The Street Fighter Movie Needs To Avoid the Mistakes That Hurt Its Biggest Rival

Legendary Entertainment’s upcoming Street Fighter movie is poised to bring one of the most iconic fighting game franchises back to the big screen. With production underway and a massive ensemble cast confirmed, including Andrew Koji as Ryu and Noah Centineo as Ken, anticipation is steadily building. The film, a total reboot of the live-action series, is being directed by Kitao Sakurai and is co-produced by Capcom, signaling a potentially faithful approach to the source material. However, Street Fighter‘s release in 2026 places it in direct competition with the sequel to the 2021 Mortal Kombat reboot, transforming the decades-long rivalry between the two video game giants into a head-to-head cinematic showdown. This puts immense pressure on Street Fighter to deliver an experience that not only satisfies its dedicated fanbase but also outshines its fiercest competitor.

The 2021 Mortal Kombat reboot was a significant commercial hit. Despite a mixed critical reception and the pandemic affecting its theatrical plans, the film became HBO Max’s most successful movie launch to date, with 3.8 million households streaming it in its opening weekend alone. This strong performance greenlit a sequel, Mortal Kombat II, which has generated considerable excitement with the casting of Karl Urban as the fan-favorite character Johnny Cage. To gain an edge in this impending box office battle, the creative team behind Street Fighter must carefully study the shortcomings of the first Mortal Kombat. By learning from the missteps that prevented its rival from achieving even greater success, Street Fighter has the opportunity to deliver a more definitive video game adaptation.

Street Fighter Should Stick to Canon, Contrary to the First Mortal Kombat

The 2021 Mortal Kombat was by no means a complete failure, delivering on the franchise’s signature brutal action. However, the film made several creative choices that proved divisive among its core audience by deviating from the source material, the most significant being the introduction of Cole Young (Lewis Tan). This brand-new character was created specifically for the movie to serve as an audience surrogate, a decision met with widespread criticism from fans who questioned the need for an original protagonist when the franchise already has a vast roster of established fighters. Cole’s storyline, which positioned him as a descendant of Scorpion (Hiroyuki Sanada), felt shoehorned into the existing lore and took valuable screen time away from iconic characters like Liu Kang (Ludi Lin).

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Furthermore, the movie’s narrative deviated from the games’ foundational premise by completely sidelining the actual Mortal Kombat tournament. Instead of the classic martial arts competition, the plot focused on a prelude where Shang Tsung (Chin Han) attempts to eliminate Earthrealm’s champions before the tournament can even begin. While this allowed for numerous fight sequences, it robbed the film of the central structure and high-stakes drama that defines the source material. Mortal Kombat II appears to be course-correcting this, with the story centering on the tournament itself, a move that Street Fighter also seems to be wisely adopting from the start by focusing on its own World Warrior Tournament.

A final controversial invention of Mortal Kombat was the concept of “Arcana,” a narrative device created to explain how Earthrealm’s champions acquired their superhuman abilities. This meant that Jax (Mehcad Brooks) received his cybernetic arms, Kano (Josh Lawson) developed his laser eye, and Liu Kang harnessed his fireballs all from the same generic source. The creative choice was heavily criticized for overwriting decades of established character lore from the video games, where each fighter’s powers stem from unique origins like military tech, spiritual training, or divine right. Street Fighter must avoid this temptation to oversimplify its own mythology, and instead dive deep into the fascinating backstories the games spent decades polishing.

Mortal Kombat 2 is scheduled to be released in theaters on May 8, 2026. The Street Fighter movie will follow on October 16, 2026.

Which movie do you think will win the box office tournament in 2026, Mortal Kombat II or Street Fighter? Leave a comment below and join the conversation now in the ComicBook Forum!