Welcome, welcome, to the pantheons of illogical meanderings, as I, your gracious host, strap down yet another unlucky kombatant for us to shine a spotlight upon.

We've got Mileena, Nightwolf, and Sheeva out of the way.

It's Smoke's turn this week.


WHO IS SMOKE?
Smoke, or Tomas Vrbada, is sorta known as a Lin Kuei assassin, sorta known as the guy who went all "Domo Arigato, Mr. Roboto", and mostly known as the dude that plays second fiddle to his best friend, series poster boy, Sub-Zero.

(Basically, Smoke's the Chris Tucker to Sub-Zero's Jackie Chan.)

Smoke started off as a mysterious gray ninja hiding in the woods that would occasionally poke his head out to see what was going on... of course, you had to suspend your disbelief that he pulled over on the side of the road, rushed to the nearest tree to relieve his bladder, and then some huge fight stumbled in past him mid-stream.

("Can you guys fight somewhere else? I'm trying to piss back here!")

In some instances, he was originally said to be a spy for Shang Tsung, and the comics even wrote him as one of Shang's assassins that worked alongside Jade to kill the Earthrealm heroes. Unfortunately, that portrayal was a bit balls, and he was written as just a smidgen above functionally retarded.

(He also said "Toasty" a lot for no reason like an idiot savant. Even Reptile and Baraka sounded smarter than him.)

Since that portrayal of him sucked something awful, it was quickly established that, officially, Smoke was the best bud of the younger Sub-Zero that tagged along on an invite to Kahn's second tournament, giving him both more character development yet also damning him to being the one ninja that suffered from a crippling case of abandonment issues and social neediness.

(Smoke probably wasn't held enough as a baby)

Smoke's story didn't pick up, however, until he was captured by the Lin Kuei and forced into going through the 'cyber initiative' during MK3, where they turned him into a cyber warrior because the Grand Master was a fan of The Six Million Dollar Man.

("We can rebuild him... we have the technology...")

And just when Smoke's story finally took a turn for the interesting.... it was dropped and forgotten. I mean, literally. He didn't show up again until two games later and it outright said that, oops, everyone forgot about him and he'd been in Kahn's garage, a poor, lonely, forgotten robot, just sort of hanging out until something interesting stumbled into his lap.

(Unfortunately, that "something" was Noob Saibot, so Smoke never got to have an award-winning robot romance that delighted the young and the young at heart)

Smoke then served as the mindless tag-team back-up to Noob Saibot where... where he again did nothing but serve as the "mother" of a race of demonic nanomachines. Smoke's hysterical fall from grace and dignity climaxed when his Armageddon ending had him turning into a giant demonic smoke monster.

(He later had cameos in the TV series "LOST" as the smog monster...)

And thus was the end of generation 1 Smoke. He had his fans (all ninjas did), but it was hard to care about him when it seemed everyone else didn't really care either (including his "best friend" Sub-Zero.) But have no fear, for Smoke emerged from the ashes in the skin of Christopher Walken for the newest retread of the beloved trilogy era!

("Your older brother entrusted me with Shinnok's amulet. I had to hide it from Sektor for ten years... in my ass!")

WHY IS SMOKE IN THE SERIES?
Is Smoke a ninja? Do I seriously need to answer this question?



*sigh* Fine. I guess you can never have enough ninjas.

(Ed Boon: "MORE! MORE ninjas! I want this game to RAIN ninjas... wait... "rain" ninjas.... guys, I got an idea for a new ninja!")

After the success of Reptile as a hidden character in MK1, the MK team decided to make lightning strike twice and included a few secret characters in MK2 that did exactly what Reptile did in MK1 - he was a pallet swap that used the moves of other fighters. In this case, he was basically just Scorpion, except they accidentally hit "desaturate" in photoshop and covered him in smoke clouds so he wasn't the most generic looking ninja in history.

Ten points if you can figure out how long it took them to come up with his name.


(Put your damn hand down, Jimmy. I was being sarcastic.)

Smoke became all about Smoke. His hair looks like smoke. He turns into smoke. He's covered in smoke. He throws smoke bombs. He kills with smoke. He sounds like he's been chain-smoking since kindergarten. Even his catchphrase is "where's there's smoke there's fire".... which is a flat-out lie. I never saw any fire, unless you played in the Netherrealm stage. And if that's true, does that mean Smoke was always on fire?

("Where there's smoke, there's... oh, OH MY GOD! PUT IT OUT! PUT IT OUT!")

You'd think all that smoke wouldn't catch on, but Smoke had a lot going for him. For starters, he was a ninja (we've been over this), but he also followed two very important rules.

One: Smoke is cool.

(Totally cool, kids.)

Two: Smoke kills.


So we have a ninja killer made of smoke. Bona fide success story, people. That's almost as good as hot women on your bedroom floor with bras made of bacon.

(You just can't argue with combinations that irresistible)

SMOKE'S STORY -
We've already talked about Smoke's established story from the prior (e.g. -"unimportant now") generation, so let's tackle Smoke in this story.

We first see Smoke tagging along after Sub-Zero to find Sub-Zero's brother's killer, because Smoke and Sub-Zero are totally BFFs.

