If you enjoyed the fight scenes in the first Mortal Kombat movie in 2021, you might love the second film even more.
Chinese-Canadian actor Ludi Lin returns as Earthrealm’s greatest warrior Liu Kang in Mortal Kombat II, which opens here on May 7, and AsiaOne recently sat down with him to find out more.
The film picks up after the first, following the same group of fighters under the god of thunder Raiden (played by Tadanobu Asano), now joined by former martial arts movie star Johnny Cage (Karl Urban).
They are pitted against each other in gory tournaments to defeat the dark rule of Shao Kahn (Martyn Ford) and his defenders.
One of Ludi’s memorable moments was finishing the epic fight between Liu Kang and his former good friend Kung Lao (Max Huang). In the first movie, Kung Lao’s soul was taken by an enemy.
They shot the scene for an entire week, Ludi said.
“Max and I were just completely exhausted and injured after we wrapped that fight, and we were just so happy to know that it’s in the can and we won’t have to do it again. I can’t wait for everyone to see it,” the 38-year-old recalled, adding the fight scenes this round were “intense”.
“After I finished the first Mortal Kombat, I said I hadn’t done a movie where I had to fight so much. And the second movie, it’s that, times three or four. The choreography was a lot more complicated, but also a lot more beautiful and exciting.”
And the difficult part was not being able to practise every choreography in the gym.
“There’s a fight between Liu Kang and Shao Kahn in Mortal Kombat II and those take place on steps. We can try to imagine the scene as best we can when we’re practising in a flat gym, but you just don’t know what the terrain is like. You don’t know how difficult it is. There’s an amped-up factor of when the camera’s rolling; you want to be as fast as possible, and that’s when mistakes can happen,” he explained.
No spoilers, but for the curious fans, he did tell us the take “looks great”.
He said there were around 20 fights in the film and “many fatalities” they had to figure out, though we’re not sure if all of them made it to the final cut.
“Everyone wanted to make this the best movie as it can. We have so many fans expecting our best work. As you know, there’s competition out there. There’s another video game fighting movie out there this year so we have to beat them,” he cheekily hinted.
Street Fighter is due to be released this October.
‘The most beautiful moment’
Johnny Cage isn’t the only addition to the sequel. Fans also get to see the badass Princess Kitana (Adeline Rudolph), her mother Queen Sindel (Ana Thu Nguyen) and bodyguard Jade (Tati Gabrielle).
While Ludi loves seeing everyone return, he also enjoys the addition of more people into the Mortal Kombat family.
“The beautiful thing about this cast is everyone’s so different from all over the world… Just like the video game characters, everyone has a very different, diverse and unique background,” said the Fuzhou-born actor, adding that everyone “got along so well”.
He smiled as he recalled a fond memory of the cast bonding in Indonesian actor Joe Taslim’s room prior to wrapping up the movie in Australia. They stayed up celebrating and saw the sunrise coming up from the ocean.
Joe, whom Ludi feels is the “uncle” of the group, plays Bi-Han, a returning character in the sequel.
“We start smelling something so good and hearing someone cooking, and we look back and it’s Joe making mee goreng (fried noodles) in the kitchen, and he’s frying up the egg and cooking the noodles for everyone. We’re dead tired, eating this food all together and watching the sunrise was the most beautiful moment,” he shared.
If Joe’s the “uncle” in the group, who’s the baby?
Ludi says it’s Australian actress Ana: “She has the gentlest soul and you just want to protect her.”
On screen though, she’s the polar opposite, which shocked the cast.
“The cast is so big and our scenes are very separate. When I watch the movie for the first time, it’ll be the first time that I see a lot of other people’s performances,” he explained.
“I remember when we went to the set to watch Ana play Queen Sindel, we were all shocked – especially after her transformation – because she’s such a baby; she’s so gentle, like a little chinchilla. Then as Queen Sindel, her voice changed, her physicality, everything changed. It’s shocking.”
