Johannes "Joe" Taslim is an Indonesian actor and martial artist, best known for his role as Bi-Han/Sub Zero in Mortal Kombat (2021)
Taslim was born in Palembang, Indonesia, the son of Maria Taslim and Mardjuki Taslim. He was exposed to martial arts at an early age. His martial arts training includes Pencak Silat, Wushu, Judo, Taekwondo, and Shotokan. However, he found his passion in Judo and this led to his career as a professional Judo athlete. He won several gold medals in national championships, a gold medal at the 1999 South East Asia Judo Championships, and a silver medal at the 2007 Southeast Asian Games. Taslim was a member of the Indonesia Judo national team from 1997 to 2009, when an injury forced him to retire.
Taslim is active as a model and actor, appearing in magazines, TV commercials, and several Indonesian feature films. In 2010, Taslim won the role of Jaka, a sergeant in a special police squad, in the award-winning The Raid, after a series of impressive fight auditions and reading. Following The Raid, Taslim took part in HBO Asia’s first action horror film, Dead Mine, which had a theatrical release in selected Asian territories in September 2012, followed by exclusive television premieres across the HBO Asia network.
Taslim appeared in the feature film Fast & Furious 6 (2013), as the villainous Jah, a mercenary who uses his martial arts to fight two of the film’s protagonists, Roman Pearce (Tyrese Gibson) and Han Seoul-Oh (Sung Kang).
In May 2013, it was reported that Taslim would star in the action thriller film The Night Comes for Us. In September 2014, pre-production on the film was halted and it was reported the script would instead become a graphic novel. The film was eventually released by Netflix on October 19, 2018. In 2016, he played an antagonist character, Manas, a former first officer of Captain Balthazar Edison (played by Idris Elba), Anderson Le, turned into an alien in Star Trek Beyond.
In 2017, Taslim was cast in the role of Li Yong in the Cinemax action series, Warrior. The series premiered on April 5, 2019. In July 2019, Taslim was cast as Bi-Han/Sub-Zero in the Mortal Kombat reboot film.