the m0vie blog

Hosted by Andrew Quinn and Darren Mooney, and this week with special guests Richard Drumm and Niall Glynn, The 250 is a weekly trip through some of the best (and worst) movies ever made, as voted for by Internet Movie Database Users. New episodes are released Saturdays at 6pm GMT.

So this week, John R. Leonetti’s Mortal Kombat: Annihilation.

Liu Kang, Sonya Blade and Johnny Cage have just won the Mortal Kombat tournament, saving Earthrealm from Outworld. However, the villainous Shao Kahn does not accept victory so easily. Breaking the rules of the tournament, Kahn and his army of monsters launch a full-scale invasion of Earth. Can our heroes stop “the merger” in time?

At time of recording, it was ranked 78th on the list of the worst movies of all time on the Internet Movie Database.

Show Notes:

• Recorded 27th February 2021.
• Note: Due to the COVID-19 situation, this episode was recorded remotely. We suspect, going forward that a lot of our episodes will be until the crisis resolves.
• Mortal Kombat: Annihilation at The Internet Movie Database.
• The Bottom 100 at time of recording.
• Follow Niall on Twitter.
• Follow Richard on Twitter.
• The Dissolve debate the worst video game movies ever, March 2014.
• Lawrence VanGelder at The New York Times cites Mortal Kombat: Annihilation as an example of how video game movies became a punchline, November 1997.
• Owen Glieberman reviews Mortal Kombat: Annihilation for Entertainment Weekly, December 1997.
• Eric Snider reviews Mortal Kombat: Annihilation for MTV as part of his “bad movies” journey, September 2008.
• Sopan Deb at The New York Times discusses the ambiguity around the “so bad it’s good” movie, December 2018.
• John R. Leonetti talks to Flickering Myth about how Mortal Kombat: Annihilation got released in the state that it did, July 2017.
• Dana Forsythe at SyFy looks at the impact that the release of Mortal Kombat on the Nintendo changed gaming forever, June 2019.
• Rob Crossley at BBC examines how Mortal Kombat changed video game culture, June 2014.
• Christoph Huber at CinemaScope argues for a reassessment of the work of Paul W.S. Anderson, April 2012.
• Mark Hofmeyer at Rotten Tomatoes argues for Paul W.S. Anderson as a filmmaking deserving of reappraisal, August 2020.
• R.A. Emmet Sweeny at The Los Angeles Review of Books argues for Paul W.S. Anderson and Milla Jovovich as one of the great cinematic partnerships, February 2021.
• Matt Patches at Grantland argues for the creative vision of Paul W.S. Anderson, February 2014.
• Ignatiy Vishnevetsky argues for Paul W.S. Anderson’s use of space at MUBI, September 2012.
• Darren Mooney at The Escapist argues for the pulpy pleasures of Paul W.S. Anderson’s Mortal Kombat, February 2021.
• Peter Suderman at Vox looks at the history and the legacy of the classic Power Rangers television franchise, March 2017.
• Shamus Kelley at Den of Geek argues in favour of the Power Rangers reboot universe, November 2020.
• Michael Coldman at Variety reports on the special effects hype around Mortal Kombat: Annihilation, Mary 1997.
• Don Shewey at The New York Times considers the special effects work of Kleiser-Walczak Construction, December 1998.
• Miles Surrey at The Ringer looks back on Paul W.S. Anderson’s Event Horizon, August 2020.
• Brent McKnight at Giant Freakin Robot looks back on the legacy and reception of Event Horizon, February 2020.
• Anita Gates at The New York Times takes a look at the summer slate of blockbusters, May 1997.
• Anita Gates at The New York Times takes a look at the autumn slate of blockbusters, November 1997.
• Don Groves at Variety reports on the international rollout of Mortal Kombat: Annihilation, February 1998.
• Robin Rauzi at The Los Angeles Times reports on the success of Mortal Kombat: Annihilation at the box office against Anastasia, November 1997.
• Variety reports on the box office success of Mortal Kombat: Annihilation, November 1997.
• Variety places the release of Mortal Kombat: Annihilation in context, between Starship Troopers and Alien Resurrection, November 1997.
• Richard Cromelin at The Los Angeles Times reports on the slate of late-in-the-year releases, November 1997.
• Robin Shou and Linden Ashby reunite to play Mortal Kombat II with The Hollywood Reporter, September 2019.
• Christopher Lambert talks to Loaded about why he opted not to return for Mortal Kombat: Annihilation, August 2016.
• Matthew Byrd at Den of Geek discusses the history of Scorpion and Sub-Zero in the Mortal Kombat franchise, April 2021.
• Mitchell Saltzman at IGN discusses the origin and development of Scorpion, May 2020.
• Darren Mooney at the m0vie blog discusses the ubiquity of “family” as a blockbuster movie theme, March 2019.
• Dwayne Johnson discusses his history as “franchise viagra” on Saturday Night Live, May 2015.
• The cast and crew of Paul W.S. Anderson’s Mortal Kombat discuss the production and development of the film with The Hollywood Reporter, August 2015.
• Caelyn Ellis at I Need Diverse Games discusses the trope of ethnic and racial stereotypes in fighting games, September 2017.
• Michael Jai White talks to MTV about finally getting to play Jax in Mortal Kombat Rebirth after being cast in both Mortal Kombat and Annihilation, June 2010.
• Michael McWhertor at Polygon looks at the development and history of the character of Noob Saibot, April 2021.
• Sean Murray at The Gamer looks at the history of Ed Boon voicing Scorpion, April 2019.
• Marjean Holden talks to Total Mortal Kombat about playing Sheeva in Mortal Kombat: Annihilation, February 2001.
• Bob Heisler at The Los Angeles Times talks about the relative bloodlessness of Mortal Kombat: Annihilation, November 1997.
• Matt Gerardi at The A.V. Club discusses 1997 as the worst year in the history of Mortal Kombat, August 2017.
• Ed Boon admits to Complex that Mortal Kombat: Annihilation is his least favourite memory of the franchise, September 2012.
• Liz Finnegan at The Escapist discusses Mortal Kombat Mythologies: Sub-Zero as the worst Mortal Kombat video game ever, July 2015.
• The Cheat looks back at the wheel kick fad of the late nineties, April 2019.
• Chris Evangelista at /Film celebrates Paul W.S. Anderson as a cinematic “wife guy”, November 2020.
• Matt Singer at IndieWire discusses the art of the “vulgar auteur”, June 2013.
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Filed under: The Bottom 100 | Tagged: films, mortal kombat, mortal kombat: annihilation, Movies, niall glynn, reviews, richard drumm, The 250, The Bottom 100, video game movies |