Ludi Lin vs Liu Kang
How does Ludi compare to his beloved character?
Besides his martial arts training, he relates to Liu Kang’s loneness.
“Liu Kang was an orphan brought into the temple underneath Raiden. And for me, I wasn’t an orphan, but I’ve been alone in a lot of stages of my life – studying in Australia and having to learn new things, going through constant challenges, including bullying and learning how to fight,” he shared.
Ludi was sent to boarding schools in Sydney, Australia, at the age of nine to further his studies. He moved to Vancouver, Canada, at 17 where he studied at the University of British Columbia.
Like Liu Kang, he’s also trained in martial arts, namely muay thai and jiu-jitsu.
The differences come in their personalities.
“Liu Kang is a lot purer than I am. I think his heart is full of light and he has just one mission, one thing that he lives for – to fight for Earthrealm, obey Raiden and serve out his purpose. As for me, sometimes I’m in my head a lot. I think a lot and I want different things. That’s how we’re different. He’s very sure of himself and I’m figuring it out,” said Ludi.
Liu Kang is not a popular character for no reason; he has a powerful chi (energy) and shoots magical fireballs – sometimes even dragon-shaped – out of his hands.
We asked Ludi how he would use those powers if he had them and his answer was more wholesome than you’d expect.
“I’ve had some thoughts on this. I’ve been asked this before, and initially I said, ‘If I had this power, I’d be a firefighter, because I could use fire to fight fire.’ Then I thought more about it, I’m not sure how that would turn out,” he said.
Now, he’d choose to be a professional candle-lighter at birthday parties and “make children all over the world very happy”.
Challenging stereotypes
Since his big break as Zack Taylor in the 2017 Power Rangers film, Ludi has starred in some big Hollywood projects like Aquaman, Black Mirror and the 2021 television series Kung Fu, which also stars Singaporean actress Tan Kheng Hua.
When coming across a role that seems like an Asian stereotype, Ludi said he tries to take it as a challenge for himself.
“I think the word stereotype is something that someone else places on you. It’s their imagination, understanding, or misunderstanding of the type of person you are… That’s often very misinformed and not based on reality. So, for me, as long as you can take that back and make it your own and reclaim it in a way, then it’s no longer a stereotype,” he explained.
He feels that way about Liu Kang: “For me, I’m not playing a stereotypical role, because I’m reclaiming it, fleshing it out and I’m making it a whole person, a true character.”
In terms of Asian representation in Hollywood, what he hopes to see next is “an accurate portrayal of Asians as whole people”.
“What I expect to see is a respect of our culture, which includes getting the languages right,” he said.
He had recently watched the 2025 film Companion and lamented how there was a robot that spoke “terrible Chinese”.
“I know for a fact that every single detail of the script has been gone over meticulously by multiple people… We have so much technology; you can voice over it, you can hire someone who can actually do it… I just encourage Hollywood to pay attention to details like that,” he said.
Acting in the long run
Looking back on his career, Ludi remarked how fast the past 10 years have gone by for him.
Power Rangers – his first big studio film – feels like yesterday, he said.
“I still get questions from people asking me details about that movie like, ‘Where’s the sequel?’ When clearly, we’re not getting a sequel to that movie,” he said with a smile.
Ludi turns 39 in November, and as he talked about 2025 being a tough year and his resolution to make more friends this year, we asked if he could see himself acting for the long run.
“I definitely see myself being an actor for the rest of my life. I have people in my life that I look up to – my friend Lisa Lu is 99 this year and she’s still acting… To have that breadth of experience, I think it’s rare. Acting is one of those things that you can work on for your whole life and still not master. Luckily, I don’t think you ever have to retire if you don’t want to,” he said.
“I don’t know if I’ll be doing Mortal Kombat for the rest of my life. I’m not Hugh Jackman. I’m not going to be Wolverine when I’m 90 years old but I’ll definitely still be acting.”
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