A totally unasked for list of new (post MK GOLD) characters and my thoughts:

Ashrah - A demon fighting for redemption? I'm definitely fine with that. She fights fairly well. One of my favorite new characters.
Bo' Rai Cho - Hated him at first, but I warmed up to the guy. His failure with Shujinko I relate to his drinking problem. He's a parody of the mentor characters in oh-so-many kung fu films. A fairly good fighter.
Daegon - He comes off in Armageddon as a little cliche, but I love his model. Spectacular fighter to use. Plus, he's a bad guy.
Dairou: One of the Order vs. Chaos characters that just mixes me up. Basically a mercenary, but not the wildcard character you hope he'd be. He does very little in the overall story and even if he did, there's little development. I don't really play as him.
Darrius: Again, Deception created a whole new series we haven't been privy to and set us down in the middle of it. Darrius represents a cool idea for the Chaos vs. Order subplot, but I find very little to care about the guy. Decent fighter though.
Drahmin: I like that he's an Oni and his little storyline in DA. The model itself is very unappealing to me. Fairly good fighter, but I rarely use him.
Frost: Love her. Yay female interpretations of beloved male characters. Her story kinda falls apart as the games went on after DA. Good fighter.
Havik: I love what he represents, but I can't play as this guy. Also, under utilized.
Hotaru: I hate playing as him (due to a training level I had a bitch of time passing). Okay with him in the Deception story game.
Hsu Hao: I actually like the guy. I love that he's the Chinese equivalent to Jax and a traitor to the Special Forces. Since he was supposed to "die" in DA, not much of a story afterwards. Would've been cool if he was the new Kano for Jax... But it looks like Jax may leave Special Forces in the new games anyway.
Kenshi: I'm not a big fan of him. His story is sad, but not sad enough IMO. Controlling him is kind of a pain to me.
Kira: Chick in black leather carrying knives? Who doesn't like that? A mishmash of other characters, but I always loves me some new Black Dragon members.
Kobra: He-Man? Just kidding. Kind of a suck up. Easy to fight with. I don't really care about the love-hate tension between him and Kira though.
Li Mei: I LOVE that she gets screwed over in DA. Love it. But her twist in character at the end of Deception really turned me off to her... but she didn't really stay with Onaga in Armageddon... So who knows? Actually, I'd be pissed if she didn't betray everyone.
Mavado: Again, any Black/Red dragon stuff I love. I'm not too fond of his crazy spring gimmick, but whatever. I've seen the computer really utilize this guy in fights, but I can't ever match it.
Mokap: I like him. Maybe it's just the filmmaker in me.
Moloch: A beast, but powerful. I use him to rush through Armageddon easily. His story seemed weak piggybacking off Drahmin.
Nitara: I want to love the vampire character, but what the hell? I'm not really good with her in a fight. At least she's actually a pivotal character in DA leading into Deception and the joke is no one knows it; I love that irony about the story.
Onaga: Time to whip out the Dragon King. Again, I use him to be cheap. I'm fine with his story.
Shujinko: I hated him at first, but after playing his Deception game, I was fine with him. An idiot, but his character kicks ass in fights.
Taven: I like him as the hero of Armageddon. Really easy character to use and can mop the floor with anyone.

JEW wrote:

I think we should also remember that a lot of these guys weren't given their current story until later games where they could fill things in. a perfect example is bo rai cho.

Deadly Alliance wrote:

During the years that Shang Tsung had sponsored the Mortal Kombat tournaments on Earth, the Outworld master Bo’ Rai Cho was secretly training warriors for competition. It is even speculated that it was he who brought the fighting style of Drunken Boxing to Earthrealm. After many years, he finally discovered the Shaolin monk Liu Kang and taught him the martial arts moves he needed to defeat Shang Tsung. Later, with the tournament securely in the hands of the Shaolin, his teachings were no longer needed and he returned to Outworld. Bo’ Rai Cho had been unable to compete against Shang Tsung in the Mortal Kombat tournament on Earth. His Outworld birthplace guaranteed that his victory would have been in the name of Shao Kahn. But the conflict this time was not a tournament to prevent an evil emperor from consuming another realm. This time the battle was to save his own realm from the tyranny of two evil sorcerers. Nothing could hold him back from the challenge that lay before him. The wrath of Bo’ Rai Cho would be unleashed once again.

