M-I-C-K-E-Y is gearing up to crack down on sharing of P-A-S-S-W-O-R-D-S, as existing subscribers will see a halt on this beginning next month. While this was implemented for new users last month, those who already subscribe to Disney+ will run into this roadblock on Thursday, March 14th.
But it doesn’t stop there as, not surprisingly, Disney+ will put a system in place later this year that will allow these existing subscribers to let people use their account…for more money, of course. This comes fresh off of the revelation that Disney+ lost 1.3 million subscribers when they upped their subscription fees. They also saw a $300 million dip in streaming revenue, which they certainly hope to regain at least a portion of once that initiative rolls out.
To explain plans for 2024, Disney CFO Hugh Johnston stated, “While we’re still in the early days, and don’t expect notable benefits from these paid-sharing initiatives until the back half of calendar 2024, we want to reach as large an audience as possible with our outstanding content and we’re looking forward to rolling out this new functionality to improve the overall customer experience and grow our subscriber base.”
We all knew the password crackdown was coming from Disney+, as fellow streaming giants like Netflix – which reigns in the world of streaming at 260 million subscribers – have also put in place. While Disney+ is pegged around 150 million subscribers, the studio says that their competitors can help gauge the outcome of their goals. “Suffice to say that the opportunity that we see on a percentage basis probably isn’t all that dramatically different from what our competitor has found in terms of their subscriber base.”
Time will tell just how Disney’s strategies will turn out, but it wouldn’t be surprising to find that if this proves to be a worthwhile move that others will follow suit. As of now, there are plenty of other subscription services that either permit password sharing or actively promote it.
What do you think of Disney+’s continued move to stop subscribers from sharing passwords? Do you think they will begin to redeem themselves in terms of revenue? Give us your take on the matter in the comments section below.
Danielle Deadwyler of The Devil to Pay and Till has signed on to star in the thriller The Woman in the Yard, which is coming our way from Blumhouse Productions, Universal Pictures, and director Jaume Collet-Serra. Universal just announced that they have moved the release of the Blumhouse / Atomic Monster horror movie M3GAN 2.0 back from its originally announced release date on January 17, 2025 to a new date in May – but the studio won’t be without a Blumhouse release in January, because now they have The Woman in the Yard scheduled to reach theatres on January 10, 2025.
The Woman in the Yard has been written by Sam Stefanak, who was previously a staff writer and story editor on the Netflix animated series F Is for Family, but details on the story are being kept under wraps.
Blumhouse founder Jason Blum told Variety that he has been looking for the right project to do with Collet-Serra for over a decade. He said, “The Woman in the Yard is the perfect match, a film that’s ambitious in scope but modest in budget that combines Jaume’s vision with the incomparable Danielle Deadwyler.“
Blum and Stephanie Allain are producing the film, while Collet-Serra and Deadwyler executive produce alongside Gabrielle Ebron, Scott Greenberg, and James Mora.
Collet-Serra most recently directed the DC Comics-inspired superhero movie Black Adam. His other directing credits include Jungle Cruise, The Commuter, The Shallows, Run All Night, Non-Stop, Unknown, Orphan, Goal II: Living the Dream, and the 2005 version of House of Wax. He’s currently in post-production on the Netflix thriller Carry On, which also happens to have Deadwyler in the cast.
I haven’t seen Black Adam, Jungle Cruise, or the movies Collet-Serra has made with Liam Neeson, but I have seen House of Wax, Orphan, and The Shallows, and that’s enough to get me interested in seeing how his Blumhouse thriller is going to turn out.
Does The Woman in the Yard have your attention? What do you think of Universal, Blumhouse, Danielle Deadwyler, and Jaume Collet-Serra teaming up for a thriller? Let us know by leaving a comment below.
In 2020, audiences would watch a global disaster unfold in front of their eyes, and ironically, that year would also bring us the disaster movie Greenland. Ric Roman Waugh’s thriller starred Gerard Butler and Morena Baccarin and follows a family’s struggle to get to emergency proceedings as they’re selected for shelter from the impending doom of a comet hurling toward our planet. Unlike most disaster films, this story was told from the perspective of everyday citizens simply trying to evade the crazy panic of the population in order to seek refuge.
Talks of a sequel have been going on for a while and Deadline now reports that Greenland: Migration is set to film this April with the cast returning along with Ric Roman Waugh and screenwriter Chris Sparling. Sparling co-writes this entry with Mitchell Lafortune. The plot, according to Deadline, reads, “The Garrity family must leave the safety of the Greenland bunker after the comet ‘Clarke’ decimated the earth and the family embarks on a harrowing journey across the wasteland of Europe to find a new home”.
