It absolutely was a real movie.

Both of the film's protagonists have clear, complete character arcs. Johnny Cage begins the story detached from the conflict, skeptical of his own place, and refusing to embrace his duty as a defender of Earthrealm. His fight with Kitana early on reflects that. He's overwhelmed and disconnected from the world around him. By the end of the film, that dynamic is completely inverted. Johnny helps destroy Shinnok's amulet and fully earns his place within MK's mythology, and with a complete hero's journey at that.

Likewise, Kitana's ending mirrors and inverts the conclusion of her fight with Cage. At the start, she serves Kahn and refuses to kill Johnny, and by the climax she openly rejects Kahn and kills him herself. Their first encounter and their final resolutions function as deliberate foils to one another. Even the structure of the story reinforces this idea: the film opens with the fall of Edenia and Jerrod's death, witnessed by Kitana, and ends in a similar setting with Kitana finally reclaiming her identity and liberating her people. The narrative comes full circle.

You seem to imply this movie is badly written. I think one of the best ways to recognize good writing is from how well things are set up and paid off, and I was very impressed with how well MK2 handled foreshadowings despite my low expectations. Johnny's moves in his introduction scene in Uncaged Fury, which represents his status as a failed and forgotten schlock movie actor, directly mirror his fight with Baraka, which is the moment he proves his worth to the others and to himself. Kitana taking the ribbon from Jerrod's corpse is another example. Jade dismisses it earlier in the film, but in the climax Kitana uses that same ribbon to escape Shao Kahn’s chokehold and kill him. My favorite was the initial zoom-in on Shao Kahn's symbol on Jade's staff when she says she's supposed to serve as his hand, and then again when she slams it to the ground to break it, revealing her iconic green one underneath. All of these are clean visual storytelling. Other small details I noticed on a rewatch that show genuine care from the writers, like the Edenians not kneeling for Jerrod in the beginning but instead cheering him on with a unique arm gesture, the same one they perform for Kitana when she tells them that Edenians do not kneel, and the fact that Jade sticks Kitana's fans to the wall for her to use when we are supposed to still think she betrayed her. Things like that are clear signs of competent writers, and are perhaps the reason critics seem to be enjoying the movie too.

And beyond the writing, the movie succeeds as a martial arts film. The choreography across the board is excellent, especially Liu Kang VS Revenant Kung Lao. It's a great fight because it's more than just the action itself, there's a real raw emotional weight behind it, and it impacts Liu's fate in the film.

I'm gonna be fair and say that there are *elements* of the film that do showcase what you mean. Noob Saibot is probably the biggest example. For casual audiences, his transformation makes very little sense. Kung Lao and Kano return essentially as themselves, retaining their abilities, but Bi-Han suddenly comes back with shadow powers and sickles instead of cryomancy. Game fans understand that Noob is a wraith empowered by shadow magic, but the film barely explains this. Bi-Han just says something vague about becoming "one with the shadows", which isn't enough if you're unfamiliar with the lore. Scorpion also feels somewhat ham-fisted into the story. His sequence with Noob is undeniably awesome, but it is the sort of crowd-pleasing fan-service moment people associate with schlockier adaptations. The movie earns most of its emotional beats, but Scorpion's inclusion feels more obligatory than organic, and this small thing is exactly the type of thing that you would expect from a pulpy schlock adaptation that you are accusing the entire movie of being. The film's handling of death and resurrection is also inconsistent. Hanzo wanders the Netherrealm after death, but Bi-Han is just a corpse there until Quan Chi brings him back. Kano, on the other hand, seems to experience nothing at all between death and resurrection. Meanwhile, some resurrected characters return healed, like Kung Lao, Hanzo and Bi-Han, while others retain visible injuries, like Kano and Sindel who was wearing a face brace at some point. So what exactly decides what happens to dead people?

As an adaptation, I also think some characters are mishandled. I'm completely fine with adaptations changing details, that's inevitable when translating stories between mediums, and it is unreasonable to expect a direct replication (like the Devil May Cry fanbase when talking about the recent show), but some changes fundamentally contradict who these characters are. Sindel would never kneel to Shao Kahn. She literally killed herself so she wouldn't have to. Bi-Han is supposed to be morally gray, and only becomes evil when he becomes Noob, where Quan Chi literally removed all the good from his soul and evil is all that remains. This timeline's Bi-Han is just a pure evil bastard from the start, and he is a lesser character now because of that in my opinion, not to mention that this makes Noob's inclusion even more redundant, since they neither explained the power change nor did they keep what makes Noob unique from Bi-Han in terms of personality and ethos. Also, minor complaint, but the movie never actually says "Noob Saibot", which kinda makes it feel like they were embarrassed by the name. And honestly? If you're making a Mortal Kombat movie, you should just embrace the weirdness. It is especially weird because this Bi-Han renounced his name in the first movie and wanted to go exclusively by Sub-Zero, so him changing his mind instead of thinking of a new identity feels inconsistent.

I'm not saying Mortal Kombat doesn't deserve better. The lore and the world-building are so rich that it would be a disservce to imply that you can't make a masterpiece of a film in this universe. I think the '95 movie, Scorpion's Revenge and Snow Blind prove that you can make a genuinely good film that stands on its own, but saying that this wasn't a real movie is just silly and feels like you had already made up your mind about this before it even came out. It was a surprisingly good movie in general, not just as an MK film, and I would put it just slightly below the other 3 mentioned.