New Line’s follow-up to 2021’s live-action Mortal Kombat movie is going to have a strong Outworld and Netherrealm presence, with Shao Kahn, Jerrod, Sindel, and Quan Chi confirmed for director Simon McQuoid’s sequel. In a promising bit of casting news, filmmakers have found an appropriately huge, menacing, and absolutely ripped dude to play the film’s ultimate big bad, Shao Kahn: British actor Martyn Ford.
According to a report from Deadline, Ford will be joined by newly confirmed cast members Desmond Chiam as Edenian King Jerrod (aka Kitana’s dad), Ana Thu Nguyen as Queen Sindel, and Damon Herriman as the sorcerer Quan Chi in Mortal Kombat 2.
Ford is a hulking six-foot-eight-inch bodybuilder and actor best known for his debut role in Boyka: Undisputed, where he played the gigantic Bane-like antagonist Koshmar and fought Scott Adkins’ Boyka in a exhilarating finale. He has since appeared in Kingsman: The Golden Circle and F9: The Fast Saga, and will appear in Bert Kreischer’s The Machine. Here he is as The Ogre in Syfy’s gory, grindhousey, single-season television series, Blood Drive:
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And here’s Ford standing next to fellow huge guy Dave Bautista:
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At six-eight, Ford stands just six inches shy of Shao Kahn’s height as listed in the Mortal Kombat games, so, yeah, he’s a big fella. Check out Ford’s Instagram account if you want to imagine what he’ll look like holding a giant maul.
Mortal Kombat 2’s cast also includes recent castings Adeline Rudolph and Tati Gabrielle, both from Netflix’s Chilling Adventures of Sabrina, as Kitana and Jade, respectively. Karl Urban (The Boys, Dredd) is on board as Johnny Cage.
Joining the — OK, fine — kast are returning actors Lewis Tan as Cole Young, Jessica McNamee as Sonya Blade, Josh Lawson as Kano, Tadanobu Asano as Raiden, Mehcad Brooks as Jax, Ludi Lin as Liu Kang, Chin Han as Shang Tsung, Joe Taslim as Sub-Zero/Bi-Han, Hiroyuki Sanada as Scorpion, and Max Huang as Kung Lao. Yes, Kung Lao and Kano died in the previous movie. So?
Mortal Kombat 2 is currently filming in Australia. The sequel’s screenplay was penned by Jeremy Slater (Moon Knight, The Umbrella Academy). The film does not have an announced release date.