Producing this installment are Basil Iwanyk and Erica Lee of Thunder Road Pictures, Anton’s Sébastien Raybaud and John Zois, G-BASE’s Butler and Alan Siegel, and CineMachine’s Brendon Boyea. Executive producers are Robert Simonds, Noah Fogelson and Sam Brown for STX Entertainment, Ric Roman Waugh for CineMachine and Chris Sparling.
Producer Sébastien Raybaud expresses his excitement, “We are thrilled to have Gerard, Morena and Ric back on board for Greenland:Migration to show the audiences what happened next to the Garrity family. To be back working with the teams at G-BASE, Thunder Road, CineMachine and STX, we know the next installment will be just as captivating as the first.” Sam Brown, president of STX adds, “The success of Greenland showcased in a narratively and visually compelling way what one man will do to protect and provide for his family against the most cataclysmic of odds. We could not be more excited to be continuing the Garrity’s harrowing story with Gerry, Morena, Ric and all of our wonderful producers and partners around the world.”
And Alan Siegel of G-BASE states, “Working together again with our friends at ThunderRoad, Anton, Cinemachine and STX is the ultimate experience. Gerry and I were blown away by the way in which we all bonded together seamlessly to produce a stunning first movie and we’re even more excited about our next adventure with the gang.”
While it was assumed that Madame Web was going to liven up the box office a bit this holiday weekend, given a lack of competition, poor word-of-mouth (including a deadly C+ CinemaScore) and dire reviews are dooming it to be one of the worst-performing superhero movies in recent memory. Indeed, it looks like Bob Marley: One Love is doing much better than expected, grossing a mighty $14 million at the Valentine’s Day box office compared to Madame Web’s $6 million. While box office forecasters warned that the Marley pic would be front-loaded, that may actually not be the case, with the film receiving top-notch word of mouth and a much-desired A CinemaScore rating. What that tells us is that audiences really love the movie, so business may, in fact, build over the long weekend.
As such, our box office predictions for this weekend peg Bob Marley: One Love as having an easy win, with about a $20 million opening weekend and closer to $40 million for the 6-day holiday. As for Madame Web, I think it won’t make it to $12 million for the weekend, with a $20 million six-day haul. That would put it well behind the $39 million Morbius made on its first weekend and not even close to the $46 million The Marvels opened with, and both of those films were considered flops. It looks like Madame Web is even more of a disaster.
The Christian TV series The Chosen has episodes 4-6 opening this weekend and should easily claim third place with a solid $6 million for the weekend. The other big flop of the year, Argylle, seems set for a fourth-place finish with $4 million, while Migration should get a bit of a box office boost to finish in fifth with $3.5 million. Why would Migration get a boost? Because it’s President’s Day weekend, and there’s virtually no family fare out there.
Here are the predictions:
Bob Marley: One Love: $20 million
Madame Web: $12 million
The Chosen: S4 Eps 4-6: $6 million
Argylle: $4 million
Migration: $3.5 million
What are you going to see this holiday weekend? Let us know in the comments!
Wonder Woman took cinemas by storm when it was released in 2017. Despite being a period piece set during World War 2, it managed to bring in droves of fans to witness Diana Prince’s origin tale. So, with the same creative team returning for a sequel and the ever-popular decade of the 80s being its setting, this could outdo the first in every way. But with expectations comes disappointment as the film released during COVID caused quite a stir for its creative partners and had some rather questionable CGI. So today on DC Revisited, we’re getting into it all as we dive into Patty Jenkins’ Wonder Woman 1984.
After the first film made $822 Million worldwide, a sequel was announced just one month after release. A few months later, it was announced that writer/director Patty Jenkins and her co-writer Geoff Johns would return and serve the same roles for this new venture. It’s not a surprise, given that Johns was still head of DC Films at this time. Johns mostly had the story outlined, and they further outlined it on a massive 20-foot whiteboard. Jenkins’s concern was emotion and ensuring the audience was properly engaged with the fantastical elements they introduced.
Zack Snyder and his wife, Deborah Snyder, would also return as producers. So, with much of the same creative team back and considering the success of the first outing, expectations started quite high. Gal Gadot returned to her role as Diana Prince, AKA Wonder Woman. But Gadot found herself with a bit more power this time around, both on-screen and off, as she served as a producer here. This is probably also why she saw her salary increase from $300 grand to a massive $10 Million. Wowza. But Gal wouldn’t be the only person playing the role of Diana, with Lilly Aspell playing a young version. She appears in an extended opening sequence and actually did the majority of her stunts.
