Sometime between MK9 and the middle of MKX, Sonya gets herself Caged and the new face of Mortal Kombat is born. But it apparently wasn't a match made in heaven, because by the time the comics start up Johnny and Sonya have bought themselves a new home in Splitsville. Enquiring minds want to know why... and more importantly, what it might mean for the roster.

Question 1: Why did they split up?

Well before we can properly speculate on that, we first kind of need to ask ourselves Question 0, which is, how did they get together in the first place? In MK9, Sonya is characterized as a hard-as-nails military chick who is so driven by her work that she truly has no time for extracurricular activities (i.e., sex with movie stars). But by the story's end, it appears that the looming threat to Earthrealm has passed: Shao Kahn is gone, and Raiden's prophecy of Armageddon is averted. Sonya finally has a minute to relax... and one minute is all that Johnny needs.

Now, it's easy to see why Sonya might go ahead and hook up with Johnny. Aside from the fact that literally every other human male in her social circle is dead, Johnny really is a stand-up guy, and they'd been through a lot together. So how did it all go wrong?

In a fictional universe like Mortal Kombat, normal domestic squabbles wouldn't be enough to break up a main-character couple. In real life, Johnny being a self-aggrandizing douchepaddle and Sonya being an unforgiving hardass would be more than adequate reasons to split up -- but that's not nearly dramatic enough for a world where "betrayal" comes with an actual backstabbing. No, for a relationship to fail in MK, it has to be the kind of situation where living with your partner turns into hell on earth. In this case, they called it the Netherrealm War.

Just when the threat of Outworld invasion has passed, Shinnok comes barging into Earthrealm, along with an army led by the Horseman of the Apocalypse, Quan Chi. Johnny, Sonya, and Raiden manage to defeat him, but now any hope for a peaceful future is shattered. They let down their guard after MK9, and the Netherrealm took them by surprise and nearly destroyed the planet.

Here's where our lovely couple starts to have some "irreconcilable differences":

Sonya is known to be incredibly headstrong and capable of holding grudges and suspicions forever. She doubles down on her duty of protecting Earthrealm, matching the slightest hint of an inter-realm threat with disproportionate, irresponsible force, just as she is doing with Kotal in the comics. In the comics, her superiors and even Johnny see her as a loose cannon, and they're not wrong. But from Sonya's perspective, any amount of force is "necessary" to make the world a safe place for her daughter.

Johnny, however, is much more laid back and level-headed. In all likelihood, he was just fine going back to a "normal" life after Shinnok's defeat, (over)confident in the fact that no threat could conceivably be greater than a goddamn Elder God raising the armies of Hell. What more could possibly happen? Might as well kick back, make some movies about the experience and live off the royalties.

Sonya would downright despise his lackadaisical attitude. She splits off to do her Special Forcing full time, and Johnny's like, "Whatevs, baby. Haters gonna hate." This is why, in the comics, Cassie sees Sonya as the overly strict disciplinarian and Johnny is the cool dad.

Honestly though, we all should have guessed from the get-go that their relationship would never last. Why? Because having some animosity between the two ex-lovers makes it a little easier for them to do Fatalities on each other. It's bad enough that Cassie will probably be able to shoot her parents in the face, but that's just normal teenage rebellion. Surely the thought even crossed your mind when you were 16 and got your car privileges cut off for a week for talking wise. On the other hand, a happily married couple who are madly in love and endlessly devoted to each other, ripping each other's torsos in half? That's just weird.




Question 2: How does it all pan out for the future?

Johnny's fate in MKX might be very subtly hidden in the following dialogue exchange:

Cassie: "Help me conjure green energy, okay?"
Raiden: "You have not your father's gift."
Cassie: "You kinda suck as a mentor."

What an odd thing to ask of Raiden. Seems like she'd have better luck asking Johnny herself, right? Well... maybe she can't. Maybe this exchange comes from a point in the story where Johnny is gone, and Raiden is the only mentor figure she has? After all, Cassie is Johnny's "princess." In all likelihood, he would strive to teach her everything he could. Asking a god for help in learning her father's moves seems like the kind of thing she'd do if no one else were around to teach her.

If Johnny were to die in action somewhere around the middle of the story -- sometime not too long after the current point in the comic, perhaps -- that could be the turning point where Cassie decides to take her mother's well-intentioned discipline to heart and join the Special Forces. For all we know, he could die in the attempt to rescue her and Jacqui from the Black Dragon.

Maybe -- and this is some bold-faced speculation here -- this could be a way of making Johnny a high-demand classic returnee for the Kombat Pack, instead of putting him on the initial roster. If the battle with Shinnok in the trailer is merely a flashback to the past, Johnny may not ever need to fight in Story Mode, leaving him wide open for DLC. If Sonya lives, that's enough parent-child interaction for the main event, and if you really want Johnny then you can buy him right away.



... That's one take on what we know, anyway. Anyone else got theories?