The Mortal Kombat franchise doesn't have the most straightforward timeline. While the original arcade games all follow an extremely simple plot, seeing Liu Kang defeat Shao Kahn in the Mortal Kombat tournament and save Earthrealm from an impending invasion, the narrative starts to get a little diluted from there. Soon, new villains are introduced, and characters start to die. But just as the Mortal Kombat universe is coming to an end, Raiden sends a message to his past self, thus changing the course of the future. And now, after even more time-bending shenanigans, Mortal Kombat 1 is set to restart the universe once more.
Mortal Kombat 11's villain Kronika pulled past versions of iconic characters through tears in reality. This eventually led to her inevitable defeat, but not before Raiden fused himself with both the past and present versions of Liu Kang, resulting in him becoming a Fire God. After squashing Shang Tsung's plan to conquer the realms using Kronika's hourglass, Liu Kang decides to reset the entire universe, this time in whatever way he sees fit. And thus begins Mortal Kombat 1. But as anyone who's seen Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse will know, sometimes there are canon events that simply need to happen, regardless of the universe.
What Liu Kang's Canon Events Could Be In Mortal Kombat 1
While Scorpion and Sub-Zero have been the most predominant mascots of the Mortal Kombat franchise in recent years, it's actually Liu Kang that's widely considered to be the series' main protagonist, and as such he's been through quite a lot over the last few decades. Liu Kang's primary role in the Mortal Kombat franchise has been as the champion of Earthrealm, chosen by Raiden to protect the planet against Shao Kahn's imminent invasion. Liu Kang has fallen into this role in every universe so far, though it doesn't always end well for him.
In Mortal Kombat: Deadly Alliance, Liu Kang is killed right at the start of the game by Shang Tsung and Quan Chi. Liu Kang is then resurrected in Mortal Kombat: Deception, though he's merely a zombified husk that's used as a weapon. In the rebooted timeline from Mortal Kombat 2011, Liu Kang is accidentally killed by Raiden following a major blowout. Liu Kang is then resurrected in this new timeline, and becomes an undead servant to Quan Chi, just like he did in the previous timeline. In Mortal Kombat 11, Liu Kang's past self is brought to the present day, and after a fight with his undead self, Raiden fuses all three of them together to create the Fire God Liu Kang.
In every timeline, it seems as though Liu Kang is destined to win the Mortal Kombat tournament, but then suffer a brutal and bloody death, only to then get resurrected as a soulless puppet. If Liu Kang has any canon events, then these would likely be them, but there's one big element that might throw a spanner in the works. In Mortal Kombat 1, Liu Kang is the creator of the universe.
Every aspect of this new timeline and universe has been hand-crafted by Liu Kang, from character relationships to whole world events. Based on the trailers fans have seen so far, it seems as though Liu Kang has already drastically changed Scorpion and Sub-Zero's relationship, along with reverting Raiden back to his mortal form. And if Liu Kang can change that, then he can presumably change anything. So while Liu Kang's canon event might be dying and getting resurrected, he's assumedly in charge of his own universe and timeline now, and he might not let those canon events happen anymore.
Mortal Kombat 1 will be released on PC, PS5, Switch, and Xbox Series X/S.
