With “Michael” holding strong and “The Devil Wears Prada 2” expected to have a big second weekend from Mother’s Day audiences, the box office is expected to stay burning hot. But it’s going to get some more fuel courtesy of Warner Bros./New Line’s gory video game film “Mortal Kombat II.”
With two films driven by female moviegoers replacing “The Super Mario Galaxy Movie” and “Project Hail Mary” — part of the fruits of Hollywood’s recent streak of more films for women — the market is wide open for a straight-down-the-middle fanboy-driven summer blockbuster. It’s a reason why Warner Bros. moved “Mortal Kombat II” from its original October 2025 release date to a mid-May slot where, one year ago, it launched New Line’s “Final Destination: Bloodlines” to a franchise record $317.8 million global theatrical run.
It’s quite possible that “Mortal Kombat II” could enjoy similar success. Warner is keeping its projections conservative at $35 million domestic and $65 million worldwide this weekend. But exhibitor sources and rival distributors tell TheWrap they believe “MK II” has a chance to open closer to the $51 million domestic opening of “Final Destination: Bloodlines,” which would put it well on its way to turning a theatrical profit against its reported $68 million budget before marketing costs.
Reviews are fairly positive with 75% positive on Rotten Tomatoes at time of writing, and the buzz from “Kombat” fans who have attended advance screenings has been strong, with the consensus being that the sequel is a marked improvement from the previous “Kombat” film released in 2021 during the early stages of theaters’ pandemic reopening process.
Released while theaters had caps on attendance to allow for social distancing and while Warner Bros. was experimenting with day-and-date releasing on HBO Max, “Mortal Kombat” got mixed reviews from critics with a 55% Rotten Tomatoes score and grossed $84.4 million worldwide.
While fans appreciated the film’s fight scenes, criticism was leveled at the film’s plot for not showing the actual Mortal Kombat tournament that the video game franchise takes its name from, as well as basing the film on an original protagonist, an MMA fighter named Cole Lewis who is pulled by the thunder god Raiden into the deadly battle between Earthrealm and Outworld.
But “Mortal Kombat II” moves Cole out of the protagonist role and replaces him with two of the most popular characters from the games: the washed up and dryly humorous martial arts movie star Johnny Cage, played by Karl Urban, and the Outworld princess Kitana, played by Adeline Rudolph, who seeks to avenge her father and liberate her people from the Outworld overlord Shao Kahn.
As Johnny is pulled into the Mortal Kombat tournament that was teased in the first film, other characters from the games are added into the sequel like Jade, Baraka, Quan Chi and Sindel. And of course, the game’s signature “fatalities” are sprinkled throughout, escalating in gruesomeness until they reach a gory climax with a final kill that feels like it is lifted directly from the recent “Kombat” games.
The early reception suggests that “Mortal Kombat” is taking a similar path to the “Sonic the Hedgehog” series when it comes to adding in increasingly more references, characters and story elements from the source material to the delight of fans. Given its well-earned R rating, “Mortal Kombat II” probably won’t reach the $492 million global total of the more family friendly “Sonic the Hedgehog 3,” but it could set this franchise up as another dependable IP for Warner and New Line if it builds fan goodwill and interest in future installments.
Another advantage of “MK II” is that while it helps to have seen the previous film, the sequel is designed to be newcomer-friendly thanks to Cage’s introduction to the world of Mortal Kombat and Kitana’s self-contained narrative arc. If that becomes a part of the post-release word-of-mouth, the film may draw in moviegoers who aren’t into fighting games but who enjoy other New Line movies like “Evil Dead Rise” and “Final Destination: Bloodlines” and are down for a bloody good time at the movies.
Of course, fatalities are not family-friendly, and the theatrical market is also open for another offering for kids even with “Super Mario Galaxy” still going strong. So Amazon MGM will provide with “The Sheep Detectives,” a bestseller adaptation starring Hugh Jackman as a friendly shepherd who reads murder mystery novels to his sheep and is mysteriously murdered. As it turns out, his sheep have taken those novels to heart, and they take it upon themselves to solve the crime.
“Sheep Detectives” is projected for a modest $12-15 million opening, which would make this a rough follow-up for Amazon MGM after the great success of “Project Hail Mary” considering that this film filled with CGI animals has a reported production budget of at least $65 million.
But the good news for “Sheep Detectives” is that critics have been near unanimous in their praise for the film, bestowing upon it a 96% Rotten Tomatoes score as it has praised its strong voice acting and surprising amount of heart. The movie will have just two weeks to build off of that acclaim before it gets major competition for four-quadrant moviegoers from Disney/Lucasfilm’s “The Mandalorian & Grogu,” so it will need to have found a foothold with the masses before then.
Finally, Paramount will release Billie Eilish’s concert film “Hit Me Hard & Soft,” which is directed by James Cameron and will be released in 3D. The film is currently projected for a $6-9 million opening weekend, with Paramount projecting a start on the lower end of that total.
A $6 million opening would be roughly on par with the $5.7 million opening of the K-Pop concert film “Stray Kids: the dominATE Experience” released by Bleecker Street this past February. But there’s a strong chance of upside given Eilish’s larger fanbase as well as the promise of a deeper kind of concert film with Cameron bringing his “Avatar”-fueled expertise with 3D to this project.