Diving more into Wonder Woman’s rogues gallery, Jenkins didn’t want to have someone who was the embodiment of evil and instead wanted the creation of several villains. First they looked at the Duke of Deception but decided against him, wanting to avoid another God after Ares was the villain in the first. But they still made sure to reference the character, in this film, being the creator of the Dreamstone, which the writers saw as a great McGuffin that would set the story’s events in motion.
Having been a big enemy of Diana’s for decades, Cheeta was chosen as one of the film’s villains. There have been several iterations In the comics, so Barbara Minerva was picked due to her backstory of being more of a friend of Diana’s before becoming one of her mortal enemies. We don’t get that here outside of brief interactions, but they seem to be on decent terms with each other. Barb would receive her powers from the Dreamstone. The studio wanted Emma Stone, but thankfully, Patty Jenkins got her first choice of Kristen Wiig, who accepted the role before even knowing what it was, simply being a fan of the first Wonder Woman. Very different from what she usually plays, the role gives Wiig a ton of action and makes her a formidable foe for Diana.
But in typical sequel fashion, one big bad wasn’t enough, so Maxwell Lorenzano AKA Max Lord was decided upon. Having become Hollywood’s IT Man, Pedro Pascal was cast in the role. Pascal is ridiculously charismatic, and unlike his comic book counterpart, he has no superpowers. Instead, Lord absorbs the power of the Dreamstone, which allows him to grant someone else’s desire, but he can take whatever he wants from the wisher. Pascal plays the role in an unexpected way, feeling like a bit of a dork.
Plenty of actors returned from the first film, but there’s one that surprised most when the cast was announced: Chris Pine as Steve Trevor. If you’ll remember, Steve died in a beautiful sacrifice that is still referred to even in the current day. According to Jenkins, despite speculation that fan demand brought him back, this was always part of the plan. So how is he somehow alive in a film that takes place almost 40 years ago? Well, turns out that due to the Dreamstone, it’s just his soul possessing another man. So, while we see Chris Pine, it’s really this guy, Kristoffer Polaha. We’ll ignore all that it implies.
Robin Wright would return in a flashback as Antiope, and Connie Nielsen would return as Queen Hippolyta. But that’s just about all she wrote for returns; with this film taking place long after the original, many human characters are either dead or in a retirement home. And any fan of the original Wonder Woman TV show will surely recognize Lynda Carter appearing in the closing credits as the Amazon warrior Asteria. It’s a nice treat for fans.
The story of Wonder Woman 1984 follows Diana Prince as she’s trying to stay under the radar. At least that’s what we’re told because she seems to do a lot of stuff in the public eye. But when a mysterious Gem called the dream stone starts granting the wishes of those who possess it, the world is flung into chaos. And guess who has to save it?
Filming started in the United States in June of 2018 under the covert title Magic Hour. Alexandria, Virginia, was the home of the Landmark Mall, which would serve as a big set piece at the film’s beginning. But they filmed in front of the Capital in Washington DC while in the area. Production would move to Europe in August and jump from country to country. They would start in England then move to Spain in September, then spend the remainder of production back in England.
Production Designer Aline Bonetto really took advantage of the neon aesthetic of the 80s and provided a layered world. She also recreated several parts of the white house and the Smithsonian, down to the tiniest detail. Even the massive compound was built practically. It’s a shame that most of the movie has this CGI film over it that takes away from so many of the practical sets.
Costume Designer Lindy Hemming returned and based most of Diana’s wardrobe on 1980s Brooke Shields. For the Wonder Woman costume itself, they went with more classic colors, but retained much of the same design. The gold armor that Diana wears during the finale is actually based on the costume she wears in Alex Ross’ Kingdom Come. Although Ross himself was upset to not be compensated for his design being used in something other than the comic.
Given that this iteration of Wonder Woman can essentially fly, there hasn’t been much need for the invisible jet. But that would change in this film as we would finally see the first appearance of the famous invisible plane. In this version, Diana turns the plan invisible herself and we’re saved from any silly boxy look from the outside.
At one time, Hans Zimmer had retired from doing superhero films, but Snyder has always managed to bring him back into the fold. While Zimmer hadn’t scored the prior film, he did score Wonder Woman’s theme from Batman v Superman, which became one of her signature music pieces. So Zimmer took on scoring duties.
Wonder Woman 1984 was released in the United States on Christmas Day 2020 and made…well, that’s where things get complicated. Everyone remembers that little thing called COVID, turned the world upside down. Originally intended to premiere in December of 2019, the film was delayed to June 5th, 2020. But when the theatres shut down on March 24th, it was given the Christmas release date. And Warner was adamant about it sticking to that date. But that’s not where the drama ends.
