ShOR 365: The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor

Photo Credit: Universal Pictures

The Mummy films have always been two of my favorite action/adventure films. It’s a period film with Ancient Egyptian myth and lore thrown into the mix. Plus, nothing beats the script. They’re funny, witty, and, at the time, they were quite original. Not to mention the cast is spectacular. I don’t think any other action/adventure film will ever be able to replicate the comedy gold that is Brendan Fraser, Rachel Weisz, John Hannah, and Oded Fehr. However, Rob Cohen and Universal did attempt it, nearly ten years after The Mummy Returns with Tomb of the Dragon Emperor and it failed.

Perhaps it was because Maria Bello is not a good match for Evy O’Connell. Maybe it was because the story was uprooted from Egypt. Maybe it was because I found the idea of magic in Ancient China a little too ludicrous. Either way you slice it, if you like The Mummy films, please skip this one.

Basically, the plot of this film is the same as the other two only set in Ancient China. I’m not even going to try to summarize it because you’ve seen it before if you’ve seen the other two films. Sadly. Evil scourge of China is cursed, becomes a mummy, then is awoken by an O’Connell and wreaks havoc on China. There. Really horrible summary but it’s pretty accurate. Oh, and Jonathan still is hunting his fortune and runs away with the Eye of Shangri-La.

Bless Bello. I will give her kudos for trying to replicate the plucky librarian the audience was introduced to through Weisz. I really will because she did give it her all. She even put on a truly rubbish English accent but she just couldn’t quite capture the character we all know and love. I do also give her the benefit of the doubt because she could only do as much as the script gave her to do and, to be honest, the script wasn’t all that great when it came to Evy. Sure, Rick remained the same but the writers changed Evy into someone she wasn’t. Evy would have never retired, despite the end of the war. When the espionage ran out, she would be finding some other tomb to desecrate somewhere. Evy O’Connell doesn’t retire. End of story.

All the good stuff was given to Fraser which made this film just a tiny bit better. Rick’s snark and one-liners feel tired, however, Fraser slips into Rick’s persona really well. He’s the quintessential American hero transplanted to England. He’s a fish out of water and that will never change no matter how much he tries to be something and someone that he isn’t. Of course, the audience never expects Rick to change. Thankfully, he didn’t but he was the only bright spot in this otherwise bland and flat reboot.

I call it a reboot because I believe that’s exactly what the filmmakers were trying to do. They took the story from Egypt to China and just gave us a new mummy, a new love interest (only this time, the love interest is relegated to Alex instead of the mummy) who lives for thousands of years, and a new army. It just didn’t work. I think I would’ve been happy had they scrapped the whole mummy business and focused on Evy and Rick’s spy work during WWII. It’s mentioned briefly before the new mummy is woken up and then never revisited. In fact, I think I would’ve preferred the filmmakers giving me an Indiana Jones type story with an Egyptian artifact hunt in the middle of the Nazi regime. Had it been done before? Yes, with Indy himself but it would’ve been better than this.

As for magic in China, don’t ask me why it’s weird. It’s probably simply because I don’t enough about Chinese lore. Chinese mythology isn’t my forte. Egyptian mythology, though? Yeah, I can throw down on some of that.

Whatever the problem was, I’m glad that The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor failed as a reboot. (I’m holding onto the idea that that was the filmmaker’s intentions.) I would’ve hated to see a brand new trilogy crash and burn as hard as this film did.