(And totally, like, for reals BFFs. No like that bitch Hydro that got all weird and stopped returning Smoke's calls.)

Smoke does his Smoke thing by wandering in the woods aimlessly until he's attack by ninja robots that seek to make him one of them.

("Resistance is futile.")

Despite being able to turn into Smoke and drift away, he gets cornered, until Raiden comes in to zap them off. Unfortunately, though he's spared, the Lin Kuei focuses on Sub-Zero instead and takes him in Smoke's place, altering the course of history.

And thus Smoke is free to forge his own path, to be his own man, to seek a new direction, free from the shackles of pointless waste and untapped potential. Finally, Smoke can move out from under the shadow of others and grow as a human being. Finally he...



... can die a needlessly pointless death that has him do nothing of worth after the robo-switch occurs and makes the storyline possibilities his original survival opened up utterly meaningless since he kicks the bucket anyway soon after.

I'm sorry, maybe I'm missing something. If you're going to go through the trouble of utterly changing a very big, important, character-defining moment in MK history, enduring fan backlash as you decimate the storylines and backgrounds of popular characters, I'd accept even that if it meant planting their feet on the path to a wide open new direction. Why would you instead do all that convoluted, needless altering that DOES set up some healthy future potential... only to negate it all immediately after?

(At least it wasn't all a dream..... OR WAS IT?!)

More baffling, to me, is how Smoke got killed. I mean, he gets his neck snapped by Sindel. But... couldn't he have escaped rather easily from that?


And thus the sad cycle of Smoke doing nothing continues. This is sad because, you know, apart from a death less dignified than what henchman number 63 got from any generic Schwarzenegger film, he actually had a very interesting personality, good presence, and surprising charisma. And let's not forget the hair.

(Such a godly mane of cascading silver locks, as if a waterfall of shimmering sex flowed from his dandruff-free scalp)

BUT... BUT BUT BUT.... Smoke also left an impression in his Arcade ending where it was revealed that Smoke was actually a young boy from Prague that was sacrificed to a demon and turned into a demon smoke monster and then forgot.

... Ain't THAT a pitch from left field?

("It's so brilliant! They'll never see it coming! Ever!... probably because it makes no goddamn sense!")

On one hand, that's actually pretty cool that he has a past, and an interesting one at that.

On the the other hand, if Smoke is really a smoke demon in human flesh that conveniently forgot, then it brings to question how the Lin Kuei managed to cybernize him the first time and how his demonic powers worked with technology.

It also shows that the Lin Kuei - that "chinese group of ninja assassins" - is about as Chinese as Mickey Rooney in Breakfast at Tiffany's.

(I don't think they're really asian....)

And Smoke is a lot less badass when you realize he grew up as "Tommy.... the gray-white ninja with the long, beautiful hair".

(The 90's - the era of color-coded ninja warriors)

SMOKE'S FUTURE
Smoke's in the same pickle as most of the good guys; he's dead, and Quan Chi has his soul, ready to use him and the others to invade Earth.

That's not very encouraging for his prospects.

(Well, MAYBE he can make it out okay....)

I'll be honest, though, I'm probably more disappointed in Smoke's fate than anyone else's, possibly even Sub-Zero's. Smoke has always been lacking. He's always been a second-string hanger-on that's never stood on his own two legs. The story in the game shook things up and forced him to break from this tradition, setting him up as a potential and unlikely hero in the absence of "greater" heroes like Sub-Zero... that was the trade-off I imagined would follow the controversial plot-swap where Sub-Zero took Smoke's fate.

But, nope, nothing was done with it. Sub-Zero and Smoke just traded storylines and Smoke was killed off before he could show an ounce of individuality or independence. His death was meaningless, unmourned, and inconsequential. And it's frustrating because the path was finally clear, the way open, for him to become something better. It was right there, staring at us smack-dab in the face, screaming and yelling, so blunt and obvious and necessary.... and instead Smoke's entire purpose spiraled in the opposite direction. Instead of becoming something better, he became this:


Whatever storyline that follows this, either Smoke will be just a bodybag to punch on during the inevitable Earthrealm invasion, an unimportant background character to tether the plot along, or he may repeat his fate from before, and just go unmentioned and forgotten for a few years and games until somebody remembers that, you know, Smoke's a pretty good character.

And, ultimately, he is. Smoke is a good character. He's got the pathos, the gameplay, the look, and the variety to stay interesting and relevant for years... it's just upsetting that, once again, NRS has failed to capitalize on the potential existing in characters and instead views them as rather disposable assets.

Frankly, I think Smoke deserved better. He came so far in this game, got so close, only to have his moment to shine stamped out.

He got crapped on, peeled off, and thrown away. And the last thing I want to do is have any MK character become the equivalent of a Huggies diaper.

(Smoke is not a receptacle of your bad, wasteful ideas!)

So that's Smoke. Do you agree? Do you not care about Smoke at all? Did you like his previous story? How about his new story? What do you think of his "smoke demon" origins? Do you prefer him human, or are you still calling this game incomplete until Cyber Smoke shows up?

Let's hear what you have to say. And let me know which kombatant should get his or her turn next.

Okay, thanks people. Garlador out.