The finishing moves in the Mortal Kombat series have always been a staple of the games, with the original 1992 release of Mortal Kombat onto arcade machines (and a release onto several home platforms a year later) with it’s bloody “kombat” and gruesome finishing moves making it one of the 3 big games of its time leading to the creation of the ESRB, the age rating system for games (as well as the reason why the clerk at Gamestop had to go on a college essay level rant about why your 12 year old self shouldn’t be playing GTA5), of which Mortal Kombat got slapped with an M, for Mature, rating. 

We have come a long way from the sprites of the early 90’s, and with 3 decades of industry development in technology and creativity, as well as 11 more mainline entries in the Mortal Kombat series alone. But, while the technology changed, the love for flashy and violent finishing moves never went away, and with the newest release back in mid September, we got quite a few more to watch, all pushing the limits of style, gore, and overall vicious carnage.

10.   Grand Finale (Li Mei)

Li Mei has been absent from the roster since Mortal Kombat Armageddon way back in 2006, and with her return to the roster she brings new abilities and skills, including a stylish new firework like magic she uses to great effect in kombat. If you were awaiting her return, you were definitely rewarded for that patience in this game.

The finisher starts by Li-Mei pushing her fingers, charged with energy, into the opponent's torso, blowing their arms off before doing it once more into their chest, causing the whole thing to burst with her spectral Shi Zi Lion, as the game calls it in the movelist, which catches their now airborne head in their mouth and brings it back to its owner. Good...lion.

Li Mei’s magic remained the same color, but in all aspects besides is brand new by comparison to previous entries.

9. Infinite Loop  (Geras)

Mortal Kombat 1 - Geras' 2nd Fatality

Geras is a newcomer in the series, having only debuted in MK11, the game prior to the current entry in the series, and while he was not very popular back then, most people in the community agree he’s definitely had a glow up, and that includes his fatalities. 

In this case, Geras reaches through a portal to a different timeline, as he wields the sands (literally) of time themselves. He rips the head off someone, and smashes it across the face of his enemy, leaving their jaw knocked off, before handing it to them. To their both horror and confusion, it is their own head with the same damages. A portal behind them opens, only for a hand to reach through, ripping their head off to use in much the same way, presenting an endless cycle for this fatality across timelines.

The portal leads to the same arena, and the same enemy, both, revealing the infinite repetition this fatality leads to. 

8. Catch A Ride (Johnny Cage)
 

Being a Hollywood icon has its perks, in this case, Johnny’s wealth and his sheer capability of burning money whenever he’d like to. In this case, Johnny shadow kicks the opponent through the windshield of a nice sports car, and opens the door, the opponent falling down onto the ground, and being bisected by Johnny slamming it down on them. Held by their guts, the opponent is dragged away as Johnny starts the car, pulling them towards a fiery explosion. Toasty!

At least your opponent ends up on the driver’s side. Probably not anywhere near where they want to be, though.

7. Atomic Heart (Havik)

Havik is another returning classic character, and one of which was highly requested to return, and he most certainly delivers, coming back in his gorey and chaotic glory. In this finisher, he pries open his own chest, ripping his heart out, and doing much the same to the opponent, replacing their heart with his, causing a massive explosion in sync with him crushing their heart in his hand. If Havik can constantly pull himself apart and put himself back together like a jigsaw puzzle, how do fatalities work on him?

Heart transplants are hard to come by, but I don't think anybody wants his irradiated grenade of an organ.

6: Safety Vest (Stryker)

Playable kombatants aren’t the only ones using fatalities in MK1, as the Kameos, the assist fighters, have their own finishers referencing their classic appearances and fatalities in most cases. Stryker, for example, gets his old bomb vest fatality, in which he approaches the opponent, and rigs a vest covered in bombs, grenades, plastic explosives, and other such devices, walking away, and detonating it over his shoulder. I just wonder where he was keeping all those bombs, it explains why he has so many grenades to throw in game, though.

Cool guys don’t look at explosions, especially when it’s explosions they make. 

5. The Red Sea (Rain)

Rain has taken a step down from demi-god to mortal man, but his power has definitely not gone away, with him now being the High Mage of Outworld, he retains his hydromancy. In this finisher, he sends a whirlpool that rises into the air, spinning his staff to strip the skin and limbs off his opponent as the water begins to spin at rapid speeds. He then parts the water to slice the opponent in two, filling the water with red.

His magic seems as though it is bound to his staff, and he can use it to control any water near him that he wields.

3. Double Dragon (Liu Kang)
 

Liu Kang finds himself in the role of Earthrealm’s protector god, seemingly having relinquished his lightning powers, his magics and abilities focus around two forms of fire, blue and red. He wields these to great effect in his fatality, in which he punches the enemy once, knocking them to their knees as he summons two dragons to grab the opponents arms, pulling them up into the air, with Liu jumping up to slam their head through their body to slice them in two, crushing it as they hit the floor.

He’s come a long way from just transforming into a green dragon in the old games, now he simply summons them to do the kill for him. Convenient!

2. Indigestion (Reptile)

Having been my main character to play since I was just a kid, I was over the moon to see Reptile return after skipping the previous entry, and he has one hell of a return to form, with his new fatality being one of the best in the whole game. He charges at an enemy in his lizard form, turning invisible, to their confusion, before sneaking up behind them and chomping down on them, taking their entire torso into his mouth before swallowing them whole. After a pause, he spits them back out, now bisected and soaked in skin scorching acid, trying to crawl away before Reptile lunges over and crushes them under a heavy clawed hand. No one told him not to play with his food, apparently.

I wonder what creature Reptile is supposed to be like to be able to do this to a full body. Some kind of snake crocodile hybrid?

1. Annihilation (Cyrax)

Despite not being a playable fighter, Cyrax has the best fatality by sheer extremity. Cyrax simply walks towards the opponent a few steps, then begins to eject a huge pile of bombs at their feet. The screen zooms out to a view of Earth, before a massive explosion shockwaves out and obliterates the entire planet. Talk about a pyrrhic victory.

What is in those bombs that makes them capable of erasing the entire planet down to the core?