The recently-released Mortal Kombat Legends: Scorpion's Revenge depicts Scorpion as being
present when the Lin Kuei wipes out the Shirai Ryu, and living long enough to see his family
dead.
This derives from the web series Mortal Kombat: Legacy, where Scorpion fights Sub-Zero and
then comes home to find his wife and son frozen to death before being killed by Sub-Zero himself.
Only, it turns out that it was Quan Chi in disguise (because having him resurrect Scorpion
isn't enough of a bad retcon to make their rivalry all about him, apparently). This version
of events was then used as the basis for the MKX comic's depiction, and has now found its
way into this film. And yes, the comic depicts it in an inaccurate vision Hanzo is inflicted
with, but the discrepancy he notes is Bi-Han's taunt, not that literally everything about
the scene is wrong aside from how Bi-Han killed him. Actually, I say that, but his death wasn't
shown until eight weeks later in a separate flashback, so who even knows what's happening
here?
The thing is, this is not accurate in the slightest. Go back to MK Mythologies. Scorpion
and Sub-Zero were both hired for the same mission by Quan Chi. Scorpion was killed by
Sub-Zero. The Lin Kuei's payment for Sub-Zero's victory was that Quan Chi would eliminate
the Shirai Ryu, which includes Harumi and Satoshi. It's not explained why Scorpion believed
Bi-Han was responsible during Mythologies, but Scorpion was already dead at the time
of their deaths. I suppose the change was made originally to be more dramatic, and then
Shawn Kittlesen probably watched the show as research for the comic, and then the movie
used it, possibly because of the comic.
But, Scorpion was not present for his family's deaths. Regardless of what the comic claims,
the games never adopted this idea. In 2011, Quan Chi's ability to trick Scorpion with
a vision the latter shows no signs of familiarity towards suggests that this is all new to him.
Do these people all think that the vision is actually accurate, but that it's Quan Chi
using shape-shifting powers he's never used before or since? Is there a single gimmick
Quan Chi has that wasn't stolen from Shang Tsung?
Ever since that Legacy two-parter released, it seems that all spin-off media has just
accepted that, not only was Scorpion alive to see the massacre, but the Lin Kuei was
either directly involved, or framed for it by Quan Chi as part of his grand scheme to
manipulate Hanzo.
Again, it's probably to make the story more dramatic, and to be fair, Ian Anthony Dale
and Patrick Seitz both really sold it, but I still feel the original version is better.
The film uses Legacy's idea that Quan Chi shape-shifted into Sub-Zero to kill Scorpion
so he could turn him into a tool, which really does ruin the entire rivalry.
Originally, Scorpion's death was a result of his intense feud with Bi-Han, which then
led to Hanzo's return to avenge his own death, leading to Bi-Han's death and Kuai Liang's
desire for vengeance. It was a constant cycle brought about by their feud constantly ramping-up.
In this version, Hanzo is basically an innocent man murdered by Quan Chi to create a weapon
that, at least makes sense in the games, where Quan Chi has a reason to want Bi-Han dead.
But, without Mythologies taking place, Quan Chi either wants this very specific man just
to do a simple fetch quest, or he has completely unexplainable motives.
Scorpion kills an innocent man. And it makes Bi-Han nothing but fodder in their rivalry
when used in a setting where Mythologies never happened, like Legacy and Legends. And while
that could be an interesting direction to go, they never do anything with it, so it's
just reducing Bi-Han to the point that he may as well not even fucking exist anymore.
It's just L's all around. Maybe some of this is Ed Boon wanting his favourite to be more
sympathetic, like Harada with Heihachi in Tekken 7.
But at the very least, the movie uses the canon names for Harumi and Satoshi, unlike
the comic. You'd think Netherrealm would've had someone look over the comic script and
correct errors like this and everything else about the scene, but nope. Because consistency
just does not matter at Netherrealm.
And before you ask: Yes, I've seen the movie now. No, I don't like it. Yes, there will
be a video eventually. Never ask me about it again.
If you liked this video, why not subscribe and support me on Patreon like these fine
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with you.
Today's recommended video is Mortal Kombat 4 Isn't a 3D Era Game by Harperlarp. It covers
another misconception that is tangentially related to the subject of Quan Chi manipulating
Scorpion, and is another example of large portions of the MK fandom just being flat-out
wrong and dumb. My words, not his.