The highly anticipated Mortal Kombat II has been pushed to May 15, 2026, making for a seven month delay from its original October date. Mortal Kombat, the R-rated reboot of the film series based on the long-running video game franchise, opened in 2021 as part of Warner Bros. controversial theatrical/streaming strategy that saw theatrical movies simultaneously release on HBO Max for 30 days.
Warner Bros. Pictures
Normally, if you look at a film’s box office, you get a sense of how successful it was. Not so for WB’s 2021 slate (actually, it goes to 2020, as well, with Wonder Woman 1984 being the first movie released this way). For example, James Gunn’s The Suicide Squad only grossed $168 million worldwide, but it was obviously successful enough to justify a Peacemaker spinoff and allow James Gunn to become the big boss of DC Studios in subsequent years.
Likewise, Mortal Kombat only made $84 million worldwide, but A: that wasn’t bad for an R-rated movie released during the bad old days of Covid, and B: who knows what it would have made if it wasn’t also available to watch on HBO Max?
With that in mind, Mortal Kombat II has potential to become a breakout hit. It’s a box office wildcard, since you can’t look at the original’s box office for comparison. It was a different world back in 2021, doubly so for Warner Bros. Plus, Mortal Kombat was seen as a solid foundation for a franchise that was hampered by some fundamental flaws. It felt like they were holding back the ‘good stuff’ for Mortal Kombat II, which ended on the cliffhanger of the imminent and eponymous Mortal Kombat tournament, as well as the introduction of the iconic Johnny Cage, now played by Karl Urban, who will take over from the first film’s Cole Young. As much as I like Lewis Tan as an actor, it was a mistake to make the lead character of a Mortal Kombat film an entirely original figure, since there are literally dozens upon dozens of characters they could have used instead.
After the red-band trailer for Mortal Kombat II broke viewership records, Warner Bros seem to have realized that they might just have a major hit on their hands. With that in mind, the decision to move the film from October to a lucrative Summer spot is probably a good idea. It’s a pain that we’ll have to wait seven more months to see the film, but if it turns out to be as successful as Warner Bros is hoping, then maybe we’ll see Mortal Kombat become a huge franchise for Warner Bros, with sequels, prequels, spin-offs, and even video game adaptations of the movies based on the video games!
So, that means we have to wait seven extra months to see if Cole Young will get killed off in the first act, disappear into the background, or, most exciting of all, get a kick-ass character arc and become an unexpected fan favorite. Hey, Mortal Kombat did it for Ermac back in the PS2 days, why can’t they do it for Cole Young?
Related: Mortal Kombat Legacy Collection Adds PlayStation Classic To Its Lineup
This story was originally reported by GameDaily on Aug 30, 2025, where it first appeared in the News section. Add GameDaily as a Preferred Source by clicking here.
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