The King of Fighters is another one of these video game movies where the writers lazily use the “other world” excuse to bring us the environments and worlds that we recall from the video game. In KOF (King of Fighters) the participants in the tournament are given ear pieces which can teleport them to another dimension to fight within an arena of the challenger’s choosing (think stage select before a match). While on the surface this sounds “cool” and limitless, the biggest issue that The King of Fighters suffers from is in the disrespect to the gamers and creators of the King of Fighters game series by changing everything about the players involved outside of their namesakes.
As a hardcore fan of the series with KoF 97 being my favorite, I was annoyed to say the least to see the butchering of characters such as Terry Bogard (who is some sort of ex-military CIA agent in the movie), Shiranui Mai (who is now a skinny detective) and Rugal (Ray Park) who stayed close to his character but decided to channel The Joker from Batman lore in order to present his ruthlessness.
Do They Do Any of The Moves?
The first thing any gamer will ask me after hearing that the movie sucks is 00% going to be “well do they do any of the special moves? The answer to that is a resounding NO! I mean they couldn’t even give us a measly fireball or combination… no special folks, I am sorry.
What made the King of Fighters so bad for me?
Refusal to Stay True to The Characters: None of the characters in the movie whose name reflects those in the games, look or perform like their counterparts. Shiranui Mai, the busty ninja girl who uses flips, cartwheels and aerial body presses to destroy her opponents is played by Maggie Q, who has an A-cup, walks around in a purple hamper, skirt thing with garters and neither throws fans, does cartwheels or speaks Japanese. Actually what’s hilarious is that the intro shows Maggie doing her obviously Kung-Fu Kata which has little to nothing to do with Ninjitsu. Kyo Kusanagi is biracial, yes the heir to the fire techniques passed down throughout the Kusanagi Samurai clan is a white dude (young Kyo looks Asian in the flashbacks – think Legend of Chun-Li)… I know, I get it, the white-wash yields more viewers especially when Maggie Q is the hawte. Anyway, it is what it is.
Refusal to Stay Even Close to The Personalities: Mai’s love for Ninja prodigy Andy Bogard now has her in love with Iori Yagami (WTF!) she is also boringly stoic and snarky instead of bubbly, funny and liberal as the in game character is. Iori is not a Heavy Metal, Japanese bad boy like he is in the game but comes off as a pampered business man… do I really need to continue with the other characters?
The Unnecessary CG Effects: I felt as if someone got this movie who had just finished special effects school and felt it necessary to attach “lightning effects” to everything moving. When Shiranui Mai does a flip it has a lightning trail, when she breaks a fall – lightning trail and her moves all have… you guessed it lightning trails.
Was there anything you liked about this movie?
Vice and Mature’s lesbian love was a nice distraction and I appreciated the fact that they actually resembled their counterparts in the game. Too bad I cannot say the same about the horrible wardrobe they were forced to wear – but still they accompanied Rugal and THAT may have been the only accurate thing about this movie.
In the end let’s sum it up, you have a movie which ignores it’s source material, changes them and ignores the basic foundation of what makes the original one of our favorite game series. This makes movies like Tekken seem genius being that it actually kept the outfits and a portion of the moves that the characters had in game. I am sorry gamers but the struggle continues to adapt a fighting game to live-action without completely birthing a turd. The King of Fighters should not be watched; it should be doused in gasoline and set on fire. Fans of Maggie Q and martial arts badass Ray Park would do well to avoid this movie in order to keep opinions on these two actors positive. This movie should never have been made.
Cinephile and opinion writer, Greg Dragon has been a fan of movies since the 80's when Kung Fu theater was all the rage and Roger Moore was James Bond. As an opinion writer that has reviewed Box Office releases on a number of prominent websites, Greg is the founder and lead critic of Spicy Movie Dogs.
