he’s fast.

Even with the Losers, Richie’s only out by implication, but it’d still be weird if he, for some reason, brought a woman as his date. He thinks about bringing Sven the Sound Guy because he’s as opposite to Eddie as it’s possible to find on short notice since Guy Fieri was unavailable, but he can’t decide whether this is genius cover or so on the nose as to be damning. He goes stag in the end, which is perhaps most damning of all. Eddie is in Schrodinger’s closet, because he doesn’t have to answer either way if nobody fucking asks him, and nobody does, because Eddie always starts doing whatever he’s currently doing to an incredibly intense level whenever the conversation turns to dating. One time at dinner when they were all in the same city for one of Richie’s tentative, low-key comeback shows, someone mentioned post-divorce dating apps, and then someone simply said the word Grindr not even in Eddie’s direction and Eddie cut his steak so hard he scratched the plate. This was an achievement in and of itself seeing as the clown took Eddie’s fork-arm, but Richie was spearing his steak for him while he cut it. He’s an enabler. An enabler to steak, and freakouts.

Anyway, even with all of this, it’s still weird that Eddie brings a woman. She’s Paula. From work. Stan sees her checking her phone so often that he figures out she’s one of the women in the matching white wedding dresses on her lock screen. Stan nudges Patty, who becomes very insistent that they should tell Eddie before he gets his heart broken, but Eddie is probably too busy periodically kicking out the backs of Richie’s knees to make him wobble and buckle against the bar to notice, or care.

Bev has great fucking aim, is the thing. There’s a lost catapult and a space-alien dead as a dodo can attest to it, but she’s still facing the opposite direction and could never predict that her bouquet toss would bounce off two different bridesmaids’ heads, straight into Richie’s hands. They’re so beautiful. White and orange and a rich, nautical blue that matches Eddie’s suit, tidily pinned up at the right shoulder and pressed hard into Richie’s side. Bev is laughing delightedly and Ben is taking a photo, and Eddie has been getting steadily drunker ever since he got back half an hour ago from gratefully sending Paula home to her wife in an Uber with some cake. He’s all pink across the bridge of his nose and he looks so fucking adorable with Ben’s blue and white yacht captain hat tilted on his head at a rakish angle, and the others are all catcalling so hard that Richie figures they might as well give up the pretense. He kicks out the back of Eddie’s knees so he’ll buckle into Richie’s flowery arms and fucking DIPS him like that old wartime photo even though Eddie’s the one with the sailor hat getting knocked off his head because they’re kissing so enthusiastically, clinging to the back of Richie’s neck and snortlaughing into his mouth, but suddenly everyone’s shouting, and they all sound - not pissed, exactly, but certainly indignant

“Are you guys serious,” Bill says, “you’re stealing their thunder right now? One major childhood romance realized isn’t enough, you’re gonna crash theirs?”

“Wait,” Richie says

Bev throws up her hands. Richie can’t see, because of her dress, but he’s pretty sure her foot is actually tapping. “Why didn’t you tell us!”

Eddie is still dangling off him like a monkey, all stunned-drunk limp with the bouquet shoved in his face. Richie hears what uh oh sounds like muffled by flowers, and Ben silently takes another photo, like he’s cataloguing a crime scene.

“You guys... didn’t know? We actually kept it a secret?”

“Until now, you jackasses!”

“What secret,” Audra asks, appearing with like eight plates of cake. “What’s happening? Oh wait, I’m caught up.”

“But—but—the fondue,” Eddie says, and seriously, it’s not like the clown ripped his legs off, he could try standing and facing this with Richie like a true bro, but Richie’s kind of enjoying the weight of him. Plus he’s pretty sure Bev won’t dare to go through Eddie to kill him, so. Human shield it is.

“What about the fondue?” Mike looks like he did after the end of The Usual Suspects. Like he’s re-evaluating every time Richie and Eddie left a room together, and wishes he wasn’t. “You guys are like that all the time.”

“Then why were you all staring!”

“Nobody was staring! It was a natural lull in conversation, we were weirded out that you were being weird about it! Have you always been this self-centered?”

