Summary
Video games have been branching out into other media ever since Pac-Man, Pole Position, and Donkey Kong got Saturday morning cartoons. Yet they haven’t always been great. If anything, and if they’re graded on a curve, the recent run of adaptations like theSonic the Hedgehogmovies and the IlluminationSuper Mario Brosmovie are probably the best of the bunch.
ButTekkendoesn’t have the fun & frolics of those mascots. It’s a violent fighting game with a crazy plot involving devils, angels, and a family feud. It’s also the biggest 3D fighting game franchise around, and many studios have tried adapting it to the screen either as a feature-length picture or a TV series. But which ones are worth watching? Here areTekken’smovies and seriesranked by quality.
6The Avenging Fist
IMDB Score: 4.3/10
The story behindThe Avenging Fistis more interesting than the movie itself. It was planned to be a Hong Kong adaptation ofTekken, except the first producer, Wong Jing, didn’t get the movie rights to the game or characters. Either he forgot, or things just fell through. With a new producer in place, everything got tweaked to be legally distinct from Namco’s IP, even if ‘Iron Surfer’ is a dead ringer for Hwoarang.
The final project now became a story about Nova (ersatz-Jin), the son of Dark Thunder (not-Kazuya), using a technological MacGuffin to save the world from rebels. It somehow got famous Hong Kong stars Yuen Biao and Sammo Hung as the Kazuya and Lei Wulong equivalents respectively, but there’s little else on offer here. Fans of mockbusters wouldfind more fun elsewhere.
5Tekken 2: Kazuya’s Revenge
IMDB Score: 2.8/10
Despite the ‘2’ in the title,Tekken 2: Kazuya’s Revengeis a prequel to theTekkenlive-action movie. Not that that’s the only thing wrong with the title. For one, Kane Kosugi’s hero spends most of the movie as an amnesiac called ‘K’ who doesn’t relearn his true name until the end. He has more in common withKing of Fighters’ K’thanTekken’s cold-blooded, demonic megalomaniac.
He also doesn’t get his revenge, as he spends much of the runtime as an agent forcedSuicide Squad-style to do jobs for ‘The Minister’. If Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa and Gary Daniels didn’t return as Heihachi and Bryan Fury for some cameos, or if the urban setting was called anything but ‘Tekken City’, it would have nothing to do with the games. It would be just another generic direct-to-video action movie.
4Tekken: Blood Vengeance
IMDB Score: 5.8/10
Tekken: Blood Vengeancerectifies the tangential connections from the prior films by having Namco’s full involvement. No cameos, no renames or disclaimers. This is the actual Ling Xiaoyu working with the real Alisa Bosconovitch to investigate the true Jin Kazama and his authentic dad and granddad, Kazuya and Heihachi Mishima. There’s also a guy called Shin Kamiya, but hedidn’t make it into the games.
Namco even used the movie to promoteTekken Tag Tournament 2, by releasing a demo with the movie’s incarnations of Xiaoyu, Alisa, Devil Jin, and Devil Kazuya. That said, while it’s the one movie that resembles the games the most, right down to the voice cast and juggle combos, it doesn’t make for a coherent plot. Which is just as well as it’s not canon to the games. Xiaoyu and Alisa made for a nice friendly duo though.
3Tekken
IMDB Score: 4.8/10
Tekken, the live-action movie from 2010, didn’t get much love from the fanbase. The antipathy towards it was even used to promoteT: BV, saying it would be truer to the source material. Which it admittedly was. But as a viewing experience,Tekkenis a touch better. It’s certainly better than its sequel/prequel, as it’s about Jin Kazama entering a fighting tournament to avenge his mother Jun.
It takes some odd artistic licenses, like establishing ‘Tekken City’, and pairing Jin up with Christie Monteiro than his in-game admirer Xiaoyu. Nonetheless, the movie really tried to include most of the game’s cast, and keep their designs as faithful as possible, right down to their outfits. Even so, it’snot the best fighting game moviearound. It doesn’t have the charm of its silly-but-action-packed predecessors inStreet FighterandMortal Kombat.
2Tekken: The Motion Picture
IMDB Score: 5.2/10
It’s calledTekken: The Motion Picturebecause the term ‘OVA’ wasn’t commonplace in 1998. Originally released as two 30-min episodes before being united as a single 1hr showing for its Western release, it’s an adaptation ofTekken 2, following Jun Kazama’s quest to stop Kazuya from getting revenge and giving in to his demonic impulses. That, and Lei discovering the Mishima Zaibatsu’s grim experiments.
If fans were wondering whatTekken’s equivalent to theStreet Fightermovie was, then this is it. It takes itself seriously with its dramatic dialogue (“TEKKEN IS THE KEY TO LIFE!”). Yet it also features invisible dinosaurs and Heihachi chomping through a thrown tomahawk, all set to the gnarliest 90s rock since theStreet Fighter 2anime. While not exactly ‘good’, it’s certainly entertaining.
1Tekken: Bloodline
IMDB Score: 6.6/10
Even so, there’s only been one non-gameTekkenproject that’s uncompromised in its quality and authenticity to the games, and it was a Netflix series.Tekken: Bloodlineisa nearly 1:1 adaptationof Jin Kazama’s story fromTekken 3, from being raised in Yakushima by his mother Jun, to his quest for revenge over her disappearance following a fight with Ogre.
It does a great job replicating the combat from the games without including literal air juggles, etc. The art style and animation work well too. The only downside is that it’s over all too quickly. It would’ve benefited from a proper season’s worth of episodes filling in some of Jin’s connections to his friends, rivals, and the Mishima clan. But what’s there is worth watching, and hopefully worth a second season as well.