With the uncertainty of COVID, Warner Brothers decided that all of their 2021 releases would release on the same day and date in theaters and on HBO Max. So Wonder Woman 1984 was officially the first film to take part in the program, something that was much maligned by industry greats like Christopher Nolan. Wonder Woman 1984 would end its run in the US at just $46.8 Million dollars, with the worldwide total coming in at $169.6 Million. And given how skeezy Streamers have been about their numbers, it’s a mystery how much HBO Max contributed. Given the production budget of $200 Million, this was rough anyway you cut it.
But don’t feel bad for Patty Jenkins or Gal Gadot. They still received their intended bonuses. So, there was no lawsuit necessary.
One of the most interesting things to note regarding Wonder Woman 1984 is how much creative freedom was given to the filmmakers. We often complain about studio interference and how much it made the movie worse, but that’s not the culprit here. Jenkins’ success with the first film meant she was given carte blanche, and the end result is absolutely one of the worst DC movies out there. With brutal CGI, a poorly concocted plot, and villains that disappear from memory as soon as the credits roll, very few aspects of this film work.
And this was evidenced by the reaction. Due to Wonder Woman 1984‘s failure, we would see Wonder Woman 3 promptly announced and then cancelled on top of all the other disappointments through DC. Due to the James Gunn/Peter Safran DC universe taking over from Superman Legacy, we will likely be seeing a new Wonder Woman when that happens. And with Sean Gunn already cast in the new Maxwell Lord role, which is fitting, as Pedro Pascal is a little busy these days.
But as we get away from the techno-fueled 80s, we’re going back under the sea and taking a look at the final film in the Snyder timeline. But, that’s a story for next time. Join us. Saaaaame movie time, saaaaame movie channel.
Netflix’s The Umbrella Academy has been renewed for a fourth season, which will also serve as its last. The show’s cast returning to their roles for the fourth and final season will includeElliot Page, Tom Hopper, David Castañeda, Emmy Raver-Lampman, Robert Sheehan, Aidan Gallagher, Justin H. Min, Ritu Arya, Colm Feore, Nick Offerman, Megan Mullally and David Cross. Character posters for the last season have now been released and features cast members on each sheet going for a stroll.
Netflix‘s official preview for season four reads, “Based on the comic series of the same name by Gerard Way, The Umbrella Academy premiered in 2019 and follows a group of estranged siblings with superpowers who are reunited after the death of their father.
Last season ended with a major twist: There’s a new timeline dictated by the family patriarch, Reginald (Colm Feore), and the siblings no longer have their powers. That’s not the only oddity in this timeline, where the stakes are higher than ever before — there are new enemies who want to see them wiped from existence, but how do they face them without their powers? And will the siblings ever get them back?”
In Netflix’s Tudum, you can get a sneak peek at the upcoming season with a new featurette. In it, Emmy Raver-Lampman, who plays Allison Hargreeves, boasts, “[It’s] really, really packed with classic Umbrella Academy family nonsense and shenanigans that you look forward to. There’s some unbelievable new characters and villains that are super exciting.” David Castañeda, who portrays Diego Hargreeves, added that he describes Season 4 as his “favorite season.”
Series showrunner Steve Blackman previously expressed, “I’m so excited that the incredibly loyal fans of The Umbrella Academy will be able to experience the fitting end to the Hargreeves siblings’ journey we began five years ago. But before we get to that conclusion, we’ve got an amazing story ahead for season four, one that will have fans on the edge of their seats until the final minutes.”
Last year, we heard that Gene Simmons of the rock band Kiss would be launching a new production company with Gary Hamilton (so the company is appropriately called Simmons/Hamilton Productions), and the first project they had given the greenlight was a shark thriller called Deep Water – with Deep Blue Sea director Renny Harlin attached to take the helm of the film! That film has since made its way through production, and a couple days ago we learned that the cast includes Aaron Eckhart of Harlin’s The Bricklayer, Sir Ben Kingsley (Gandhi), Molly Wright (Netflix’s True Spirit), Angus Sampson (Mad Max: Fury Road), Kelly Gale (Plane), singer and actor Li Wenhan, who is a member of the Chinese-Korean K-Pop group UNIQ, and Nashi (Creation of the Gods I: Kingdom of Storms). Now a first look image has made its way online, and it shows the characters played by Eckhart and Wright. You can check it out at the bottom of this article.
Scripted by Pete Bridges and John Kim, Deep Water centers on an eclectic group of international passengers whose plane, en route from Los Angeles to Shanghai, is forced to make an emergency landing in shark-infested waters. The terrified group is forced to work together and overcome their differences if they hope to escape their sinking plane and the frenzy of sharks drawn to the wreckage.
