Anyone remember the Warrior King?

Antiyonder · December 1, 2023

The Warrior King is an animated character to be specific. Not of a movie or his own show, but rather four separate animated shows not even owned by the same company.

Back when the USA network regularly aired animated shows, they had an action block consisting of Street Fighter, Savage Dragon, Wing Commander Academy and Mortal Kombat Defenders of the Realm.

Only thing I'm not sure of is the specific planning. The network originally wanted a full on crossover between all four shows, but different ips, and different production companies resulting in many types of differences would be a problem. Heck, Street Fighter had the Vancouver VAs from the Ocean Group, the others were US actors like you'd see in Gargoyles or the DCAU.

So they created a new character simply called the Warrior King voiced by Michael Dorn. His story is retrieving an elemental orb through various worlds or time starting in the Street Fighter episode Warrior King.

Episode ends with a portal leading into Savage Dragon's episode oddly titled Endgame. It was only the second of the crossover and there wasn't any signs of a subplot going on in the show.

Anyway yeah, Savage after being uncertain about him join to stop the Fiend who is causing problems with the orb until it is lost in another dimension.

Does have an interesting bit of continuity where an officer flirts with Warrior King, who mentions that he is taken. Well he and Chun-Li were very briefly involved.

Next two shows air in opposite order. And yes this is the closest to a Mortal Kombat crossover, but barely. Not just cause WK and the orb is the only link.

The Mortal Kombat episode Resurrection has Shao Khan bringing Shang Tsung back to life and giving him the orb for usage, until Raiden and the others take it out of his grasp. Raiden then tosses it into a portal in space where Warrior King in his only (Silhouetted) appearance.

Yep, finishes in Wing Commander Academy's episode Recreation. The show is a prequel to the game and the most polished show. Pretty much up there with Batman TAS and Gargoyles. Even has many of the game cast including Malcolm McDowell.

The episode establishes Warrior King ending up in suspended animation until the middle of the ep and that he might have been in this world much longer before hand, and not doing well.

Recreation is titled as such cause the crew take a vacation leave on a paradise planet Oasis which was once a barren desert planet. Yep, the orb has long since been on this world and gave it life.

So the Warrior King loses it, even threatening to kill in order to retrieve his orb, eventually though accepting his home can't be saved.

Sadly even back then, a VHS compilation was out of the question, but the Warrior King albeit belonging to USA was made so that each show could have a crossover ep that isn't too connected to other shows.

Saw both the Street Fighter and most of the Wing Commander Academy episode back then, seeing the other ones online.

And a video on the story: