Despite a satisfying conclusion to The Mummy, the film made a ton of money and, these days, that means a sequel. How exactly does one create a follow-up to a film that saw the titular antagonist destroyed in the end? Psh! Nothing a little ret-conning and distraction can’t fix.Main characters Rick and Evelyn O’Connell (Brendan Fraser and Rachel Weisz) are now married and have a son. While exploring a pyramid, they find the Bracelet of Anubis, which contains both the location of the oasis of Ahm Shere and the power to unleash the Scorpion King and his legion of monstrous warriors upon the earth. Naturally, Rick and Evelyn’s son puts the bracelet on out of curiosity, setting in motion a week-long countdown to potential doomsday.
Little Alex O’Connell is abducted by an Egyptian cult who have also somehow managed to resurrect Imhotep, the evil mummy from the first film. The cult wants to use Imhotep’s restored powers to defeat the Scorpion King so they can control the Army of Anubis. This leaves Rick and Evelyn one week to find the oasis of Ahm Shere, rescue their son from imminent death and defeat the Scorpion King and Imhotep before either can conquer the world.
If this sounds like an awful lot of action for two-hour movie, you’re right. The Mummy Returns is quite relentless in bombarding you with fight scenes and special effects pieces while also yanking you from scene to scene with a pace that, once it picks up, never drops back a gear. Despite all the seeming complexities and rapid flow, the film is still pretty easy to follow. It’s a journey from Point A to Point B in the hopes of stopping Bad Guy #1 and Bad Guy #2 from succeeding. Despite this fairly easy setup, there are some elements of the film that don’t make a lot of sense.
For instance, was it really necessary to bring Imhotep back for the sequel? From a marketing standpoint, it makes perfect sense to bring back the cold, evil villain, especially since they chose The Mummy Returns as the title. Without the reemergence of Imhotep, one could argue that the film would have no reason to exist as titled. The problem is that, at the end of The Mummy, he was made mortal and stripped of his powers. How exactly does the Egyptian cult restore all of these things for Imhotep? This is never explained. We’re just told that he’s back and bad as ever. It seems to be the filmmakers’ hopes that we will be too distracted by all the action to ponder such things.
The Mummy Returns also relies on significantly more CGI and special effects than its predecessor. Universal Pictures only sank an extra $18 million into the sequel’s budget and, considering they had to up their stars’ salaries, it's clear they didn’t pull enough out of the piggy bank. As ambitious as some of the scenes try to be, their ambition is undone by weak looking effects. Sometimes it’s only a matter of a monster warrior looking flat or just a tad too fake. Other times, like in the case of the emergence of the Scorpion King from his chamber, it is impossible to suspend disbelief because the visuals are terrible.
It was the zombie pygmy mummies that killed it for me though. Dozens, if not hundreds of these odd and horribly fake looking things dwell in the lush oasis of Ahm Shere and protect the temple of the Scorpion King. The filmmakers try to use them as fearsome adversaries and a comedic device at the same time. Due to this, they come across as too goofy to be taken as real threat, no matter how many people they end up killing. The Mummy had its goofy moments and so does this film but the zombie pygmy mummies cross a line that's better left uncrossed.
Fans of the first film will easily enjoy this sequel and there are plenty of references to events and artifacts from the predecessor to draw a knowing smile from Mummy devotees. For the rest of us, this will still entertain but the continuing adventures of Rick O’Connell don’t satisfy quite like the first time. While it’s still harmless popcorn adventure fun, The Mummy Returns starts to descend into ‘dumb’ territory, which is never good.
RATING: 2.25 out of 5
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