I've been a diehard Street Fighter fan ever since Street Fighter II: The World Warrior debuted back in 1991.
That's why seeing the trailers for this upcoming film, which hits the 2026 movie schedule on October 16th, has got me so excited, since it looks like everything I've ever wanted in a Street Fighter movie (and yes, I know the 1994 adaptation has its fans, but I only appreciate it as a so-bad-it's-good kind of movie).
However, after seeing the most recent trailer, I was struck by something - this movie has Evil Ryu in it! But like, why?! Seeing him in the trailer just adds to my list of fresh concerns for this film, and I don't like that. I'll explain.
We Really Can't Have All Of These Other Stories Going On If We're Going To Get Evil Freaking Ryu
For a while there, it was hard to peg which era of Street Fighter this movie was going to be. Sure, all signs pointed to Street Fighter II, but before we got our first trailer, the cast of characters was a bit perplexing, as we had Joe (Alexander Volkanovski) in the film, and he appeared in the FIRST Street Fighter from 1987. However, the film also features Dan Hibiki (Andrew Schulz), who didn't appear in the series until 1995's Street Fighter Alpha, as well as Don Sauvage (Eric Andre), who didn't appear as a ring announcer until 2016’s Street Fighter V!
Granted, all of these characters canonically appear around the same time period (the timeline gets funky between Street Fighter III-VI, hopping back and forth in time), but it was still difficult to determine when this movie was taking place until we got confirmation. That said, with ALL of these characters from different eras being represented, it already feels like this movie is jam-packed. So, adding such a MAJOR storyline as Evil Ryu, who made his first video game appearance in Street Fighter Alpha 2, just seems like WAY too much.
Evil Ryu is a MAJOR part of Ryu's backstory, and to have that AND all of these other characters just seems like too much story going on here. Either that, or they won't go as in-depth as they should, which isn’t good either.
I Also Now Understand Why Akuma Had To Be Here
When we got word that Roman Reigns was playing Akuma, I was all like, huh? It's not because Akuma doesn't DESERVE to be in this film, but, it already has M. Bison (David Dastmalchian), and I figure that any Street Fighter movie should have either Akuma OR M. Bison as the big bad. Not both.
This also aligns with my concern about who the main protagonist is. If it’s Chun-Li or Ken, then M. Bison makes sense. If it’s Ryu, then Akuma makes sense. To have both villains doesn’t really make much sense at all.
However, now that I know that Evil Ryu is in this film, Akuma makes PERFECT sense. Ryu's internal struggle with the Satsui no Hado (literally translating to “surge of killing intent”) is directly connected to Akuma, who wants to push Ryu over to the dark side. Yes, it’s great stuff, but should it be in a film that already feels overstuffed as it is? I don’t think so.
In The End, Evil Ryu Would Have Been Cool For A Sequel, But Not As An Introduction To This World
Now, it's not like I think Evil Ryu shouldn't be in a Street Fighter movie. I just don't think he should be in THIS movie.
Evil Ryu is a really important character arc in Street Fighter lore, and I just think that there’s seemingly too much going on already, even if this film IS 125 minutes long.
So while I would love to see the Evil Ryu storyline covered in a Street Fighter sequel (possibly one that looks more serious and less goofy), I don't think I want it in this first Street Fighter movie.
What do you think, World Warriors? Do you think this video game movie will be a Vanilla Edition or a Champion Edition? I’d love to hear your thoughts.
