Mortal Kombat: Everything You Need to Know About Mileena

The tainted clone of an Edenien princess, Mileena has risen through Mortal Kombat’s ranks from palette swap fighter to the big bad of MKX.

The lore of Mortal Kombat is tricky, to say the least. Its in-game canon involves time traveling, wizards, cyborgs, dragons and yes, deities. Keeping track of who is doing what at a given time can be a bit confusing.

But before 2011’s Mortal Kombat decided it was time to revise history, we were introduced to a multitude of palette-swapped martial artists who, for the most part, were cookie-cutter replicas of their more famous counterparts. One such character was Mileena, the doppelganger of fan-favorite fighter Kitana who became an iconic character in her own right.

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Mileena shares more in common with Kitana than just the costume design. She’s actually a genetically engineered clone created by the evil sorcerer Shang Tsung under the orders of the invading conqueror Shao Kahn, who had become paranoid that his “adopted” daughter Kitana would turn on him.

Kitana, being of Edenian descent (a race of alternate dimension humanoids who descended from gods), also transfers those traits to Mileena, giving her access to an incredibly long life span, the ability to wield certain magical powers and enhanced strength beyond that of a normal human.

That doesn’t explain Mileena’s most identifiable trait — her toothy grin. The other half of her DNA comes from a race of monstrosities known as Tarkatans. Depending on which continuity you’re following, the Tartakans are either a race of demonic-looking, blade-wielding fighters who were also conquered by Shao Kahn or the result of interbreeding between the humanoids and demons of Outworld.

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At any rate, Mileena is the result of those two species being spliced together by an evil sorcerer and trained as an assassin. Much like her twin sister, Mileena fights using a pair of handheld weapons. Unlike Kitana’s fan blades, however, Mileena carries a pair of sai, which she uses for both defense and devastating attacks on her enemies. She has the ability to teleport short distances, turn invisible for limited amounts of time and a mild (by Mortal Kombat standards) healing factor.

Throughout the franchise’s history, Mileena has been a major antagonist, usually allied with Shao Kahn or impersonating Kitana. She’s also been a notable playable character in many Mortal Kombat titles, with notable feature roles in Mortal Kombat: Deception and Mortal Kombat X. While she was relegated to minor roles throughout much of her existence, Mileena rose to prominence in Mortal Kombat X, where she attempted to assassinate the current ruler of Outworld, Kotal Kahn, using Shinnok’s amulet.

While she is unsuccessful in her rebellion against Kotal initially, Earth’s warriors form an uneasy alliance with Kotal Kahn to find Mileena and track down the amulet, which is actually a key to freeing Shinnok from the Netherrealm. Bested by the combined forces of Kotal Kahn and Earth’s Special Forces, Mileena is violently executed at the hands of the Kytinn D’vorah. It was D’vorah herself who was allied with the sorcerer Quan Chi, allying with him to restore Shinnok.

For the moment, Mileena’s story ends here. While she doesn’t play a significant role in Mortal Kombat 11’s story yet, the addition of DLC and the game’s focus on twisting time travel and resetting the universe means the monstrous Mileena could be just one DLC release away.

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About The Author Kai M (46 Articles Published)

A content creator since 2005, Kai’s work has netted several awards in the online community. From fiction to documentary, page or screen, you’ll find much of his work covers a little bit of everything. Follow him on Instagram as @themediabay

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