Adapting Kitana: Boring Hero or Redeemed Prize

Kitana.

Mortal Kombat mainstay. Icon of the franchise. General fan-favorite.
One of the more developed characters story-wise, and one of the few to undergo an actual arc through the series.

And, for some reason, a character adaptations of Mortal Kombat just can’t get right.

The story has been adapted to outside media quite a few times now—movies, comics, TV, animation—and has even been rebooted/re-imagined in the games themselves. Kitana, as would be expected for a popular and iconic character, has been featured in most if not all of them.

But, for some reason, we’ve yet to see a great interpretation of her. For all the times she’s appeared in MK films, animation, etc., few (if any) have managed to truly nail her. Have they come close? Sure. Is she the only character who’s been done dirty by adaptations? Absolutely not. Has she gotten it worse than others? Not really.

Most would point out—not incorrectly—that Mortal Kombat is just a video game. Not exactly Shakespeare. For all the lore present, when you get down to it, it’s a collection of familiar archetypes, stock characters, and cliches. Should any of these characters, including Kitana, really be that hard to translate to film, television, comics, etc.?

So how and why—despite multiple goes and despite being one of the franchise’s most popular and iconic characters—do so many miss the mark?

Who is Kitana? What is Kitana? Why is Kitana? 

I suppose the best place to start is to establish just what makes Kitana who she is character-wise. What are the critical beats that define her story, and why are they so important in defining her?

First, we begin with Shao Kahn conquering Edenia in her infancy. We know she was at most a toddler because it’s stated in canon he conquered the realm 10,000 years ago and Kitana herself is canonically 10,000 years old.
Meaning that she grew up with no knowledge of her real father (or mother because Sindel kills herself shortly after the takeover) and believed Kahn was her father.

This is important because it establishes how she spent most of her life loyally serving him. She thought he was her family and she was doing a daughter’s duty. For all intents and purposes, even though she didn’t know better, Kitana spent most of her life as one of the “bad guys.”
It sets up her arc and conflict when she eventually learns the truth and chooses to turn against him. She was one of the bad guys, but grows into a more heroic and selfless person.

Now, the original games never specified how exactly she learned the truth. Only that she discovered these secrets through her years as an assassin, and that it happened at some unspecified time before she first appeared in Mortal Kombat II.
That’s important because it establishes she already made the choice to turn against Kahn before she even encounters the Earthrealm heroes.

Which brings me to the more critical element. Arguably the most important, defining thing about her: she made that choice.
Upon finding the truth about her past, Kitana vows to overthrow Shao Kahn and restore her home. Whether it was out of guilt or an ingrained sense of justice or a little of both, she makes the choice to turn good despite having every reason not to. She turns away from the only life she knows, willingly joins the losing side, risking her own life and soul … all in the hope of setting things right.

It’s important she makes that choice herself. That’s what agency is. Similar to her learning the truth about her past, in the original games, no one made Kitana turn good. No one told her to turn against Kahn. It was her choice, made with her own initiative.

I went into greater detail with this in my retrospective on Kitana, but these are the things that made her a great protagonist, developed character, and strong hero within the Mortal Kombat franchise. Despite her step-father’s lies and manipulations, she was in control of her destiny and grew from a ruthless assassin to selfless hero and leader.

Doesn’t seem too complicated, right? Grows up loyal to her step-father as his assassin, discovers the truth, turns against him, and grows into a hero. More intricate than “actor wants to prove he’s legit” or “chosen one destined to save the world” or “army woman chasing criminal,” but not that complex.

In fact, I would argue it’s pretty straight forward, yet open-ended enough for adaptations to fill in gaps and offer their own details. Within those details lies the potential for a compelling and rounded character with true motivation, who faces genuine conflict and grows over the course of the story under her own power.

When you lose or downplay one of those elements, it affects the entire character. We see that in how Kitana’s been depicted in Mortal Kombat’s various adaptations through the years.

Meet the Variants

Let’s start with the first go at translating Kitana to another medium: the comics. Now, the Malibu Comics were a bizarre hodge-podge of … weirdness … that never even tried to be a canon adaptation, and character depictions across the board were all over the map.
Kitana has a recurring presence when they reached the MKII era, as would be expected, and they run mainly with her as a rebellious traitor (or soon to be traitor) to Kahn’s forces, sabotaging them from within. They don’t delve deep into her conflicts, and she doesn’t do much that important, but she comes across as competent, capable, and defiant.