Arclight Films’ Ying Ye, Gabba Post’s Neal Kingston, Aristos Films’ Grant Bradley and Dale Bradley, and Nostromo Pictures’ Adrian Guerra and Xavier Parache produced the film, while Brian Beckmann and Ryan Hamilton from Arclight Films serve as executive producers alongside Vladimir Artemenko from Top Film Distribution, as well as Rob Van Norden and Johanna Harlin. Arclight Films will be presenting the project to potential buyers at the European Film Market. Filming took place in New Zealand and Spain, wrapping at the end of 2023. Post-production work is being done in Australia.
Harlin had this to say about the project: “Deep Water offered me an epic canvas to work on, which I’ve dreamed of since seeing the original The Poseidon Adventure in a movie theater as a kid in Finland. My superb cast stood by my side valiantly through a rigorous shoot of barrel rolling planes, tidal waves of water and ferocious sharks. This film is my tribute to all the action, imagination, emotion and beauty that made movie making the first love of my life. I can’t wait to show the audiences around the world what an emotional rollercoaster we have created.“
Are you looking forward to Deep Water? Let us know by leaving a comment below – and check out the image of Eckhart and Wright’s characters while you’re scrolling down:
In recent weeks, writer/director Parker Finn has been assembling the cast for a sequel to his 2022 horror film Smile (read our review HERE, watch the movie HERE) – a project we’re referring to as Smile 2 until we hear otherwise. The film is aiming for an October 18, 2024 theatrical release date, and according to Deadline, Finn has just rounded out the cast with the two latest additions. We’ve previously heard that the cast will include Naomi Scott of Aladdin and Charlie’s Angels, Lukas Gage of The White Lotus and You, Rosemarie DeWitt of La La Land and the Poltergeist remake, Dylan Gelula of Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt and Dream Scenario, and Kyle Gallner (Red State), reprising the role he played in the first movie. The two new additions are Raúl Castillo, who had roles in Zack Snyder’s Army of the Dead and Rian Johnson’s Knives Out, and Miles Gutierrez-Riley of The Wilds and On The Come Up.
Castillo recently wrapped work on another genre project, called Open House. Gutierrez-Riley will be seen in the Marvel / Disney+ series Agatha: Darkhold Diaries.
Smile was based on Finn’s short film Laura Hasn’t Slept (watch it HERE), which won the Special Jury Recognition Prize in SXSW’s Midnight Short category. Caitlin Stasey (Neighbours) played the title character in that short, and reprises the role in Smile, making it a follow-up of sorts. Smile has the following synopsis: After witnessing a bizarre, traumatic incident involving a patient, Dr. Rose Cotter (Sosie Bacon) starts experiencing frightening occurrences that she can’t explain. As an overwhelming terror begins taking over her life, Rose must confront her troubling past in order to survive and escape her horrifying new reality.
Stasey was joined in the cast by Sosie Bacon, Kal Penn, Kyle Gallner, Jessie T. Usher, Rob Morgan, Judy Reyes, and Gillian Zinser.
Smile was produced by Temple Hill, and they are producing Smile 2 as well.
Finn has previously said that he feels there’s a lot of interesting stuff left to explore in the world of Smile. “I would never want to just repeat myself or retread the same ground. I’d want to make sure that there’s a new, exciting, fresh way into it that the audience isn’t anticipating. I also want to find some new ways to scare them and unnerve them. But as far as how it may connect to the first one, I’d want that to be surprising as well.“
Are you looking forward to Smile 2? What do you think of Raúl Castillo and Miles Gutierrez-Riley joining the cast? Let us know by leaving a comment below.
It’s Saturday morning. You slept in just a tad, but you still get up early because the new episode of X-Men will be airing on Fox Kids. You get your bowl of cereal ready, turn on your tube television and hear that static as the screen fades in. Then, you hear that iconic theme song. Nostalgia is a hot commodity nowadays, but with animation, the team behind X-Men ’97 has the advantage of emulating the classic look of the original 90s cartoon. This was demonstrated by the viral video of a segment of Star Trek: The Next Generation being made into a cartoon in the style of the original Star Trek animated series.
Disney has just released the trailer for X-Men ’97 and they hit you hard and fast with the nostalgia. The beginning of the trailer and teaser poster convey images of a child’s room in the 90s as he collects X-Men comics and videotapes of the animated series. The synopsis reads, “X-Men ’97 revisits the iconic era of the 1990s as The X-Men, a band of mutants who use their uncanny gifts to protect a world that hates and fears them, are challenged like never before, forced to face a dangerous and unexpected new future.”
