Headscratchers / Mortal Kombat: The Movie

• What was the point for Shang Tsung to drag Sonya into the Otherworld? Why couldn't he challenge her right there? Also, what's the deal with Liu Kang forcing Shang to fight him? The deal was that Cage gets to fight Goro ahead of his turn and Shang gets to challenge whomever he wants for the final battle.
  • He was trying to force her to accept his challenge. Cage made him agree to enter the tournament so he has to fight someone. He chose Sonya as the least threatening (considering Kang is the chosen one and Cage just killed Goro it's an acceptable assumption as she only killed Kano, whom he told to go easy on her). By isolating her he was trying to force her to think there was no other choice. As for Kang, he simply wanted to avenge his brother whom Tsung killed in the previous tournament.
  • Shang Tsung wanted to isolate Sonya both to get away from Raiden (who cannot enter Outworld) and to essentially cheat. Either Sonya accepts and he kicks her ass, or she refuses and he, with no witnesses, can pretend that he won and Shao Kahn is free to invade Earthrealm at will, something Kitana sees through and warns him is treason. The important aspect of his deal with Cage is not that he is allowed to challenge someone- as Raiden said, as an ex-Champion he could do so at any time- but that this challenge would be "the final battle of the tournament", winner take all. The problem is, the rules state this is fine only if the opponent accepts, a rule that Sonya did not know, which is one reason he picked her. The other, of course, is that Liu Kang is The Chosen One and Tsung just plain didn't want to fight him for that very reason; he ultimately accepted Kang's challenge because he was backed into a corner and, frankly, by that point seemed a little pissed off. Finally he was panicking- Goro had just been killed, Tsung was about to fail Shao Kahn again, and so faking Sonya's defeat was sort of a desperate gamble to avoid his Emperor's wrath.