well ya everyone knew batman fit in well with mk but its characters like greenlantern or wonderwoman who ppl were getting worried about, since they are like the generic heroes who do what is expected from a hero. and not really beat the shit out everyone they meet. of course im not 100% if greenlantern or wonderwoman had a dark or gritty moment since i dont read the comics.

Applause for Incredibly-Low-Standards Man!

Compared to Mortal Kombat, DC is just another episode of the Teletubbies.

lmao

Well, it depends on you're point of view on what "dark and gritty" is.
By Mortal Kombat standards, dark & gritty means blood and death.

Green Lantern once went batshit insane, slaughtered the rest of the Lantern Corps, and tried to destroy the universe.
Wonder Woman has snapped necks, killed gods, and once beheaded Medusa on national television.

So yeah, Green Lantern and Wonder Woman at the least qualify MK's standards.

And yet, this game is about as dark as the sugar plumb fairy.

Honestly, I have never thought MK to be all that dark and brutal.

It's dark in an 'Army of Darkness' way to me.

Bingo!

That's always what MK has been - a cheesily dark game.

MK doesn't just have blood and death. It has a "horror" and "mystery" atmosphere.

The only DC title that has anything near that is Batman.

GL and WW are scouts. I don't think some violence in their history qualifies them, as most comic titles have encountered some.

Batman's dark, but not dark enough for MK.

The Joker, however...

Well you both got a point. MK was dark, but in a more non serious way. MK 1 was the most dark of them all and most serious. MK 2 added some darkness but also relieved some. I believe with the current systems they can achieve darkness on a more serious level by introducing more realistic graphics and animations. Combined with the more dark and mysterious athmosphere from the first 2 games. And THEN...we got ourselves that dark and gritty MK game.

remember this fake trailer? I hope one day they will make a MK with this athmosphere and graphics, even if its fake and hard to see.

http://nl.youtube.com/watch?v=crdQ00ns-BA

Not only that, but typically DC's "darkness" is about more than being "dark" for the sake of saying "dark." It's motivated by developing plots and contributing to a designed asthetic.

MK's "darkness" reads more like a checklist of naughty things children will try to get away with drawing in Sunday school. Not exactly big on the ideas.

Yeah Superman and Wonderwomen are very dark and gritty. Just look at their colors at their pants.

a characters costume design is irrelevant to narrative tone

Nah...I disagree.

I mean, and I've read a couple of these comics where the DC heros kill in them. But, the point isn't that "they have never been" dark or gritty...or w/e.

The point is that their integrity is not, nor has it ever been consistently negative like Mortal Kombats is.

These DC characters have no mainstay in the slogan of the year. "Darker, Grittier, Dirtier". Therefor they have no real potential to be passed off as such to the main-stream. Even if it is that they are currently "mingling with the killers" for a game or two.

Let's just admit that.

Their integrity is of a "do -gooder class". Not higher, not lower...just lighter toned. For instance, these characters are cartoon series worthy, where MK is not. They both tried the same thing, and MK fell short really early....cuz it doesn't work. heh...The comparison, is between an American Cartoon, and an almost Horror Anime. That's the difference.

Why do we fight these things? lol

The comparison is between an American cartoon and a dark slapstick martial arts comedy with mystical elements. There is nothing moderately horrifying about Mortal Kombat ( unless we're talking about gameplay HYOOOOO)

Shouldn't it be a dark colored batman in this game?

Eh... Attributing Defenders of the Realm's fate to the moral fibre or adult tone of the characters really gives it too much credit. They made their bed with cheap animation, a cheesy premise, and bad writing.

The cop-out is really that, on the page, a character can be whatever you want it to be. The response that supports that is the countless examples of works where the characters are operating on very similar levels. The spectrum of DC's catalogue stretches beyond Mortal Kombat both ways. They have the inevitably lighter, and the inevitably darker.

The comics medium just happens to have the luxury of sixty-years of print and the opportunity to more intently rest on their narrative. MK paints short strokes with broad brushes, but the DCU's darkest hours are able to examine asthetics, psychology, and any number of other subjects far more intently.