The voice cast includes Ray Chase as Cyclops, Jennifer Hale as Jean Grey, Alison Sealy-Smith as Storm, Cal Dodd as Wolverine, JP Karliak as Morph, Lenore Zann as Rogue, George Buza as Beast, AJ LoCascio as Gambit, Holly Chou as Jubilee, Isaac Robinson-Smith as Bishop, Matthew Waterson as Magneto and Adrian Hough as Nightcrawler. Beau DeMayo serves as head writer; episodes are directed by Jake Castorena, Chase Conley and Emi Yonemura. Featuring music by The Newton Brothers, the series is executive produced by Brad Winderbaum, Kevin Feige, Louis D’Esposito, Victoria Alonso and DeMayo.
The Fox Kids X-Men animated series ran from 1992 to 1997, and this new series will pick up where the original left off. The popularity of the cartoon kept Marvel Comics afloat during the company’s dark days when the brand was struggling to be profitable and was far from the juggernaut it is now. The cartoon would lend itself to the success of Bryan Singer’s 2000 film adaptation, X-Men, which modestly started the comic book movie boom before 2002’s Spider-Man had Hollywood clamoring for the same box office success. Hugh Jackman, the first (and so far only) big-screen Wolverine, is due to make his return in Deadpool & Wolverine.
Universal Studios intended to build a cinematic universe with reboots of their classic Monster properties: the Dark Universe. A series of connected creature features, starting with a new version of The Mummy (watch it HERE), a big budget adventure film led by Tom Cruise. It sounds like a success story in the making, but something went wrong on the way to the screen. The Mummy was a financial failure, poorly received by critics and movie-goers alike. The Dark Universe was dead on arrival. So let’s look back at this bungled attempt at creating a cinematic universe and find out What the F*ck Happened to The Mummy.
The Mummy franchise started in 1932 with a film that starred the legendary Boris Karloff. He played Imhotep, an Ancient Egyptian high priest who was buried alive for attempting to resurrect the love of his life. Returned to life thousands of years later, Imhotep comes to believe a modern woman may be the reincarnation of his lost love. Universal made five more Mummy movies over the next couple decades… and while Imhotep ditched his bandages early on, the other mummies remained shambling, bandage-wrapped creatures throughout. Jump ahead to 1999. Universal revived the Mummy franchise with a blockbuster hit that starred Brendan Fraser as adventurer Rick O’Connell and Arnold Vosloo as Imhotep. Rick fought Imhotep again in 2001’s The Mummy Returns – a film that also spawned the spin-off franchise The Scorpion King. And in 2008, Rick battled another mummy, this one played by Jet Li, in The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor. Although Dragon Emperor wasn’t as popular as its predecessors, Universal was initially planning to make another sequel. Having battled Egyptian and Chinese mummies, Rick would next take on a South American mummy in a film titled Rise of the Aztecs. There was even talk of Antonio Banderas playing the villain this time around.
But the same year Dragon Emperor was released, there was a shift in the blockbuster landscape. 2008 was when the Marvel Cinematic Universe got started with Iron Man. As Marvel built this series of connected superhero movies, assembling the Avengers, other studios started looking for ways to build their own cinematic universes. And that’s when Universal realized they could reboot their old Monster movies with films that would be connected to each other and full of crossovers. After all, that’s how the studio had made them the first time around. Standalone films like Dracula, Frankenstein, and The Wolf Man led to crossover movies where the monsters shared the screen. Then they were all introduced to the Abbott and Costello comedy duo as well.
This new endeavor would be called the Dark Universe. But how would they get it started? Would they build upon the success of the Brendan Fraser Mummy movies? Nope. Rise of the Aztecs was scrapped. Universal hired Jon Spaihts, who worked on the Alien prequel Prometheus, and The Hunger Games screenwriter Billy Ray to write competing drafts of a Mummy reboot. Maybe one script would be more worthy of going into production than the other, or maybe they’d just blend the finished scripts together into one. Star Trek reboot writer Alex Kurtzman was hired to produce The Mummy and develop a reimagining of Van Helsing. Underworld director Len Wiseman was attached to direct The Mummy at one point. When he stepped away, the job went to Mama director Andy Muschietti. The idea was that this Mummy would be darker in tone than the Fraser films, but still aimed at viewers of all ages. As development went on, it became clear that this would be more of an adventure movie than a horror movie. So Muschietti bailed. That’s when Kurtzman stepped up to direct the film as his second feature, following the drama People Like Us. Around that time, Universal also brought their Fast and Furious franchise writer Chris Morgan into the Dark Universe. Kurtzman and Morgan were to mastermind the entire series. Universal was going all-in on this. There would be reboots of Frankenstein, Bride of Frankenstein, The Invisible Man, The Wolf Man, Phantom of the Opera, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Creature from the Black Lagoon. All of the classics were coming back.