“I guess so,” Richie shrugs. He looks down at Eddie, covered in pollen and thoroughly confused. He’s so drunk he’s looking kinda cross-eyed. “You hear that, dude? We were killing it, until we fucked it all up!”

Eddie grins up at him. “Good enough!” he slurs, and then lets go of Richie’s neck for a high five. Everyone’s gone back to ignoring them in favour of dancing to Journey, so at least nobody notices Richie’s so eager to return it that he drops Eddie on the floor instead

#this is so dumb but i made myself laugh #and im trying to get writing again by working it out through dumbass ficlets #reddie #ficlet

[smokeybrand]

Smokey brand Postmortem: You Suck

I don’t really talk about my love for Mortal Kombat near as much as i do for Marvel, Fate, Star Wars, or Batman, but i adore that bloody franchise. Seriously, the vast majority of this blog is just Marvel and Star Wars content but, i mean, I'm an Eighties baby. That was a massive chunk of our childhoods. See? Even in an essay bout Mortal Kombat, Marvel and Star Wars found it’s way into the conversation. I have a problem but that’s not the problem i want to address in this essay. The problem i have with this one, is the f*cking Mortal Kombat release that just dropped. F*ck did they get so much wrong! I haven’t felt this frustrated with a movie since The Old Guard. I wanted this to be a Comparison but, as i tried to coalesce my thoughts about both films, it became mad apparent to me that the Nineties version of this movie would runaway with it. How is it possible that a film which came out twenty-six years ago, sh*ts all over one with modern shooting techniques and effects? How can a PG-13 movie, saturated with tongue-in-cheek camp and constant nods to the camera, do the Enter the Dragon knock-off franchise more justice that the blockbuster, R-rated, third attempt? Yeah, so this is a postmortem now.

Issue: Cole Young

Why? F*cking why? Listen, I'm all for reimaginings. I love when people can take an established work, recontextualize it, and present something new but familiar. That’s why i keep seeing Batman movies. You can only tell that dude’s story so many times but it’s how you present that story which grabs me. I like the idea of Cole. A fresh face for the audience to view these fantastical circumstances through? Good idea. I hate the execution of Cole. Punk ass weenie who literally develops powers by getting his ass kicked, portrayed by an actor who can’t act, but brought in because of his stunt background, only to nerf the physicality of the role, relegating dude’s greatest strength to his greatest weakness? F*cking, why?

Fix 1: Drop Cole Young, Start Liu Kang

Look, Liu Kang IS Mortal Kombat. He’s their Ryu. He’s their Link. He’s their guy. Drop the family. Drop the Scorpion stuff. Drop the professional fight thrower shtick Build him up as a dude who learned all of this in the Buddhist orphanage he grew up in, denying all of it as just legend and storytelling, until he’s attacked by Sub-Zero. Force him to fight Subby-boy, only to get his ass beat without his Arcana, but have Jax save him just in time. Basically follow Cole’s plot going forward with an emphasis on Liu’s training.

Issue: Shang Tsung

Listen, Ng Chin Han is a get. Dude is a decent actor and i enjoyed he take on the shapeshifter but come on? If you’re not trying to do a Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa, you’re doing it wrong. Shang Tsung should be snarky, quippy, and overconfident. This dude has won nine straight Mortal Kombat tournaments. It’s fine for him to be conniving and deceitful, Deadly Alliance, but this version of Shang is just too flaccid for the title. Hell, when Tagawa came back for the game, he STILL exuded that same smarmy energy and it was perfect.

Fix 2: Give Shang Tsung more agency

I, personally, love smarmy Shang Tsung but if you want to go different, go brutal. Make Shang the spear head of the offense. Give him a seen where he is just mowing down jobber monks in Raiden’s temple before getting real intimate with Hung Lao. Have Tsung absolutely brutalized Lao as Liu watches, breaking his neck before sucking the sole out of his limp body. You got an R, Lean into that sh*t. You gotta give Liu that Chan moment. Lao’s death not only establishes Shang as a straight up force, but activates Liu’s Arcana, fulfilling the prophecy.

