Its 2025 and I am still not over New X-Men

Take a look at other big franchises. Marvel, DC, and Star Wars are all massive franchises that have gotten major reboots/retcons in the last 20 years. What do they have in common?

When a franchise decides to do a retcon, they commit 100%. For DC this was cancelling every comic book that was not in the New 52 line. For Star Wars this was only producing media in the Sequel Era.

Netherrealm Studio notably hasn’t done this.

Mortal Kombat 1 came out in 2023. What new Mortal Kombat content has come out since then?

The MK Mobile game still gets updates. The icon for the app is clearly MK1 Bi-Han and MK Movie Hanzo.

Then there was the Fortnite collab. The battle pass had you unlock MK1 Bi-Han first, and then Kuai Liang second, in line with the previous timeline but not the retconned one. Kind of interesting that they close to go for a path closer to canon, when the Bi-Han skin is the more detailed, modern look.

There are also three versions of Scorpion in the game. All of them are pretty clearly Hanzo imo. They already brought in MK1 Bi-Han why would they exclude MK1 Scorpion?

The appearance of MK1 Sub-Zero does not conflict with the old timeline, but the appearance of MK1 Scorpion, would.

In the same collab we get Thunder God Raiden. If NRS was full sending Liu Kang’s timeline, shouldn’t this be Liu Kang?

Then of course there is the Mortal Kombat II movie that just came out. This movie is the best adaptation of the franchise we have gotten in a decade. Interestingly it is also a sharp divergence from its prequel and is kind of a return to form for the franchise. In this series they make it abundantly clear that Bi-Han is Sub-Zero and Hanzo is Scorpion.

McFarlane Toys had a pretty extensive line of toys for MK11 and MKX. They have produced exactly zero toys for MK1. But here is the thing- they havent stopped making MK toys. They are actively coming out with new releases. But all of their new releases are classic designs.

Then there is the Pop figures from 2024. As far as I know this was only merch of MK1 Liu Kang that has ever been released. It also notably came out while MK1 was still receiving support and updates from the NRS.

The Youtoos release is super weird in that its very late. It is releasing in 2026 way after support ended for MK1, and also way after the release if the MKII movie. Which is not generally how these releases for merch tends to work. My best guess, this was a delayed release. Yootoos got the licensing rights way earlier, but some hangup in production delayed them until now.

Then there is the SuperX Collaboration. See a pattern here? MK1 Bi-Han but classic Scorpion. They just re-released this collab a few months ago for the movie.

The interesting thing about the SuperX collaboration is that it DOES feature Kuai Liang Scorpion. In some promotional images it does use him. But what is also interesting about this release is that is it explicitly an MK1 collab not a Mortal Kombat the franchise collab.

I have excluded several other collabs for being non-transformative. When a company just slaps the same render of a character with a different filter on a tee-shirt, they aren't really creating new content so I am not counting it. Also there have been a few just 'Mortal Kombat' collabs that just reference the franchise as a whole without any reference to a specific era in its history.

And one last thing! This is the concept art for Sub-zero that is in the game. That is straight up Kuai Liang. The artist who drew that thought they were drawing Kuai Liang. He has the scar and everything.

And then he is voiced by this dude. Why would NRS hire a Japanese man, who speaks fluent Japanese, made famous for game about Japan, to play a Chinese man cosplaying as a Japanese man?

Take a look at other big franchises. Marvel, DC, and Star Wars are all massive franchises that have gotten major reboots/retcons in the last 20 years. What do they have in common?

When a franchise decides to do a retcon, they commit 100%. For DC this was cancelling every comic book that was not in the New 52 line. For Star Wars this was only producing media in the Sequel Era.

Netherrealm Studio notably hasn’t done this.

Mortal Kombat 1 came out in 2023. What new Mortal Kombat content has come out since then?

The MK Mobile game still gets updates. The icon for the app is clearly MK1 Bi-Han and MK Movie Hanzo.

Then there was the Fortnite collab. The battle pass had you unlock MK1 Bi-Han first, and then Kuai Liang second, in line with the previous timeline but not the retconned one. Kind of interesting that they close to go for a path closer to canon, when the Bi-Han skin is the more detailed, modern look.

There are also three versions of Scorpion in the game. All of them are pretty clearly Hanzo imo. They already brought in MK1 Bi-Han why would they exclude MK1 Scorpion?

The appearance of MK1 Sub-Zero does not conflict with the old timeline, but the appearance of MK1 Scorpion, would.

In the same collab we get Thunder God Raiden. If NRS was full sending Liu Kang’s timeline, shouldn’t this be Liu Kang?

Then of course there is the Mortal Kombat II movie that just came out. This movie is the best adaptation of the franchise we have gotten in a decade. Interestingly it is also a sharp divergence from its prequel and is kind of a return to form for the franchise. In this series they make it abundantly clear that Bi-Han is Sub-Zero and Hanzo is Scorpion.

McFarlane Toys had a pretty extensive line of toys for MK11 and MKX. They have produced exactly zero toys for MK1. But here is the thing- they havent stopped making MK toys. They are actively coming out with new releases. But all of their new releases are classic designs.

Then there is the Pop figures from 2024. As far as I know this was only merch of MK1 Liu Kang that has ever been released. It also notably came out while MK1 was still receiving support and updates from the NRS.

The Youtoos release is super weird in that its very late. It is releasing in 2026 way after support ended for MK1, and also way after the release if the MKII movie. Which is not generally how these releases for merch tends to work. My best guess, this was a delayed release. Yootoos got the licensing rights way earlier, but some hangup in production delayed them until now.

Then there is the SuperX Collaboration. See a pattern here? MK1 Bi-Han but classic Scorpion. They just re-released this collab a few months ago for the movie.

The interesting thing about the SuperX collaboration is that it DOES feature Kuai Liang Scorpion. In some promotional images it does use him. But what is also interesting about this release is that is it explicitly an MK1 collab not a Mortal Kombat the franchise collab.

I have excluded several other collabs for being non-transformative. When a company just slaps the same render of a character with a different filter on a tee-shirt, they aren't really creating new content so I am not counting it. Also there have been a few just 'Mortal Kombat' collabs that just reference the franchise as a whole without any reference to a specific era in its history.

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Hey! I haven't really been posting lately (I haven't had any art I felt like posting or ideas 💔) but I wanted to share that I am doing art fight this year!