According to Collider, the first ever Street Fighter movie promo has been unveiled at the License Expo this year. Announced at SDCC 2023, this movie is several rounds away from us still. However, the poster itself has several ties to the series.
The Street Fighter logo itself looks like the very logo that Udon used for their ongoing Street Fighter comic book series. While the background itself draws inspiration from the original 1987 game intro. In Street Fighter, Capcom is written in graffiti on a wall, waiting for someone to break it. When the wall breaks, a man shows up and turns his back, showing the Street Fighter logo. The intro itself has been redone in Super Street Fighter IV with mainstay Cody Travers breaking the wall.
The walls and graffiti themes have been used for various games within the series. The American release of Street Fighter II for the SNES, and Super Street Fighter II console game covers had brick walls in their art. The latter used it as a backdrop for the sillouettes of the new fighters to the game. Even Street Fighter 6 goes all in on the graffiti look.
At First Bout You Don’t Succeed..
Street Fighter has had a long history of its’ story being adapted to live-action. The first movie, Street Fighter(1994), had Jean Claude Van Damme as Guile and the late Raul Julia as M. Bison. The movie’s plot attempted to give Super Street Fighter II a different story. Starring other A-List actors such as The Mandalorian Ming Na Wen as Chun Li and Wu Warrior / Arrow’s Byron Mann as Ryu, the film itself is considered to be “so bad, that it’s good.” The movie even gave birth to a particular meme.
Surprisingly, this was the same year that the cult classic Street Fighter II: The Animated Movie was released. Both movies were only 4 months apart, yet Manga Entertainment’s The Animated Movie anime had a more favorable reception.
The Legend of Chun Li was the second American adaptation with Mortal Kombat’s Robin Sho to step in as the wise master Gen. Kristen Kruek took on the titular role as Street Fighter’s first female combatant, Chun-Li, post her Smallville run in 2009. Recently, the fan project Street Fighter: Assassin’s Fist was released in 2014. Both adaptations decided to go more into the Street Fighter Zero / Alpha territory of the lore.
With Super Mario Bros: The Movie shattering expectations and other video game adaptations doing well, such as Fallout, perhaps this alone is why Legendary wants to make an attempt. Danny and Michael Philippou will be directing this film, stating that this might be something we’ve never seen before for the 4-decade franchise. History usually repeats itself, yet it seems as though this movie might break the live-action fighting game adaptation curse. It is unknown at the time of this writing as to what the setting will be or who else is also attached.
