Mortal Kombat II was not yet finished with selecting its ideal release date.
Warner Bros. is now set to release director Simon McQuoid’s sequel movie in theaters May 15, 2026, after it was previously slated for release in two months on Oct. 24. The film will now be part of the launch of next year’s summer season and avoids the crowded landscape of this October. Earlier this year, Sony’s Final Destination: Bloodlines found success in a similar May slot.
Hailing from New Line and based on the popular video game franchise that dates back to the 1990s, the film stars Karl Urban as Johnny Cage, alongside Adeline Rudolph, Jessica McNamee, Josh Lawson, Ludi Lin, Mehcad Brooks, Tati Gabrielle, Lewis Tan, Damon Herriman, Chin Han, Tadanobu Asano, Joe Taslim and Hiroyuki Sanada.
Mortal Kombat II centers on the group of ragtag fighters who must defend Earth from the evil forces of Outworld. It follows 2021’s Mortal Kombat, which rebooted the film franchise that kicked off with the original 1995 movie.
McQuoid helmed the film from a script by Jeremy Slater that is based on the video game created by Ed Boon and John Tobias. Producers include McQuoid, Todd Garner, James Wan, Toby Emmerich and E. Bennett Walsh.
New Line chief Richard Brenner introduced the first footage from the film at CinemaCon in April. “Expect amazing fights, epic battles and a few fatalities,” the exec teased at the time.
The first Mortal Kombat II trailer debuted online last month and included Urban’s self-referential quip when his character, who is an actor, is approached by a fan asking for a reboot of his signature show.
“Nobody wants that,” Urban replies in the footage. “Shit went out in the ’90s.”