The most noteworthy of the Malibu run is the one-shot Kitana & Mileena issue that reveals her backstory.
What works about this issue is it captures the sense of betrayal and shock Kitana would have in discovering Shao Kahn is not really her father and that he molded her to be his killer. It also leans into the conflict of Kahn actually favoring her and wanting her to stay on his side.

Where it fails is they have her fully grown when he takes over Edenia and loyal to him via brainwashing and erased memories.
As explained, the power of her story is the genuine loyalty she had for her step-father. Explaining it away with brainwashing or mind control diminishes the impact of her discovery and reduces her character arc to an instant “good” to “evil” switch without the conflict or development that should come from it. It frees her of responsibility and it’s just a cheesy, lame way to do the story.

Kitana being a genuine, ruthless killer who actively changes to a more selfless, heroic leader is a compelling arc. Mind control and brainwashing cheapens it.

Next comes the 1995 film where Kitana is portrayed by Talisa Soto.
She has a relatively minor role in the first movie, which is understandable given it’s mainly an adaptation of the first game where she wasn’t even involved. She’s presented as a mysterious presence and, though certain details of her backstory and history are explained, isn’t delved into that deeply.

We’re told about Shao Kahn’s invasion of her home (only referred to as Outworld, as Edenia wasn’t a thing in the games yet) and how she was adopted as his daughter. They never say she WASN’T once loyal to him, needed to learn the truth, and all the rest. Presumably, a decent sequel could’ve explored and fleshed out those elements with her taking a larger part in the story.

Unfortunately, they don’t do that, and that is the cardinal sin of the film adaptations’ depiction of Kitana. They completely ignore her past loyalty to Kahn and present her as always against him her entire life.
Suffice to say, removing this element leaves her a much less compelling figure with weaker conflict and little to no development. Kitana in the movies doesn’t really have a journey to make as a character. She was always the heroic princess, and she ends the story pretty much the same person she was when she began.

I’ve always been very critical of that aspect of the movies, but despite her small role in the '95 film, it’s worth commending the things they got right—especially considering all the ways subsequent adaptations have gotten her wrong.

Even though she has a minor part, from what we do see of her, Kitana comes across as capable and cunning. She’s able to walk the fine line of dropping hints to Liu Kang without outright giving herself away (though Shang Tsung is suspicious of her).
When she fights Liu, she’s clearly holding back and only testing him. So even though she “loses” the fight, she doesn’t come across as weak.

An overlooked line of dialogue from her is when she says to Liu, “If I did not believe in you, I would not have helped you.”
What this says about her is she’s not waiting to be rescued. She’s fully intent on overthrowing Shao Kahn, but she’s being careful and guarded with how she goes about it. Like the games, she’s waiting for the right opportunity to do it openly and isn’t going to throw her best/only chance away on a fluke.

I see no point in dwelling on Annihilation. As said, they don’t bother fleshing out her backstory, and even worse, play the damsel-in-distress card by having her get captured and held prisoner for a chunk of the movie. She really doesn’t do much of anything else.
At least they let her beat Sindel.

The television series, Mortal Kombat: Conquest, was basically a prequel to the movies, so Kitana’s portrayal follows their lead.
Again, we’ve no indication she was ever genuinely loyal to Kahn—making a much less dynamic character—but they do have her still serving as one of his assassins. Despite her service, she’s opposed to him and secretly undermining him any way she can.

Like the movies they took their cue from, there’s something to be said about her successfully walking this line between servant and traitor, and the show does delve a little bit into Kahn’s fixation on her and keeping her around—going so far as to suggest it’s sexual in nature and he wants to actually bang her.

Unfortunately, she was just an occasional guest character who appeared in only a handful of episodes. So whatever drama they could’ve gotten out of that was minimal.
And this, I think, is a recurring problem with many adaptations of Mortal Kombat. They often put the actually interesting and popular characters off to the side in minor parts and fan service appearances, and instead focus on the far less compelling “relatable” characters.

