Rain (Mortal Kombat)

As a child, Rain was smuggled away from his homeland of Edenia in the midst of the realm's takeover by Outworld emperor Shao Kahn, while his father stayed behind to perform his duties as general of Edenia's armies, but he was killed and his armies crushed in the invasion. Thousands of years later, during the events of MK Trilogy, Rain resurfaced during Kahn's invasion of Earthrealm prior to the third Mortal Kombat tournament, and was attacked by Kahn's extermination squads; not wanting to suffer at their hand, he elected to turn his back on his homeland and side with Kahn, who trained him as an assassin alongside fellow Edenians Kitana and Jade before enlisting them in the fight against the Earth warriors.[8] However, Kahn's would-be domination of Earthrealm is unsuccessful and Rain is absent from the series until the Konquest mode of Mortal Kombat: Deception (2004), where he asks Shujinko to find a dagger belonging to Goro, which he in turn keeps for himself until he is knocked out by Jade.[9]

MK: Armageddon (2006) marks Rain's return as a playable after a decade. As one of only seventeen characters in the game to receive an official biography,[10] he plays his largest role in the original series continuity by learning of his true Edenian heritage from Outworld sorcerer Quan Chi, who lets Rain in on a secret that his late father had tried to keep from him: that he is actually a direct descendant of Argus, the protector god of Edenia, in addition to being the half-sibling of the game's protagonist Taven and his brother Daegon, both of whom were favored by their father to assume his mantle of Edenia's protectors.[11] Rain consequently starts to refer to himself as a prince of the realm, as seen in Armageddon's Konquest mode, but he still chooses to independently fight on the side of evil. Rain confronts Taven in Arctika but is defeated in battle and flees into a portal.[12]

His storyline is altered in the 2011 Mortal Kombat reboot, which makes no mention of his father or siblings, instead describing him as having been orphaned at a young age by Kahn's conquest of Edenia and raised under the protection of Edenian resistance fighters. As he gained a reputation as an exceptional warrior, his level of arrogance followed suit, and when he was refused leadership of the resistance, he betrayed them to their (unidentified) sworn enemy. This caught the attention of Kahn, who offered the power-hungry Rain an army of his own in exchange for his services.[13] However, in Rain's ending, Kahn had no intention of fulfilling his end of the bargain. Rain therefore kills him in combat and ends up saving Earthrealm in the process, for which he is thanked by Raiden, who also informs him that he is the son of Argus. Rain, consequently drunk with power to which he felt he was entitled, coupled with a sense of superiority from being the offspring of a god, takes over Kahn's armies to rule all realms, starting, to Raiden's horror, with Earthrealm.[14]

Rain is not playable in Mortal Kombat X (2015), but is a supporting character in the game's story mode. He serves as Mileena's advisor and tries to help her reclaim the Outworld throne from the warlord Kotal Kahn in the midst of a civil war. Rain plans to take the throne for himself when the war is over, but is stopped by D'Vorah. He is featured in Tanya's noncanonical arcade ending, in which he and Tanya flee Kotal Kahn's forces in Outworld but are captured. She turns him over to Kahn in exchange for clemency, and Rain is burned at the stake.

Rain as a playable character in the Sega Genesis version of UMK3

Rain was the tenth palette-swapped human ninja introduced into the Mortal Kombat series. His uniform in the attract mode was initially a burgundy color,[4] which was altered to traditional purple in the home versions of UMK3 and MK Trilogy.[15] His offense drew on the power of weather as he was able to harness water and lightning, while he shared Reptile's victory pose and the stance for Ermac's Telekinetic Slam for his lightning strike, which caused opponents to bounce into the air and thus set them up for a juggle combo. His roundhouse kick was unique to the series as it sent opponents flying onto the opposite side of the screen, while his Animality turned him into a pygmy elephant that trumpets the skin off his opponent. Bryan Dawson of Prima Games named Rain in MK Trilogy as one of the series' "cheapest" characters, citing his specials therein that led to lengthy combos.[16]

For his reemergence in Armageddon, Rain was given a new, distinct identity like the other ninjas from the two-dimensional games, with less emphasis on purple for his uniform and more on black and gold, giving him a more regal appearance that now included a back-length cape, while he still concealed his identity behind a mask that itself was a standalone entity as he was now shown as having long, black hair tied up in a topknot. In his official Armageddon render, he is seen brandishing a pair of curved knives but never actually uses them in the game; instead, his weapon is a sword. He was given more water-based special moves for Armageddon and the 2011 Mortal Kombat reboot, the latter for which he was not included on the original roster but was later added by NetherRealm Studios as a downloadable character available for purchase in July 2011, three months after the game's release.[9]

Rain appeared in the 1996 animated series Mortal Kombat: Defenders of the Realm, in the fourth episode ("Skin Deep"), where he was portrayed as Kitana's ex-fiancé (in turn sparking jealousy in Liu Kang) who was thought to have been killed in battle against Shao Kahn thousands of years ago but has suddenly resurfaced. He enlists the help of the Earthrealm defenders in searching for a sacred scimitar in order to keep it away from Kahn, which turns out to be a ruse that enables him to kidnap Kitana and strand the Earth heroes in Outworld.[17] Rain was voiced by Rino Romano and went unmasked in the entire episode; he was given a youthful look with short black hair parted in the middle.[18]

Percy Brown as Rain in Mortal Kombat: Konquest

Rain's live-media incarnations were portrayed by African-American actors. He was played by stuntman Tyrone Cortez Wiggins in the 1997 film Mortal Kombat: Annihilation, in which he partakes in the Outworld invasion of Earth while serving as the general of Kahn's extermination squads, but is killed when Kahn hammers him into a fire pit in his war room for sparing the lives of Kabal and Stryker (both of whom never appear onscreen) after having captured them. In a continuity violation, an outtake of his demise was edited into Baraka's death scene later in the film. Rain has no fight scene in the film nor the novelization based on the script, where he has a reduced role and is identified only as a "masked general" while Baraka takes his place among Kahn's subordinates in the Outworld invasion. At the start of the twelfth episode ("Shadow of a Doubt") of the 1998 television series Mortal Kombat: Konquest, Rain makes a brief appearance and is played by Percy "Spitfire" Brown. He has no dialogue and is sent by Kahn to kill Kung Lao before the next tournament, but is unsuccessful after being forced to flee when Taja intervenes.

Rain was included as an "exclusive" in a "Klassic Ninja" six-pack of 4" action figures released in 2011 by Jazwares, while a polystone statue of the character was released by Syco Collectibles in 2012.[19][20] In DC Comics' 2015 weekly Mortal Kombat X prequel miniseries, Rain debuts in the eighth chapter as he joins Reiko and Mileena in their war against Kotal Kahn, manipulating the weather to block out the sun and therefore deny Kahn his primary power source, but he is severely burned by Kahn in retaliation.[21] He is not seen again until the twenty-first chapter, in which he is disfigured and recuperating under Mileena's care after being recovered by the Red Dragon clan. He informs Mileena of a conversation he overheard among Red Dragon clansmen regarding her former comrade Reiko's loyalty to Havik, resulting in Mileena planning an invasion of Shang Tsung's island to hunt down Reiko, Havik and the Red Dragon.[22]