Boon: Next Mortal Kombat game to be "serious"

Ed Boon is done joking around with Mortal Kombat. We don't know what that means, but he seems so serious about it, we can't help but be a little intimidated. He put on his business face in an interview with CVG about the next game in the series, saying "we're not going to joke around in this one, it's not going to be like jokes." Does this mean we can't expect Babalities? No more Johnny Cage crotch shots?

Boon goes on to expand on his vision for the new, more mature MK, (or will it be MC?) calling it more realistic and grittier, with the designers feeling no obligation to bring back favorite fighting styles or weapons. He stops short of saying he'll bench favorite characters, presumably to stem the tide of "If joo dont bring bak ScOrPiOn ILL cut your brak lines" emails that are probably just making love to "GrEEdo didnt shoote 1st dumba$$" emails somewhere just waiting for their moment to strike. Boon said the title probably won't be available until the end of 2008, and we're (pun incoming!) seriously excited to see this brave new world of spine removal.