Fatality?
Warner Bros. has delayed the theatrical release of Mortal Kombat 2 by seven months, to an early summer release date: May 15, 2026. The video game adaptation, which has already been completed and has been screened for press, was originally slated to hit theaters less than two months from now, on Oct. 24.
Entertainment Weekly has reached out to a representative for WB for comment.
“The tournament demands a new time and place, worthy of its spectacle,” an Instagram post announcing the adjustment said.
With the departure of MK2 to 2026, WB now has just two theatrical films remaining in its 2025 slate: The Conjuring: Last Rites, which bows on Sept. 5, and Paul Thomas Anderson’s One Battle After Another, which hits theaters on Sept. 26. The distributor currently has no releases scheduled for October, November, December, or January, and will return to the big screen with Emerald Fennell’s Wuthering Heights on Feb. 13, 2026.
Warner Bros.
The sequel to 2021’s R-rated Mortal Kombat has built significant buzz online, with a record-breaking trailer that garnered over 106 million views in its first 24 hours — the most ever for a red-band trailer, which allows for more graphic content than typical movie marketing.
Mortal Kombat 2 was originally set to open on the same day as Springsteen: Deliver Me From Nowhere, which stars Jeremy Allen White as Bruce Springsteen, and Regretting You, the romantic drama adapted from a novel by Colleen Hoover (It Ends With Us), starring Alison Williams and Dave Franco.
Disney’s sci-fi adventure Tron: Ares, Aziz Ansari’s fantasy-comedy Good Fortune, the horror sequel Black Phone 2, and the Dwayne Johnson sports biopic The Smashing Machine are also among October’s earlier releases.
MK2‘s new slot in May pits it in direct competition with Is God Is, a thriller from first-time filmmaker Aleshea Harris, adapting her 2019 play of the same name. That film stars Kara Young, Mallori Johnson, Janelle Monáe, Vivica A. Fox, and Sterling K. Brown.
Earlier in May, The Devil Wears Prada 2 is set to reunite Anne Hathaway, Meryl Streep, Emily Blunt, and Stanley Tucci from the 2006 original. And a week after MK2‘s release, Disney will premiere The Mandalorian and Grogu, its first Star Wars film since 2019’s The Rise of Skywalker.
Mortal Kombat 2 will introduce Karl Urban as Johnny Cage, the fictional Hollywood action star who was absent from the 2021 film.
“His integration into the Mortal Kombat story and universe is a big part of what this movie explores,” Mortal Kombat co-creator Ed Boon told EW. “He’s a washed-up Hollywood guy thrown into this magical, ultra-violent thing. Karl, his depiction of Johnny Cage is different than our games in some ways. He’s adding his own flair to it, but I think it’ll feel fresh. There’s like a novelty factor in there.”
Warner Bros.
The movie will also star Lewis Tan as Cole Young, Ludi Lin as Liu Kang, Mehcad Brooks as Jackson “Jax” Briggs, Jessica McNamee as Sonya Blade, Tadanobu Asano as Lord Raiden, Joe Taslim as Sub-Zero, and Hiroyuki Sanada as Scorpion, all returning from the 2021 film. New additions include Adeline Rudolph as Kitana, Martyn Ford as Shao Kahn, and CJ Bloomfield as Baraka.
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Director Simon McQuoid, who previously helmed the 2021 film, told EW that he intended to amp up every element of the franchise for the sequel. “What I realized was go bigger, go bolder, don’t hold back, and really feed off the history of Mortal Kombat more,” he said. “Just build on where we were and then make it significantly more intense, bigger in scale, bigger in variation, bigger across the board really as a cinematic experience.”