What this bio does is set up Bo Rai Cho's been around, but hasn't been seen due to his Outworld heritage, which is a fairly okay retcon to pull. At this time, Bo Rai Cho did not train Shujinko, which makes him more of a mentor character out to do the right thing. There's no mention of why he's such a fartsy alcoholic at this point, except that he brought drunken boxing to Earth. As you say Jew, later when Deception rolled around, we got a more clear vision of who he was. But his current story does follow this background. The only thing that changed in Deception was that he formed a truce to lead Kitana's army (technically Mileena in disguise).

DarkMaze wrote:

Gawd, I'm so out of touch with MK now. I'm not familiar with almost any of those characters. I lost track entirely after MK4.

I couldn't even keep up with MK4. Like who the hell was Kai!? But I caught up when I heard Armageddon was coming out. I got DA and Deception for about $10 altogether. Didn't take as long as I thought to fresh myself on the new characters.

Syd Lexia wrote:

I don't think there's any canon reason why Bo' Rai Cho is a drunk, it's just a tribute to Drunken Master.

True, but I need me some character motivation, so I just blame Shujinko. Knowing Midway, they'll make it canon eventually.

MOGHARR wrote:

characters like jade and reptile are fine, because they actually gave them a stroy to kinda tie them in to the mk universe. mokap is just some stupid ass that they decided to crete for the hell of it.

Technically, he's a tribute to Pesina for going through all the painstaking motion capture. That's a hell of an honor, especially for the many, many years of service.

When Reptile first appeared in MK1 he was just "super cheap green ninja with double powers". As Jew pointed out, his story didn't develop until MK2. Jade kind of had a story within MK2 if I recall from the comic or something, but her presence had no barring on the games until UMK3.

I really don't see why there's hate for Mokap that fans decided to bestow on him. I didn't even know people hated him until I read his Wikipedia article. From the start he was a special effects motion capturer who works with Johnny Cage. Boom. There's a connection. While his presence isn't actually a part of Deadly Alliance, he's a part of the story cause Cage keeps making movies off these adventures. Arguably, Cage died at the end of Deadly Alliance, so he never made the DA game thus neglecting Mokap's involvement with it. But it's still unclear how long Armageddon takes place after Deception. Since Cage has not been said to make a movie based on Deception, it is entirely possible he made Deadly Alliance during the intermission and before he has made sense of the Shinnok dreams.

In any case, Mokap fits into Cage's story, which is his connection to MK. Now why he needed the power of Blaze, I'm not too sure, but I'm sure its because Johnny Cage begged him to come help him. Friendships are an important bond in the MK universe. Sonya has Jax, Kitana has Jade, Liu Kang has Kung Lao, and now Johnny Cage has Mokap.

Syd Lexia wrote:

I don't think I recall a single DA ending in which Johnny Cage died. I think he was just rotated out for variety.

The beginning of Deception states that the Earth warriors had been defeated. As mentioned in the bios (and witnessed first hand in Unchained) the warriors who fell were reincarnated as slaves by Onaga. Johnny Cage is among those fell along with Jax and Kitana (both playable in Unchained). So in the canon of the series, Johnny Cage did die at the end of DA... However, the series has also retconned itself so this is actually the FIRST time Johnny Cage has died as his other death was for a film or a publicity stunt (blame Vogel for that one). This is what I was referring to.

JEW wrote:

grasping for strings sir. the fact is that mokap was a bonus joke character, he didnt' even have a slot on the fighter select screen in DA. armageddon rolls around and he's official MK canon.

I'm going to have to disagree with you as this is Mortal Kombat, the franchise where even Hornbuckle is a character. Pretty much any character (even glitches) mentioned or seen become characters. Why should Mokap be any different? I didn't think Meat could be a regular character, but look what happened? I guess I'm just not sold on your argument and that we're actually debating two different things about the same subject.

Deleted Insert: The following was meant to interrupt my post, but the actual text became too incoherent.