Mortal Kombat is a tournament fought between worlds. Earthrealm, the human world, and Outworld, an empire of conquerors ruled by Shao Kahn, are two of many realms, and in the first two timelines, under a rule set by the Elder Gods, one realm may only take over another after winning ten tournaments in a row. The Lin Kuei are a Chinese clan of assassins, Sub-Zero's clan; the Shirai Ryu are the rival Japanese ninja clan Scorpion belongs to in every timeline (in the New Era he founds it himself). The feud between those two is the series' most famous grudge.
The games run on three timelines: the original, from the first Mortal Kombat in 1992 to Armageddon; the rebooted timeline that began with the 2011 Mortal Kombat and ran through X and 11; and the New Era of Mortal Kombat 1 (2023). Where they differ, this says which one it means. Every design on the Mortal Kombat shelf comes from that history.
Earthrealm, Outworld and the tournament
Besides Earthrealm and Outworld, the realms include the Netherrealm, a hell of demons and sorcerers, and Edenia, a peaceful realm that Shao Kahn conquered and folded into Outworld long before the first game.
When the original Mortal Kombat opens, Outworld has won nine tournaments in a row, with the sorcerer Shang Tsung running them and his champion, Goro, unbeaten. One more and Earthrealm falls. Liu Kang, a Shaolin monk, wins the tenth and defeats Shang Tsung. In Mortal Kombat II the fight moves to Outworld, and in Mortal Kombat 3 Shao Kahn gives up on the rules: he brings his dead queen, Sindel, back to life on Earth, which gives him the claim he needs to invade.
The tournament is the excuse. The real story is a long war over whether Earthrealm survives at all, and most of the cast choose a side in it.
Raiden, god of thunder
Raiden is the god of thunder and Earthrealm's protector. In the original game he takes mortal form to enter the tournament, and from then on he gathers and guides Earthrealm's fighters: Liu Kang above all. The wide straw hat, the glowing white eyes and the lightning he throws make him the easiest god in the series to spot. Thunder God is named for the title.
He is also why the reboot exists. At the end of Armageddon, with almost every fighter dead, Raiden sends a warning back to his younger self, and the 2011 Mortal Kombat replays the early tournaments as he tries to change what happens. At the end of Mortal Kombat X, purging Shinnok's corruption from Earthrealm's life force taints him, and he turns harder and darker. In the New Era of Mortal Kombat 1, Raiden is a mortal, a young man Liu Kang trains as Earthrealm's champion.
Scorpion vs Sub-Zero
In the original timeline, Hanzo Hasashi was a warrior of the Shirai Ryu, killed by the Lin Kuei's Sub-Zero, a man named Bi-Han. He comes back from the Netherrealm as Scorpion, a vengeful spectre with a skull under his mask, and kills Bi-Han in the first tournament.
His weapon is a spear: a blade on a rope that he throws into an opponent to drag them in, shouting "Get over here!" as he does it. Get Over Here is that line; Fire and Ice sets him against Sub-Zero.
From Mortal Kombat II, the Sub-Zero is Kuai Liang, Bi-Han's younger brother, who takes the name and the fight. Bi-Han himself later returns as Noob Saibot, a wraith of shadow. The grudge turns on a lie. The sorcerer Quan Chi murdered Hanzo's family and clan and let the Lin Kuei carry the blame. Scorpion learns it in Mortal Kombat 4 in the original timeline and in Mortal Kombat X in the rebooted one, where he makes peace with Kuai Liang.
Mortal Kombat 1 reshuffles the names: in the New Era, Bi-Han is Sub-Zero and his brother Kuai Liang is Scorpion; when Bi-Han betrays the Lin Kuei's purpose, Kuai Liang leaves and founds the Shirai Ryu.
On the shelf
The Lin Kuei vs the Shirai Ryu
The Lin Kuei are an ancient clan of assassins from China, some of whose warriors, Sub-Zero first among them, can control ice. Leaving the clan is punished by death. Lin Kuei is named for it.
In the original games' lore, the Shirai Ryu was founded by a Lin Kuei deserter named Takeda, who fled to Japan and taught the clan's secrets to his own students. The two clans have been enemies ever since: blue against yellow, ice against fire.
In Mortal Kombat 3, the Lin Kuei decide to turn their warriors into cyborgs, such as Sektor and Cyrax. Kuai Liang refuses, becomes a renegade hunted by his own clan, and in the original timeline later takes the clan over as its grandmaster. In the rebooted timeline he is first caught and turned into a cyborg; by Mortal Kombat X he is human again and grandmaster of a rebuilt Lin Kuei. Cold Front and Absolute Zero are both Sub-Zero.
On the shelf
Kitana and her steel fans
Kitana is the princess of Edenia, daughter of Queen Sindel and King Jerrod. When Shao Kahn conquered Edenia he killed Jerrod, took Sindel as his queen and raised Kitana as his own daughter. In Mortal Kombat II she is ten thousand years old, though she looks young, and serves Kahn as an assassin until she learns the truth and turns against him. Mileena, who looks like her twin, is in the original timeline a clone made by Shang Tsung from Kitana and the Tarkatan race.
Her weapons are a pair of steel fans with bladed edges. She throws them, slashes with them up close, and fans a gust that lifts an opponent helpless into the air. Her signature Fatality, there since Mortal Kombat II, is a kiss that finishes the loser; the games call it the Last Kiss.
The New Era changes the family again: in Mortal Kombat 1, Kitana and Mileena are sisters, both daughters of Sindel.
What a Fatality is
A Fatality is the finishing move. When a fighter wins the deciding round, the announcer calls "Finish him!" or "Finish her!", and in the few seconds before the loser falls the winner can enter a secret button command, from the right distance, to kill them in a way that belongs to that character alone. Then the word itself fills the screen.
The first game set the tone. Sub-Zero's became infamous as the spine rip; Scorpion pulls off his mask to show the skull and breathes fire. Its Pit stage adds the first stage Fatality, an uppercut off the bridge onto the spikes below.
The sequels kept adding finishers. Mortal Kombat II brought Friendships and Babalities, the joke versions, and Mortal Kombat 3 added Animalities, where the winner turns into a beast, and Mercy, which spares the loser for one more round.
On the back of a tee
Every fighter above is on the Mortal Kombat shelf, drawn from canon reference art. Check the size guide before you pick a size.
Why it works on the back: the series was built on colour coding, yellow ninja and blue ninja, fire and ice, and two flat colours facing off read from across the room the way they did on an arcade screen.
Read next: Hadoken, Shoryuken and the Satsui no Hado explained (the other side of the arcade rivalry) and Kratos from Sparta to Midgard: God of War explained.
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