WARNING: The following contains spoilers for Mortal Kombat Legends: Battle of the Realms, now available on Blu-ray and digital HD.
In the Mortal Kombat series, the tournament's rules are pretty straightforward. Brackets line up fighters to scrap and move on, or die, ergo the name of the tournament. It's quite direct and what the movies were based on, with Earthrealm's warriors trying to get past villains who want to assimilate Outworld and the others into one. However, come Mortal Kombat Legends: Battle of the Realms, the rules are changed up, making no sense as they shape an incoherent, haphazard contest.
Mortal Kombat Legends: Battle of the Realms's first fight focuses on Johnny Cage taking on D'Vorah, the bug queen, with Shao Kahn indicating they'll all compete in a two-day tournament -- the last of its kind to control all the realms. Initially, the audience is left thinking Johnny will die, given that the trailers showed D'Vorah fighting Sonya Blade too, however, D'Vorah simply delivers her "nut-buster" move, leaving him on the ground grimacing in pain.
She doesn't move in for the kill, with Shao Kahn declaring her the victor. It then becomes a tournament where anyone fights anyone, with no brackets and no mandatory kills, which totally goes against the essence of the tournament where fighters either mutilate each other or perform Fatalities to move on. It's confusing and random as to who eventually kills and when. After all, D'Vorah could have murdered Johnny right there but instead, she offers him mercy.
Later in Mortal Kombat Legends: Battle of the Realms, Kitana fights Raiden, Raiden beats Reiko senseless, Sonya takes on D'Vorah and such, with no one even keeping track of who wins. Some fights aren't even finished so it's just a montage with no results. It's a really weird way of hyping the most important tournament around with Li Mei getting brutalized by Sonya too. It's never made clear why Jade didn't attempt to kill anyone for the Emperor, making the fights lack conviction and importance.
There are some bright spots, with Jax ripping off Kintaro's arms and taking him out of the tournament, but it still doesn't stick to the "Finish Him!" aspect of the video game. There are some Fatalities with Shang Tsung killing Stryker, Sonya impaling D'Vorah and Shao Kahn offing Kung Lao and Raiden, but it's so inconsistent that nothing resonates. It gets worse when Sonya rushes in to fight Shao Kahn, only for him to emerge victorious and deem it the final. There was no indication it was the main event, so to hear him declaring he'll rule the realms is ludicrous and feels crafted out of thin air.
More so, Liu Kang runs in right after as if it's the Royal Rumble to challenge the Emperor, leaving fans wondering what's the order for these fights. It's extremely disorganized, lacking the flair of seeing a board with fighters advancing so audiences know what's going on. The fact that fighters can also come in, coach and help up their friends is so off-putting because these are supposed to be isolated brawls where the emotion's felt in the stands.
To top it all off, the Elder Gods never address how Shang Tsung manipulated the rules on his island for Shao Kahn in the previous film. The Emperor even insults them as Raiden looks on, not even proffering an argument for how the sinister duo constantly bend rules, so it leaves fans wondering if there are no consequences for flagrant disregard of rules in Mortal Kombat Legends: Battle of the Realms. It's why the gods granting the Emperor this last tournament is laughable because rather than entertain his petition, they should be taking Shao Kahn and Shang Tsung to task for publicly flouting the law, compounding how this entire system is a joke.
See the Elder Gods lay down absolutely no rules in Mortal Kombat Legends: Battle of the Realms, now available on Blu-ray and digital HD.