Why build a show or movie around Kitana and Sub-Zero and the characters fans actually like when we can focus on bland, generic heroes no one gives a shit about?

(*cough* Cole Young)

Next, we have Defenders of the Realm, which acts as a spin-off of the movie but incorporates elements from the games’ canon. It basically imagines the MK heroes as a quasi-Justice League who live in a secret headquarters and go out on missions defending the Earth from evil.

Following the movies’ lead, the cartoon makes the same critical error in Kitana’s character by ignoring her past loyalty to Kahn. In fact, one episode included a flashback depicting a fully grown Kitana witnessing the invasion of Edenia.
So, again, fewer conflicts, no development, and a much less compelling character.

Following the superhero team format, everyone involved is distilled into a simple archetype to fill out the group. Liu’s the boy scout leader of the team, Sub-Zero’s the broody anti-hero, Nightwolf’s the smart one, etc.
And Kitana is presented as the prim, proper royal Lady to contrast the more down-to-earth, hot-headed Sonya.

It’s … boring. About what you’d expect from an attempt to turn Mortal Kombat into a children’s Saturday morning cartoon, and it’s a very dull interpretation of Kitana’s character.

But I will commend Defenders for capturing one aspect of her: that she’s fighting for a seemingly lost cause.
One of the later episodes—might have even been the last one—involved Kitana enacting a risky plan to overthrow Kahn once and for all with Shang Tsung’s help. Naturally, there’s a double-cross and the plan goes tits up. Though the heroes escape with their lives, and Outworld is left in disarray with Kahn and Tsung and other factions turning on each other, the episode ends with her lamenting she’s no closer to saving Outworld and no matter how hard she tries, she just can’t seem to free her home.

It’s a small beat, and an element of her character more apparent in later games like Deadly Alliance, but it was a nice touch that acknowledged some of her pathos and tragedy.

Moving on, although the reboot, Mortal Kombat 9, is part of the games’ story, I think it’s fair to count this as an adaptation as it is a retelling of the story. Unlike the popular depiction of Kitana that had been going since the first movie, in this game she is indeed initially loyal to Shao Kahn, learns the truth, and turns against him.

That’s about the only good thing I can say about her portrayal in MK9, because it’s all downhill from there. Yes, she learns the truth and turns on Kahn. But she does so with virtually no initiative or agency of her own.

She only begins questioning her place after Liu Kang humbles her during the first tournament. Kahn doesn’t appear to want anything to do with her and openly wonders why he bothered keeping her around. She searches for answers only when Raiden specifically tells her to start looking and where to look. Kahn outright tells her about Edenia himself, and she doesn’t even really choose to turn on him. He has her thrown in a dungeon to be executed, so of course she’s not going to serve him anymore. The choice to turn good was made for her.

And, believe or not, that’s not even all of it. They took away her history with Mileena. Even after she joins the heroes, she contributes nothing of value.
As I explained in detail in the Retrospective, MK9 was a goddamn disaster for Kitana (and others), and unfortunately—even though it reminded the world that once upon a time she was a loyal assassin for Shao Kahn that needed to change—it’s impact on her is still being felt today.

Anyway, around the same time MK9 pissed all over her, we got the web series, Mortal Kombat Legacy, which is arguably the best adaptation of Kitana we’ve gotten so far.

She grew up loyal and dedicated to Kahn, and he favored her. She discovers the truth, and she’s appropriately horrified and devastated by the revelation. And upon learning these secrets, she vows to overthrow him and set things right—her choice.
They have their own take on the “how” she learns the truth—and mileage will vary on whether it works or not—but they hit the key beats, and not only that, treat them with actual gravity.

If I have a gripe, it’s that she loses to Mileena and only prevails because Johnny Cage interferes. But that’s fairly minor in the grand scheme.

She doesn’t appear or is even mentioned in the 2021 movie, save an easter egg of her fans seen in the background. Some, I’m sure, might consider that a good thing.

Now, finally, we come to the recent animated movies, Mortal Kombat Legends.
She has a brief appearance in the first movie, Scorpion’s Revenge, fighting Liu Kang in the tournament. Unfortunately, it takes its cue more from their fight in MK9 than the one from the '95 movie—trying and failing to kill him rather than testing him and dropping hints. And, of course, she loses decisively with ease.