"Iconic" has been bandied about a lot during the lead-up to this game, but with no disrespect, the value of MK characters can't possibly match-up to the representation DC characters have for the zeitgeist of history and larger-than-life ideals. This bright, bold canvas is what at times has lent the true weight of darkness to these characters, provided not only by that obvious contrast, but the strength and minutia of the writing.

MK has a mature rating because we don't want small children imitating the colourful cartoon violence these games are built around.

Noone's going to deny that MK have made a name for themselves doing that, but to attribute a bit of blood, a monster or two, and a dark purple colour palette to superior darkness is laughable. MK fans don't really have any business spitting over that.
Anyone can slather things in blood, and pull apart limbs.
Plenty of DC characters have done it, and it's even on shelves right now (in a Superman mini-series, no less -- Final Crisis: Legion of 3 Worlds).

A little perspective goes a long way!

And to go back to the cartoon example -- which really boils the characters down to their value as a commercial entity -- when have we ever seen the MK characters be especially dark in any other medium? The movies, cartoons, comics, lunchboxes, t-shirts, action figures, and any other commercially viable product, have all adhered to the same interpretive constraints as any DC property.

The pendulum swings both ways. For DC, it's a bigger pendulum with a wider swing each way.

I know its not the darkest, but DC has gotten darker in spots. Look at how Final Crisis is turning out, and lets not forget our new raging friends:

http://www.newsarama.com/php/multimedia/album_view.php?gid=666&page;=1
http://www.newsarama.com/php/multimedia/album_view.php?gid=666&page;=2
http://www.newsarama.com/php/multimedia/album_view.php?gid=666&page;=3
http://www.newsarama.com/php/multimedia/album_view.php?gid=666&page;=4

Now, I know they're too new to have been included, but having Atrocitus in the game would have been awesome.

And because no one in Mortal Kombat wears brightly colored spandex.....

As others have already pointed out, Mortal Kombat is "dark & gritty" for 10 years olds. It's mature the same way a Friday the 13th sequel is mature.
So although characters like Superman and Wonder Woman aren't necessarily meant to be seen as "dark" or "gritty" characters...even though they can and have been presented that way here and there....let's not pretend Mortal Kombat is the video game equivalent of Seven or Silence of the Lambs.
Cause it ain't, and it never was.

true the costumes dont scream dark and gritty but the personalities of the characters do, i mean all the characters have no problem with snapping necks and total gore when facing an opponent on a regular basis. You did mention thjat dc characters have had those dark moments but on average they try to avoid the lethal and gory approach to getting things done. In addition i think that most of the Dc characters haveent had as dark a past as any of the MK characters. well,.... except for the characters in the batman comics and deathstroke. But once again im not 100% here, i dont read comics

Win.

Actually, I think you got that backwards. MK has incredibly ineffective storytelling standards compared to DC, therefore rendering all of its would-be "darkness" null and void. MK isn't even taken seriously anymore by anyone over 15, so it's about as dark as Goosebumps(the book and TV series for the uninformed). Blood and gore that looks like red Play Do, yellow ninjas who seek revenge on anything and everything in sight and fat drunken bastards who puke and fart for special moves aren't exactly elements that one can take seriously.

@ Mick: I wouldn't mind seeing a "Stan Lee's Just Imagine" style retelling of the MK mythos by some of DC's best talent. Then some of these people could finally see the quality they've been missing out on all these years.

Here's what I think:

MK - Violence, blood, gore, and death are expected and even encouraged throughout all the games.

DC - Violence, blood, gore, and death are bad, often rare, and highly discouraged amongst the heroes throughout the years.

When Batman and Superman stated their supreme disappointment in Wonder Woman for killing someone, even if it was to save their life, I think that elevates them to a standard that MK shouldn't bring them down to. Superman is not, and has never been, a killer. Sub-Zero is a killer. Batman has never taken a life. Jax and Sonya have taken many.

I'm not so upset at some characters, like Joker and Deathstroke, who ARE killers, but inclusions like Captain Marvel, who technically is still a teenage boy in a man's body, makes the entire thematic mesh between the worlds to be uncomfortable and schizophrenic in tone.

Ultimately, they had to compromise. Superheroe's can kill and MK needs its violence. Ultimately, MK is the side that took the hit, lowered the violence quota, and shifted its tone to suit the needs of Batman and co.

I'd rather not have such compromise in the future.