On June 11th, 2010, geek websites, online video game communities, and genre movie blogs all started to catch wind of Mortal Kombat: Rebirth – a sort of screen-test billed as a mock trailer that gave fans a glimpse of what a serious Mortal Kombat movie could look like. Rebirth was one of the many properties at the time that was undergoing the dark face-lift that many franchises aspired to in the wake of the success of Christopher Nolan’s Batman franchise. Since then, director Kevin Tancharoen and writer Oren Uziel were funded by Warner Premiere for a 10 episode web-series followed by a deal for a full-length feature film reboot by New Line Cinemas.

In an unfortunate turn of events, Deadline has reported that Kevin Tancharoean has left the project. After his departure, Tancharoen tweeted a message to his fans:

After 3 years of Kombat, I’ve decided to move on to other creative opportunities. I wish everyone involved in the movie big success

The “3 years of Kombat” that Tancharoen is referring to in his tweet is Mortal Kombat: Legacy – his still going web-series, which is currently heading into its third season. It’s unsure how they will proceed after losing the man responsible for creating the new demand for non-video-game, Mortal Kombat media. As of now the future of the web-series and the long-gestating feature-film reboot is in question, but with the momentum that Tancharoen built, coupled with Uziel’s (presumably) ongoing involvement in the process, New Line might be making calls as of this moment to make sure the project continues.