They weren’t quite sure if their 2014 release Dracula Untold should be part of the Dark Universe, though. Reshoots were done to open the door to this possibility. Just in case. But once Dracula Untold was released, they decided, no, it wasn’t a Dark Universe movie. The Mummy would get this party started.
The Dark Universe would run on star power. This became evident when Tom Cruise, who had worked with Kurtzman on Mission: Impossible 3, signed on to star in The Mummy. And you don’t cast Cruise in your potential blockbuster to read the lines from an existing script. He’s going to bring some big ideas to the table, and he’s going to get some degree of creative control. Since Kurtzman had little directing experience, it’s been no surprise to hear that he struggled with the scope of the film during production. So Cruise took on nearly complete creative oversight. Sources told Variety, “it felt more like Cruise was the real director, often dictating the major action sequences and micro-managing the production”. And his control carried on into post-production, when he brought in his own editor.
Although Jon Spaihts retains a story credit on the finished film, Kurtzman also worked on the script. So did Rachel Getting Married writer Jenny Lumet, Jurassic Park writer David Koepp, Cruise’s frequent collaborator Christopher McQuarrie, and McQuarrie’s pal Dylan Kussman, who is best known as an actor. There were probably some uncredited script doctors in the mix as well. Here’s where problems begin to emerge. Not only was Universal rushing into the idea of a shared universe, but there were also too many cooks in the Mummy kitchen.
One draft of the script was said to involve a Navy SEAL named Tyler Colt, who battles mummies led by Ashurbanipal – a real historical figure – during a mission in Iraq. It was during the Lumet rewrite that the villainous mummy became a female character to be played by Sofia Boutella. She is Ahmanet, an Egyptian princess who was erased from the history books. The daughter of a Pharaoh, she craved the power of being Pharaoh herself. She wanted to be worshipped as a living god. But then her father had a son who became heir to the throne. So Ahmanet called upon Set, the god of death, who turned her into a monster. She murdered her family and planned to bring Set into the world through the body of a mortal man. That plan was thwarted when she was captured and mummified alive for her evil deeds. Her body was taken to a tomb in Mesopotamia, an area we now know as Iraq. Her sarcophagus was suspended by chains in a pool of mercury, a substance the Egyptians believed weakened evil. Unfortunately, Ahmanet’s evil is unleashed when the tomb is discovered in modern day. But it’s not discovered by anyone named Tyler Colt. Instead, it’s located by treasure-hunting American soldier Nick Morton, played by Cruise, and archaeologist Jenny Halsey, played by genre regular Annabelle Wallis.
Nick isn’t like the heroes Cruise often plays. He’s not highly capable or skilled and he’s not a badass. He’s a flawed person, a bit of a creep who’s only out for himself. He uses people around him to get closer to his goals. If someone is slower than him in a scary situation, he’s even fine with leaving them behind. The idea was that he’s an immoral guy who has to find his soul and humanity while battling this supernatural evil. He can be a fun character to watch, as long as you’re not looking for any trace of Ethan Hunt, Jack Reacher, or Maverick.
Ahmanet’s sarcophagus is loaded into a military cargo plane for a flight to London, destined for the headquarters of an organization called Prodigium. Like S.H.I.E.L.D. in the MCU and Monarch in the Godzilla and Kong Monsterverse, Prodigium was meant to tie together the movies in the Dark Universe. The scientists and soldiers of Prodigium are monster hunters; the organization exists to recognize, contain, examine, and destroy evil. That’s why there are nods to vampires, the Gill Man, and even The Mummy ‘99 in their base. Their leader, Doctor Jekyll, is a troubled man who has to regularly inject himself with a serum. This keeps him from being overwhelmed by an alternate personality; Mister Hyde, who thrives on chaos and suffering. The role of Jekyll and Hyde was offered to Tom Hardy, but a deal couldn’t be made. The next choice was Javier Bardem – who opted to play Frankenstein’s Monster in a future Dark Universe movie instead. So the filmmakers turned to Russell Crowe. Cruise and Crowe are friends and had been wanting to work with each other for a long time. They finally got their chance here, and it seems like Crowe had a blast working on the movie, drawing inspiration for his Jekyll and Hyde performance from Stephen Fry and Ray Winstone.
Things go very wrong during the flight to London. The plane crashes, and this was the big stunt Cruise suggested for the film. He wanted the crash sequence to be shot in a zero gravity situation. Filming took place on a real plane achieving zero-g twenty-five thousand feet in the air. The cast and crew went into zero-g sixty-four times, and each time would have about thirty seconds to film Cruise and Wallis floating around in the plane. It’s impressive if you hear about it… but if you watch the movie without knowing how it was done, it’s no more impressive than if the actors were swinging on wires on a stage.
