By
Brandon Zachary
Published 34 minutes ago
Brandon Zachary is a Lead Writer for Screen Rant's New Movie Team. He also writes or has written for Comicbook.com, CBR, That Hashtag Show, Just Watch, and TVBrittanyF. Brandon is an Emerging Screenwriters Semi-Finalist, co-writer of a Screencraft Quarter-Finalist, a seasoned on-screen interviewer, and a MASSIVE nerd. You can reach him at [email protected]
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Street Fighter is the latest cinematic adaptation of the video game series of the same name, and it is putting pressure on David Dastmalchian to match one of cinema's best bad movie performances. The original Street Fighter currently has a 11% Tomatometer score on Rotten Tomatoes, and is usually regarded as a guilty favorite.
The bizarre elements and unexpected campy comedy have made it into a cult classic that seems to be an influence on how the new Street Fighter adaptation is approaching the source material. That means David Dastmalchian has to live up to Raul Julia's iconic performance as the same character — but he may just be the right actor to do it.
Over Twenty Years Later, Raul Julia's Street Fighter Performance Is A Fan Favorite
Raúl Juliá as M. Bison in Street Fighter (1994)
Raul Julia's performance in the critically decried Street Fighter film is a campy delight, setting the bar high for 2026's seemingly self-aware Street Fighter to clear. Julia had multiple award-winning performances to his name, but he's perhaps best remembered for his purposefully overacting in some family films.
While his turn as Gomez in The Addams Family films was delightful, it's Julia's final turn as M. Bison in Street Fighter that has stuck with plenty of fans for years. The central villain of the film, M. Bison is a would-be world dictator with cartoonish plans for the world, something the other villains recognize over time.
Street Fighter is a weird balance of goofy and campy, with different types of tones at play in the movie. However, the most entertaining when some of the cast get to play the story for comedic effect. This is very much what Julia is going for, with his M. Bison full of wild mood swings and over-the-top insults.
It's what makes the character so memorable, as he's able to shift from more aggressive proclamations while wearing rocket boots to a more subdued (but no less hilarious) delivery of casual dismissal of Chin-Li's desire for vengeance. Julia deploys a great deal of comic timing in his performance, all while never losing a sense of menace.
Julia recognizes the goofy potential of Street Fighter. It's something consistent with the other villains in the film, who are likewise ridiculous and largely played for laughs. It's also a self-aware element of the execution that seems to be at play in the new Street Fighter film, given the bombastic elements of the trailer.
David Dastmalchian Is The Perfect New M. Bison
The semi-ridiculous tone already seems to be at the heart of this new Street Fighter, with the trailer depicting Eric Andre's enthusiastic announcer, a fighter breaking a car with his fists, and general mayhem. One prominent shot of the trailer reveals David Dastmalchian as M. Bison, flourishing his cape in a grand motion.
M. Bison is just one of the antagonists of the film, and the trailer's brief snippets of Akuma suggest that the villainous martial-arts master will be a major threat to the film. However, Dastmalchian's look in the trailer suggests he's going to approach the character with a certain amount of the flourish that Julia brought.
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Dive into the world of movies and TV shows with Screen Rant, your source for news, reviews, and exclusive content. Subscribe By subscribing, you agree to receive newsletter and marketing emails, and accept Valnet’s Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. You can unsubscribe anytime.Dastmalchian has become one of modern film's most interesting stars, an actor with the range to be a heartbroken man on the verge of a breakdown, a talk show host realizing the horror he's allowed into his life, or a traumatized and ridiculous supervillain who uses polka dots as weapons.
Dastmalchian has a great handle on tone as a performer, something that makes his casting as the new M. Bison especially exciting. His casting recalls Julia's own talent for knowing when to push the character and when to rein him back for ideal comic timing. It'll be exciting to see how Dastmalchian makes Street Fighter's villain his own.
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Street Fighter
Action
Release Date
October 15, 2026
Director
Kitao Sakurai
Writers
Dalan Musson
Cast
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Noah Centineo
Ken Masters
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Andrew Koji
Ryu
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Callina Liang
Chun-Li
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Cody Runnels
Guile
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Street Fighter
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