EXCLUSIVE: It was clear back in the mid-1990s when New Line made the first adaptation of the Midway videogame, and it’s still evident today: There’s a massive appetite for Mortal Kombat. WaveMetrix data reports that the latest trailer for the Simon McQuoid sequel has notched 106.8M worldwide views in its first 24 hours after being dropped on Thursday, July 17 at 9AM PST — the best ever for a red-band trailer. The trailer launched in 68 countries and 47 languages. Mortal Kombat II opens on Oct. 24.
The previous McQuoid movie back in 2021 was also a red trailer record-breaker, clearing 116M views in its first week and besting the 4-day traffic of Logan and Deadpool 2.
Great views yield excellent box office. Despite a theatrical day and date release on HBO Max, Mortal Kombat opened to a robust $23.3M over April 23-25, 2021; that was about on par to the unadjusted 1995 opening of the first movie which did $23.2M. We’ll finally get to see the movie’s theatrical potential sans a same day HBO Max play. 2021’s Dune, a day and date release from Warners/Legendary, opened to $41M in U.S./Canada. But the pure theatrical play of its sequel last year, Dune: Part Two, jumped its opening +101% to an $82.5M 3-day.
The 24-hour traffic for Mortal Kombat II outstrips that of other red-band trailers, i.e. James Gunn’s The Suicide Squad (58.5M, dropout date March 26, 2021), Deadpool 2 (52M, drop date Feb. 7, 2018) and the previous Mortal Kombat movie (47M, Feb. 18, 2021 release).
The livestream numbers of the Mortal Kombat II trailer hit 2.7M streams worldwide across such social media channels as Mortal Kombat Movie, Mortal Kombat Games, Warner Bros (US, UK, Canada), IGN and Imax channels (TikTok, X, YouTube, Twitch).
Sentiment for the trailer was positive to neutral, earning praise from fans, celebrities and influencers with shoutouts to Karl Urban’s casting as martial artist Johnny Cage, the pic’s beloved Mortal Kombat characters and iconic lines with some citing that Scorpion’s “‘get over here!’ is already the things of fanboy dreams”.
There was another halo effect: New Line and Warner Bros. created a faux Uncaged Fury trailer for a movie starring Urban’s Cage. How’d that do? 22.2M views in 24 hours, and we’re told that traffic was all organic.
Part two follows the champion fighters from the videogames as they’re joined by Cage. They’re pitted against one another in the ultimate, no-holds barred, gory battle to defeat the dark rule of Shao Kahn who threatens the very existence of the Earthrealm and its defenders.
Lewis Tan led the first film as Cole Young, an MMA fighter facing off against Outworld enemies in a high-stakes battle for the universe. Returning cast also include Jessica McNamee as Sonya Blade, Josh Lawson as Kano, Tadanobu Asano as Lord Raiden, Mehcad Brooks as Jax, Ludi Lin as Liu Kang, Chin Han as Shang Tsung, Joe Taslim as Bi-Han and Sub-Zero, Hiroyuki Sanada as Hanzo Hasashi and Scorpion, and Max Huang as Kung Lao. Newcomers apart from Urban include Tati Gabrielle, Adeline Rudolph, Martyn Ford, Desmond Chiam, Ana Thu Nguyen, and Damon Herriman.
Jeremy Slater wrote the screenplay. The film is produced by Todd Garner, James Wan, Toby Emmerich, E. Bennett Walsh and McQuoid, and executive produced by Michael Clear, Judson Scott, Slater and Lawrence Kasanoff.
To date, the three Mortal Kombat movies from New Line have grossed $257.8M worldwide.
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