Nick dies in the plane crash. But he doesn’t. He awakens in the morgue, with visions telling him Ahmanet has chosen him to be the body of the demon Set. The mummy rises from the plane wreckage to seek him out, killing anyone who gets in her way, absorbing their life force to regenerate herself. To bring Set’s essence into Nick, Ahmanet will have to perform a ritual involving a ceremonial knife with a jewel in the hilt. She needs the dagger and the separated jewel, so Nick and Jenny go scrambling to find the pieces before the mummy does. And they don’t only have to deal with Ahmanet. She can raise the dead to serve as her zombie slaves, which provides some cool moments. Including one where zombies swim after our hero in a flooded tomb.
Unfortunately, at one point the action is disrupted by a clunky twenty minute stop-over in Prodigium headquarters. The movie actually takes a break to do Dark Universe world-building. Which ends up giving it a disjointed, assembly line feeling.
The action resumes with Ahmanet revealing that she, like Imhotep in the ‘99 version of The Mummy, can call upon sandstorms. She sends one blasting through the streets of London… But she doesn’t accomplish anything by using this power, so it feels like it was just added in as an expensive nod to the earlier Mummy. It’s out of place and inconsequential. Oddly, Kurtzman has said this was the first idea he had for the film, as it represents “a monster coming to our world in a real way”. So it’s interesting that it’s so awkward. Maybe because it was something they were determined to include whether it fit in or not.
Kurtzman has also said he wanted the film to be a collision between horror and comedy, along the lines of An American Werewolf in London and the Evil Dead franchise. While more serious than the Brendan Fraser films, this Mummy is more intentionally comedic and funnier than it has gotten credit for being, although many viewers have noticed the influence of American Werewolf in certain scenes where Nick is visited by his dead comedic relief sidekick Vail, played by Jake Johnson. Scenes that come off as being unnecessary.
The Mummy has a terrible reputation. And, like Nick Morton, it has plenty of flaws that can be picked apart. But it’s not as bad as its reputation indicates. It’s an okay movie, with ups and downs, some laughs, and entertaining stretches. And under different circumstances, it would have been considered a box office success. It made over four hundred million, in the same range as all three Brendan Fraser movies, not adjusting their numbers for inflation. The problem was the amount of money Universal put into the budget: nearly two hundred million by some counts. And then a hundred million more for the marketing. When you make a Mummy movie that can’t be considered a success after earning four hundred and ten million dollars, you’ve made some poor accounting decisions.
The next Dark Universe movie was supposed to be a remake of Bride of Frankenstein, with Angelina Jolie and Gal Gadot in the running to play the Bride. There was a script by David Koepp and the perfect director at the helm: Bill Condon, who made Gods and Monsters, a fictional story of the last days of original Frankenstein and Bride of Frankenstein director James Whale. Gods and Monsters even featured scenes of Whale on the set of the original Bride of Frankenstein, so it was fitting that Condon was going to make his own version of that film. But, disappointed with The Mummy’s box office, Universal cancelled Bride of Frankenstein soon before production was supposed to begin. And they scrapped the Dark Universe completely. So we didn’t get to see Javier Bardem as Frankenstein’s Monster, or the Invisible Man movie that would have starred Johnny Depp. The studio decided to focus on filmmaker-driven, standalone reboots of their Monster properties, leading to projects like the Depp-less The Invisible Man and the Nicolas Cage Dracula comedy Renfield. In some cases, it’s probably for the best that they didn’t carry on with the Dark Universe. For example, there was a Creature from the Black Lagoon script that had a rocket launcher battle and an ending where the Gill Man is recruited into Prodigium, taking a helicopter ride with Doctor Jekyll. We didn’t need to see that.
Looking back on The Mummy years later, Kurtzman – who has gone on to work on many more projects – told The Playlist, “You learn nothing from your successes and you learn everything from your failures. That was probably the biggest failure of my life, both personally and professionally. There’s about a million things I regret about it, but it also gave me so many gifts. I didn’t become a director until I made that movie, and it wasn’t because it was well directed. It was because it wasn’t. And I would not have understood many of the things that I now understand about what it means to be a director had I not gone through that experience. As brutal as it was in many ways, and as many cooks in the kitchen as there were, I am very grateful for the opportunity to make those mistakes. It rebuilt me into a tougher person, and it also rebuilt me into a clearer filmmaker.”
So while The Mummy didn’t turn out like anyone hoped, it all worked out in the end. But it’s still a shame Bill Condon didn’t get to make his Bride of Frankenstein.
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