Issue: The f*cking prophecy

Bro, you gotta get rid of all the Scorpion prophecy sh*t. That doesn’t fit. It doesn’t make any sense. The prophecy is supposed to be a foreshadowing of Outworld’s downfall. Tying everything to Scorpion and Sub-Zero just because Ed Boon loves the character is kind of ridiculous. And that’s coming from me, a guy who uses Scorpion as his main since MKI. I love Scorpion, Dude is my favorite character in the entire franchise but giving him such a prominent role in this first film was a mistake.

Fix 3: Make it the Shaolin Prophecy

Have Shang Tsung send Sub-Zero into the Shaolin Temple with a team of Jobbers, probably Tarkatan or other Lin Kuei, and murder everyone. It is whispered that a great champion, kin to Master Kung Lao, would defeat the armies of Outworld, sealing Earthrealm off from the Emperor's grasp. baby Liu and Kung are saved, sent off to an orphanage in the US where they grow up in an orphanage run by a weird old man who tells stories. Eventually, the two separate, Kung returns to their homeland, Liu stays in the states, and they live their lives. Fast forward a bit and Shang gets wind that there are two survivors and he dispatches Sub-Zero to go after Liu. Fast forward to the temple, Liu reconnects with his cousin, Kung, who explains his powers activated during a battle against, let’s say... Baraka? Raiden feels it, recruits Kung Lao, who has been training in the temple ever since. He spars with Liu, teaching him the secrets her learned from Master Bo Rai Cho, until Raiden’s Temple is singed. Everything lays out like it did in the film except Liu watched Lao die at the hand of Shang, his Dragon Arcana activates, and the Sorcerer knows he dun goof’d.

Issue: Fights

The fighting sucked in this, man. It was shot like none of the principal actors were physical enough to pull off the fight scenes, which is ridiculous, because that opening scene was exceptional and those dues are old as f*ck. The dude who plays Scorpion, Hiroyuki Sanada, is f*cking sixty, man. You’re telling me these youngsters with actual stunt backgrounds, can’t give me a scrap as entertaining as a sixty year old man? Word?

Fix 4: Oh, there’s a lot here, bud

First, shoot the scraps better. Holy sh*t, that Taken editing was stupid. We live in an age of John Wick, The Raid, and Jason Bourne films, but you chose to shoot these scenes like this? Really? Bro, no. Hell, the fights in Enter the Dragon are some of the best I've eve seen and that motherf*cker dropped forty-eight years ago. Just do whatever he f*ck they did, just do it with a modern twist. Two, cast motherf*ckers that can believable execute the choreography. The chick that played Sonya in the first one, had to learn her fighting n set during the downtime of production because she as late to the shoot. THAT chick was a more believable fighter than the dude who played Cole and that was his f*cking job before he was an actor! F*cking, how?? Three, hire better stunt coordinators. These fights needed to be plotted out much better. Sure, fatalities are cool and special moves are awesome but they aren’t necessary. Liu Kang through one fireball in the first MK film and it was ll the better for it. I don’t need giant flame dragons and head claps and sh*t, i just need brutal, intense, violence inflicted upon a person. These people are in the fight for their lives. I need to feel that. Four, hire more jobbers. Too many actual named characters died in this movie. Too many actual named characters appeared in this movie. Why the f*ck was Nitara in this?

Look, there’s still SO much i would change about this flick. The costumes, the tone, the choice in music, the writing; All need to be adjusted. I would hold Scorpion back until sequel. Have him breaking out of the Netherrealm as a post credit stinger or something. This movie is broken and i think that’s because WB just made this thing to secure rights or a a backdoor pilot for HBO max content. Either way, this movie is bad, man and it didn’t have to be. You can make dope ass, martial arts films, on the cheap, especially when you “ground them in reality.” Why the f*ck didn’t that happen here? How the f*ck is the budget so high, and the film so cheap looking? I miss the ingenuity of the Eighties. Cats had to figure out how to make sh*t work because CG was too expensive. Now, that sh*t is everywhere and it’s a detriment to film. That sh*t takes casualties out of practical films and Mortal Kombat is definitely one of those.