Mortal Kombat 2's game-exclusive fight scene clip proves it learned all the right lessons from the first movie

The first fight scene from Mortal Kombat 2 has been released, courtesy of a game-exclusive clip shown to users booting up NetherRealm's Mortal Kombat 1.

The clip, which you can also see below, features Liu Kang (Ludi Lin) and a revenant Kung Lao (Max Huang), who previously perished at the hands of Shang Tsung in the 2021 movie.

Instantly, long-term fans will recognize the backdrop, a big-screen rendition of the Blue Portal stage from Mortal Kombat 2 on the SEGA Genesis.

But it's the action that will get the pulses racing, not least because – in Ludi Lin and Max Huang – there are two legitimately world-class martial artists fighting in full flow. There even seems to be a nod in how I play Kung Lao, with the revived kombatant spamming his razor blade hat attack over and over.

Those on the fence about Mortal Kombat 2, then, should rest easy in how the action is presented here. It's fast, frenetic, and packed with the sort of OTT drama that sets it apart from most fighting game peers.

Better yet, it's moved away from the interminable fighting pits and bland backgrounds that populated the original's action set-pieces – something that producer Todd Garner admitted was down to some low expectations on the executive side of things.

"Quite frankly, in the first movie, the studio didn't know what they had," Garner said during a press conference attended by GamesRadar. "So we were in that fighting pit for like 75% of the movie, just because of the budget."

Garner added, "This time, we really wanted to make sure that we went to all the different realms that people know."

Mortal Kombat 2 is released in cinemas on May 8.

For more, check out all the upcoming video game movies in the works (spoilers: there are a lot).