Which brings me to how this particular adaptation manages to bungle her. In these movies, Kitana knows the truth about Edenia and her parents, but still serves Shao Kahn. Unlike the games, and virtually every other adaptation, she isn’t waiting for the right time to turn on him or secretly undermining him. She continues serving him out of fear, convinced any resistance is hopeless, and needs to be “inspired” by Liu Kang’s courage.

This goes on in the sequel, Battle of the Realms, where she insists she has no choice but to serve Kahn and only turns against him after Liu and Raiden convince her. And when she does finally turn on him, she immediately gets the shit beat out of her and is taken prisoner.

I said earlier the critical thing with Kitana is that she chooses to turn good despite having every reason not to. That’s what makes her a hero. The fact she makes that choice under her own initiative and agency is what makes her a strong protagonist. That she pulls this off successfully shows she’s competent and capable.
And in Mortal Kombat Legends, she is none of these things.

In this, she doesn’t turn against Kahn out of fear for her own life. When she does finally turn, it’s only because Liu Kang and Raiden made her. And even when she betrays Kahn, she goes about it in the dumbest way possible and is promptly crushed.
Kitana in these movies has no courage, no agency, and no competence. This may be not as bad as MK9, but this portrayal is pretty damn low.

Threading the Needle

When looking at the various adaptations of Kitana, there seem to be two prevailing takes.
One downplays or outright ignores her history with Shao Kahn, leaving her a pretty dull, but competent hero. The other remembers she was once evil and turned good, but tends to rob her of agency and initiative, reducing her to the prize Liu Kang wins for saving the world.

A recurring flaw with early adaptations is a refusal to acknowledge her years of loyalty to Kahn. She’s always against him, was always the heroic princess, and if she ever did serve him at any point, it was due to brainwashing or mind control.
And, as explained, removing that from her character takes away a crucial element of her. Without it, we’re left with a blandly heroic figure who—while may still be competent and intelligent—doesn’t have a whole lot of depth.

Modern depictions, meanwhile, seem to treat the key beats of her story like check-marks to be clicked without realizing why they matter. We might get a Kitana that was raised by Shao Kahn and was his assassin. She might learn the truth about Edenia and turn against him. She might even have a fight with Mileena, whose history with her is treated as optional.

But the gravity of these beats is ignored. She almost never demonstrates any remorse or conflict about the fact she spent much of her life killing people in the name of the man who stole her kingdom and murdered her parents. She demonstrates no reluctance giving up the only life she knows … except in MK Legends, which goes too far and makes her a coward.
Her relationship with Shao Kahn itself is rarely, if ever, explored. Additionally, modern depictions of him ignore that he did once favor her and actually wanted her by his side, which is not only bad for her story, but makes him a much less interesting character, too.

Arguably worst of all, her arc is attributed solely to Liu Kang. Following MK9’s lead, if she turns good, it’s because Liu humbled her or inspired her. When she tries to turn on Kahn, she gets captured and must be rescued. If she survives the following war, it’s because Liu was protecting her.
She exists like this for no other reason than to motivate him—to give him a little extra something to fight for. Something for him to get mad about when she gets beaten and/or killed. Something to offer a kiss reward if/when he prevails like Princess Peach from Super Mario Bros.

For whatever reason, they just haven’t managed to balance the crucial elements of Kitana’s character. We’ll get the former assassin, but with none of the agency. We might get the noble hero, but with none of the depth or conflict. And too often she gets reduced to “Liu Kang’s love interest” … i.e. the least interesting thing about her.
As said, so far, the closest we’ve gotten to hitting all the marks correctly is Mortal Kombat Legacy—about four episodes of a brief made-for-internet web-series which, as much as they got her right, went off the rails with a lot of other characters.

Is Kitana really that hard to adapt? Why do we come so close but never quite stick the landing?

In the early days it might be more understandable. When Malibu was making those comics, MKII was still brand new, and though Kitana was an instant fan-favorite, they couldn’t know where her story was going to go. Yet, aside from the brainwashing, they had a decent sense of who she was.
Her inclusion in the '95 movie can be owed almost entirely to her popularity and the desire to have another female character aside from Sonya. And as said, it’s a fair portrayal for what it is. The shame of it is the sequels and spin-offs didn’t have any interest in fleshing her out beyond the “heroic princess” role.

