One Mortal Kombat fan wows with a fantastic recreation of Scorpion that appears as it came straight from the game’s official artwork. One really clever Mortal Kombat fan has darkened the official Scorpion artwork from Mortal Kombat X. Over the last few decades, NetherRealm’s long-running and groundbreaking fighting game series has spawned a plethora of impressive fan art, ranging from reimagining celebrities like Terry Crews and Vanilla Ice as Jax and Sub-Zero to rendering images from the first three Mortal Kombat games in crisp 4K resolution.
Scorpion is the Mortal Kombat franchise’s closest thing to an official mascot, having appeared in nearly every mainline MK game as well as a cameo appearance in 2013’s DC Comics-based Injustice: Gods Among Us. Hanzo Hasashi was his original name, and he was a highly revered warrior in the Shirai Ryu ninja clan. His family was assaulted and butchered by the Shirai Ryu’s primary opponent, the Lin Kuei, on a fateful day, and Hanzo was killed by the Lin Kuei’s chief assassin Bi-Han – who would later assume the identity of Sub-Zero. Hanzo made a bargain with the Netherrealm sorcerer Quan Chi and was reincarnated as the undead murderer Scorpion, unable to rest in peace until his clan and family were fully avenged. Scorpion would enter the Mortal Kombat tournament to exact vengeance on Bi-Han, only to spark a new enmity when Bi-brother Han’s Kuai Liang assumed the role of Sub-Zero in Mortal Kombat.
Toxic Illustration, a Reddit user and artist, tweaked Scorpion’s official Mortal Kombat X artwork, displaying the deadly ninja wielding his characteristic chained kunai weapon while his flaming eyes burn amid the shadows. While some commenters assumed this was a unique image, Toxic Illustration later stated that the prior Scorpion artwork was filtered to make it appear more stylised. Aside from Scorpion, Toxic Illustration has employed this approach for photos of DC characters, including The Joker, who made a cameo appearance as a DLC fighter in Mortal Kombat 11 recently.
According to recent speculations, NetherRealm is working on Mortal Kombat 12 now that it has officially completed generating new content for Mortal Kombat 11. Fans are already speculating about MK 12’s potential roster of playable fighters, with some hoping for a big cast akin to Mortal Kombat Armageddon and others making strange-but-reasonable demands for WWE legends Mick Foley and Kane. In any case, after the timeline-shattering events of the Mortal Kombat 11: Aftermath DLC, players are anticipating a drastically different Mortal Kombat universe.
Given how popular and iconic Scorpion is among Mortal Kombat fans, it’s almost certain that the Shirai Ryu warrior will appear in Mortal Kombat 12 as his younger self from MK 11. Meanwhile, enthusiasts like Toxic Illustration continue to capture the Mortal Kombat universe’s combatants through artwork, whether it’s an original sketch or a reimagining of NetherRelam’s official photos of the zombie ninja warrior.
