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Adeline Rudolph's fanwielding Princess of Edenia plays just as big a role in the sequel as Karl Urban's Johnny Cage. Fangirl: Why Kitana is Mortal Kombat II's s

Adeline Rudolph's fan-wielding Princess of Edenia plays just as big a role in the sequel as Karl Urban's Johnny Cage.

Fangirl: Why Kitana is Mortal Kombat II's secret weapon (exclusive)

Adeline Rudolph's fan-wielding Princess of Edenia plays just as big a role in the sequel as Karl Urban's Johnny Cage.

By Nick Romano

Nick Romano is a senior editor at ** with 15 years of journalism experience covering entertainment. His work previously appeared in *Vanity Fair*, Vulture, IGN, and more.

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October 9, 2025 9:00 a.m. ET

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Adeline Rudolph as Kitana in 'Mortal Kombat II'. Credit:

Warner Bros. Pictures

- Adeline Rudolph's Kitana plays just as big a role in *Mortal Kombat II* as Karl Urban's Johnny Cage.

- "Kitana's storyline feels very much interwoven into Johnny Cage's story," the actress says.

- Rudolph also discusses wielding those lethal fans, while director Simon McQuoid explains the design challenge of creating them.

*Mortal Kombat* director Simon McQuoid had two things on his mind when mapping out the sequel. One was Johnny Cage. The ending to that first movie, released in 2021, signaled the character's arrival when Lewis Tan's Cole Young sets off to find the next Earthrealm champion in Hollywood.

The second was more female characters. Aside from Jessica McNamee's Sonya Blade, the testosterone-heavy core cast was thus far comprised of Liu Kang (Ludi Lin), Jax (Mehcad Brooks), Scorpion (Hiroyuki Sanada), Sub-Zero (Joe Taslim), Kano (Josh Lawson), Kung Lao (Max Huang), Lord Raiden (Tadanobu Asano), and Shang Tsung (Chin Han), to name a few.

And if *Mortal Kombat II* was going to have more women, "That's obviously gonna be Kitana and Jade," McQuoid tells **. "There are other great female characters, but for the second film, they seemed logical."

*Chilling Adventures of Sabrina* alums Adeline Rudolph and Tati Gabrielle will now arrive in *Mortal Kombat II* (pushed to open on May 15, 2026) as Kitana and Jade, respectively. Ahead of the sequel's presence at New York Comic Con this weekend, Rudolph and McQuoid preview how the movie is just as much about Kitana as it is about Urban's Johnny Cage.

"Especially when I first read the script, it felt very much like the intertwining of two worlds. You have Earthrealm and then you have Edenia and Outworld," the actress says, referencing the domains of Kitana and Shao Kahn (Martyn Ford). "Kitana's storyline feels very much interwoven into Johnny Cage's story, and they go in and out of each other throughout the movie."

*Mortal Kombat II* officially kicks off the titular tournament, in which champions from different realms compete to the death in physical combat. Lord Raiden recruits Johnny Cage, a washed-up actor, to fight for Earthrealm, which puts him head-to-head against Kitana.

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While auditioning to play the deadly fan-wielding Princess of Edenia, Rudolph feared she didn't give enough effort. "I was worried that I wasn't gonna book it," she says. "I kept feeling like Kitana's such an intricate character and so hard to nail because she's regal and very poised, but on the flip side, she's very vulnerable and very empathetic. So I felt to mix the two was difficult, but also an exciting challenge."

The casting process ran long and overlapped with her shooting another project in Bulgaria, but by the end of her final hourlong session with McQuoid over Zoom, she got the call. "I was in Germany waiting to do my green card interview, and they're like, 'You can't give [them] your passport. You have to fly to Australia and start stunt training immediately."

Adeline Rudolph's Kitana faces off against Karl Urban's Johnny Cage in 'Mortal Kombat II'.

Courtesy Warner Bros. Pictures

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That training, obviously, included Kitana's signature weapons: two razor-sharp steel fans. "I loved my fans," Rudolph comments. "From the second that I saw them, I couldn't stop opening them, closing them, and flipping them around."

McQuoid calls those death instruments "quite the design process." They had to feel both elegant and lethal, yet also valuable with regard to how Kitana acquires them in the movie. "They had to feel like they would cut your head off, but they needed to have a level of detail in them that made them feel handcrafted," the filmmaker notes.

To Rudolph, Kitana is more than those fans. She hopes audiences will feel "the heartbeat of this story," she says — even in Kitana's fight sequence with Johnny. At the risk of trash-talking her opponent in the tournament, Rudolph adds, "Johnny Cage not being as seasoned as Kitana can be quite comedic."

*The cast of *Mortal Kombat II* will attend New York Comic Con for a panel this Saturday at 5 p.m.***

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Source: "AOL Movies"

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