Jax Briggs

"Bring it!!"

- Jax Briggs's Battle Cry in Mortal Kombat (2011)

Major Jackson "Jax" Briggs is a Special Forces commander with cybernetic enhancements and a hero from the Mortal Kombat series of fighting games.

Mortal Kombat Special Forces
After Jax received a transmission telling him about an escape from a Special Forces detention facility and that the escapees were Tremor, No Face, Tasia, and Jarek. They had escaped to a warehouse on the south side of town and most likely had help from an outside source, which Jax decided was Kano. He went to the warehouse, where he found a squad that had been sent in had been wiped out making the major swear vengeance on Kano. Jax equipped himself with some bionic implant prototypes for his arms to increase his strength and set out to bring down his enemy. After fighting his way through the warehouse and sewers, defeating No Face and Tasia along the way, Jax received another transmission that told him about a corporate building the Black Dragon used as a front for their operations.

He proceeded there, where he defeated Jarek and his investigations then brought him to the ancient city, Sin Kiang, where he faced off against Tremor. Jax came across a portal that he decided was part of some plan by Kano to take control of the world and entered it. The portal brought him to Outworld where he eventually caught up with the Black Dragon leader, who had claimed an artifact called the Eye of Shitian, which could grant him great power. The two battled and Jax won, using the eye's power to return them to Earthrealm where he put Kano in custody (who would escape later) and removed the bionic implants.

Mortal Kombat II
Following the end of Mortal Kombat tournament, which Kano and his partner, Sonya Blade, had competed in, Jax found the movie star, Johnny Cage, in the sea near the Special Forces Agency. He interrogated the star about the whereabouts of Sonya, but did not believe Johnny's story about what had happened on the island. However, Jax received a video signal from his partner, who was working with Kano temporarily to try and escape from Outworld. He went to apologize to Cage at a commercial shoot, where the star was attacked by warriors from Outworld led by Kintaro. After helping to drive back the attackers, Jax traveled to take part in Shao Kahn's tournament along with the other warriors of Earthrealm. He soon found out about Shao Kahn's plans and succeeded in freeing Sonya, as well as arresting Kano, but he got away from them as they went through the portal. Jax attempted to warn the government of the coming threat, but they did not believe him.

Mortal Kombat 3
Jax began to covertly prepare for the oncoming Outworld threat, outfitting his arms with bionic implants again. Soon his fears came true, when Shao Kahn began his invasion of Earthrealm and while the souls of most of the other Earthrealm inhabitants were taken, Jax's soul was protected by Raiden. Jax joined the other Earthrealm warriors in fighting Kahn, succeeding in driving the emperor and his forces back into Outworld. He was named the commander of the new Outer World Investigation Agency, that dealt with threats from other realms. They operated from an underground bunker and sent out scouts to explore and map unexplored realms at the same time looking for portals leading to Earthrealm, which needed to be destroyed.

Mortal Kombat 4
After the fallen Elder God, Shinnok, made his return and took over Edenia, Jax assisted Raiden in battling against him and his forces. During this time, he and Sonya discovered the malfunctioning Lin Kuei cyborg Cyrax trapped in a desert. They brought him back him to their home base where they reversed the process that turned him into a cyborg. Cyrax then joined them out of gratitude.

Mortal Kombat Deadly Alliance
But years later, Jax not only had to deal with Kenshi and Cyrax being lost in Outworld, the Outer World Investigation Agency was nuked and wiped out by the traitorous Hsu Hao. Soon after, Raiden brought the Earthrealm warriors to Shang Tsung's island and asked them for help in fighting the Deadly Alliance. Jax quickly agreed to help the thunder god, using this as a cover to hopefully find Hsu Hao and succeeded, killing him by ripping out his artificial heart. After this, he joined the other Earthrealm warriors in their stand against the Deadly Alliance, but he and the others were killed in the battle. Upon Onaga's return, Jax and the others were resurrected as his slaves, but they were freed by an alliance between Ermac and Liu Kang's spirit.

Mortal Kombat Armageddon
In Jax's Armageddon ending, Blaze's power caused the cybernetics in his arms to grow and spread across his body. He was transformed into a full cyborg and soon became aware of a neural chip implanted in his brain by Sektor. Jax defeated him in a rage and took control of his cybernetic ninja clan, the Tekunin. It is unknown if he planned to return to the Special Forces.

Mortal Kombat vs DC
After the merger of the universes began, Jax and the other Mortal Kombat warriors began finding themselves battling against beings from the DC universe. He infiltrated the U.N. Orbital Space Station and took on many other DC characters, such as Captain Marvel and Wonder Woman. Jax found Sub-Zero, who'd been captured, and allowed him to join them in fighting the other universes fighters. He later fought Lex Luthor, but was defeated and accompanied the other Mortal Kombat fighters to the fusion of Outworld and Apokolips, where they had the final battle with the DC fighters. After Raiden and Superman defeated Dark Kahn, the universes returned to normal.

In his ending, the battle with the DC warriors left Jax badly injured and to keep himself alive, he was forced to enhance his cybernetics. He replaced much of his body with robotic versions, making him more powerful than ever, but at the cost of his own humanity.

Powers
Jax is quite a hardened combatant due to his life as a soldier and is capable of being ferocious, but staying focused. His most notable trait is great physical strength, so much so that he can shake the earth with a punch and crush heads with ease. With his bionic implants, Jax's strength is even more increased, using pistons to increase the force of his blows, and they also carry portable missiles. He is also quite a skilled technician and scientist, having developed the portal technology of the Outer World Investigation Agency and uses a machine gun in combat. As his alternate weapon fighting style, Jax uses a pair of tonfa.

Trivia

 * Jax's original name was going to be Kurtis Stryker, but this was recycled later for another character introduced in Mortal Kombat 3.


 * He was originally going to be a kickboxer, but this was scrapped due to similarities to a number of Street Fighter characters. He originally wore a yellow martial arts gi, but this concealed his physique so it was dropped. There was game footage of Jax shot with his original gi costume, but his actor split the pants during shooting.


 * Before Sonya was created, Jax was conceived with her scenario, but since there were no female characters, Midway conceived Sonya as his replacement.


 * Interestingly in Mortal Kombat Unchained, when Havik performs a fatality where he eats the opponents arms and vomits the remains, he still vomits meat when he does it to Jax, despite Jax's arms being metal.


 * His code name is "Cobra" according to early production shots of Mortal Kombat Special Forces.


 * When Jax is knocked off the sky temple in Armageddon, he yells "Oh my god! This is not happening to me!"


 * His fighting stance from MK3 is similar to that of some of the male ninjas and comes from the Shaolin Fist fighting style.


 * Jax is one of the only two characters to have his own game, the other being Sub-Zero.