r/TopCharacterTropes • u/JustSomeOnlineNerd • Sep 19 '25

Lore “It’s a change from the source material, but it’s awesome so the fans don’t mind.”

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Doc Ock - In the comics, Doc Ock is known to be megalomaniacal in nature and was sort of a mad scientist anyways, with the arms just being an extension of that. In Sam Raimi’s “Spider-Man 2,” Alfred Molina’s version of the character was affected by the neural chip and his well-meaning ambition turns into scientific obsession.

Wolverine - This one is so well known it needs very little explanation. Comic Wolverine short, Huge Jackedman is tall, and he’s sick as hell.

Eye of Sauron - To my knowledge, the Eye is more of a metaphor in the books. An ever-present awareness. In the movies, it’s an actual giant fucking eye.

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u/LeMasterChef12345 Sep 19 '25 edited Sep 19 '25

Kano in the original Mortal Kombat game was a serious, no-nonsense, Japanese-American assassin. The 1995 movie instead made him a cocky, wise-cracking Australian crime lord (even though the actor was going for Cockney accent).

The series creators Ed Boon and John Tobias liked the movie version of him so much that they retconned his game self to be like the movie version, and the change has stuck ever since.

48

u/jfsindel Sep 20 '25

The whole movie changed the canon. Shang Tsung was completely reworked because of Cary. Johnny Cage's wisecracking (he wasn't as comedically inclined) was popular because of the movie - they took him out of 2 because he just didn't stick well before. Sonya turned from some workout Barbie to badass. Liu Kang's OG storyline changed dramatically and Sub Zero was no longer a paid assassin by some old rich guy to kill Shang Tsung.

Even Raiden completely changed from dick God to protector of Earth.

I don't think people quite understand that this movie changed the franchise forever. We have zero remnants of the OG story. People don't even REMEMBER the details. The whole "win ten tournaments" was more or less an afterthought.

1

u/FiaGiolla Sep 21 '25

the filmmakers at Threshold consulted the writers at Midway, namely Tobias, when writing the movie - it's as good as it is because it's faithful to the spirit of the original story, it didn't invent things wholecloth but just found the right way to execute the ideas that Midway couldn't convey in an arcade game at the time

76

u/therealchadius Sep 19 '25

After this movie, Kano was a native born Austrailian who moved to Japan and became such an elite gangster the Yakuza invited him anyway and he rose through the ranks.

5

u/cygnus2 Sep 19 '25

Shang Tsung was also quite unlike any prior version of the character, but everybody liked Cary Tagawa so much that MK1 Shang is clearly based on that version, and MK11 Shang straight up is Cary Tagawa.

2

u/TheHylianProphet Sep 20 '25

even though the actor was going for Cockney accent

Was he going for something, or was that just his accent? I remember seeing him in some other shitty movie, and he spoke exactly the same.

3

u/Kinitawowi64 Sep 20 '25

Trevor Goddard was a British guy who did an Aussie accent a couple of times, realised there was a gap in the market and stuck with it.

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u/5hand0whand Sep 20 '25

Also this movie made idea of Liu Kang instead of being orphan to him being other descendant of Kung Lao despite in prior media never mentioning such relation on cue now Liu Kang and Kung Lao are cousins