It seems the consistent sticking point is her switch from loyal assassin to heroic princess—specifically, when and how she makes that change. When she’s introduced to us in the games, her loyalty to Kahn was in her past and she was already plotting to turn against him openly.
So early adaptations introduce her as already a good guy because that’s what she was like in the games, but forget her history.

Modern adaptations seem to take the approach that we should actually see Kitana when she was evil, watch her discover the truth, and have her turn against Kahn as it happens. In theory, that makes sense. From a writing perspective, there is good drama in witnessing these revelations and changes happen to her in the moment rather than left in her backstory.

The problem is they make all these developments the result of other characters. In the original games, Kitana was the hero of her own story that was already in progress before she was even introduced. She was the active agent of her own journey. In modern adaptations, she’s a side-plot the other protagonists encounter on their journey. She’s something for the hero—Liu Kang—to redeem and win.
And that’s a severe disservice to a character that had, in the original games, grown into one of the franchise’s best heroes.

Not to say she’s the only character who’s been bungled in adaptation, or that she’s even gotten it the worst.
For years, the go-to portrayal of Scorpion—often a noble, if flawed anti-hero in the games—was a psychotic madman with no mention of his lost family. He’s only recently managed to break out of that chain.
The younger Sub-Zero has arguably done better, but as one of (if not the) best developed protagonists in the series, none of the adaptations have come anywhere near where he should be. Kuai Liang should be one of the main characters of any movie or TV series, but we’ve yet to see it.
Annihilation got Jade about as wrong as they can get a character wrong, and adaptations seem to just hate Kung Lao.

The writer of the Mortal Kombat Legends movies, Jeremy Adams, recently did an interview where he discussed which characters get emphasized and which ones don’t. He lamented that any given movie just doesn’t have enough time to give every character attention.
Which basically boils down to a common excuse when Kitana’s portrayal is criticized—not just in adaptations but the games as well: “Not everyone can be the star.”

It’s a fair issue. The thing with Mortal Kombat, especially the original games, was it had no inherent structure. You had all these characters with their own stories, and if you were to structure a narrative around it, you have to decide which ones get the most attention. An ongoing television series might allow room to give every key character their due, but a ninety minute to two hour movie? That’s a tough needle to thread.

Which brings me to an interesting quote Adams said regarding Kitana herself: “… that internal struggle she's going through is an entire movie unto itself.”

That kind of gives the game away right there. It’s a common thing in storytelling that the dynamic characters with clear, fleshed-out motivation who encounter genuine conflict will demand attention.
That’s part of the reason characters like Kitana and Scorpion and the younger Sub-Zero, among others, emerged as such prominent figures in the story and garnered such fan-bases. They’re among Mortal Kombat’s best developed protagonists who have each undergone their own arcs. Frankly, they are MK’s stars.

And that’s the catch. Kitana, portrayed properly—the key elements of her character fleshed out treated with the gravity they deserve—maybe should be a star of the story. Maybe she should be among the lead protagonists?
And that’s why, so often, parts of her story are downplayed or ignored. They want her to be a side character. As said, presumably so other, less compelling characters can have the spotlight due to some misguided notion the audience is going to relate to them more.

(*cough* Cole Young)

How does one decide which characters should get the focus in a movie or TV show? In some cases, I think the answer is actually pretty obvious.

Maybe someday we’ll get an adaptation of Mortal Kombat that realizes characters like Kitana and Sub-Zero (and others) are the ones who should be center stage.
And when they do, maybe we’ll finally get a Kitana that really explores her history with Shao Kahn and appreciates the gravity and pathos of her transformation from ruthless assassin to heroic leader. One that allows her to grow and achieve her development and accomplishments under her own initiative and agency. An adaptation that lives up to what Kitana is for her fans.

It could happen. As said earlier, for a long time Scorpion was just a glorified henchman whenever they made an MK movie or TV show. Now, he’s one of the main leads of Mortal Kombat Legends, and a central part of the 2021 film.
Speaking of, that movie is likely going to get a sequel, so it seems a given Kitana will make an appearance.

. . .

Yeah, we’re probably going to have to wait a while for a proper adaptation of Kitana.