THE MUMMY’s second prologue finds Rick O’Connell (Brendan Fraser) and Beni Gabor (Kevin J. O’Connor) in their French Foreign Legionnaire days, fighting Tuaregs (North African forces) for the lost Egyptian city of Hamunaptra and its treasures. Losing the battle, Rick encounters shifting sands that reveal Imhotep’s face.

The French Foreign Legion is an interesting angle. Historically, they were comprised of non-French volunteers and undesirables conscripts who were used in over a century of colonialist violence against primarily African countries. They were essentially mercenaries for France’s imperialist nation-building, and it explains why Rick is far more a soldier than an explorer— he’s a gussied-up gun for hire.

This gets into one of the least-discussed aspects of THE MUMMY series; the hero-worship of Rick as an Indiana Jones analogue when he is, in practice, no better than the mercenaries helping the rival dig team. Both are groups of westerners pillaging Egypt for western interests. Evelyn (Rachel Weisz) might have academic interests in the discoveries, but she, like the others, are pillaging for western museums and she is going against the wishes of native Egyptians to do so.

It says a great deal about THE MUMMY’s charisma and charm that this colonial violence doesn’t make all these characters seem immediately reprehensible. Then again, I’m a White person. Perhaps groups that were impacted by colonialism find it impossible to sympathize with any of them.



#021 Rick O'Connell
Team: No Affiliation
Range: 6
Points: 50
Keywords: O’Connells & Carnahans, Medjai, Soldier, Warrior, Mystical, Past

6 11 18 2

6 11 17 2

6 11 17 2

6 11 18 2

6 11 18 2

6 11 18 2

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

Always Saving My Family From Mummies: Adjacent friendly characters with the O'Connells & Carnahans keyword modify their Defense by +1.
Sacred Golden Spear: Blades/Claws/Fangs, Precision Strike, and Giant Reach: 2. Ignores Mystics Team ability.

THE MUMMY’s main story begins with Evelyn discovering the map to Hamunaptra and enlisting her brother Jonathan (John Hannah) and Rick to guide her. These events lead to her inadvertently resurrecting Imhotep as the Mummy. Like Rick, Evelyn is charming as all get-out, and Rachel Weisz is transcendent in the role.

In the first MUMMY, Evelyn is an awkward, accident-prone librarian who inadvertently unleashes Imhotep, only to spend the rest of the movie as a damsel in distress. The second film, THE MUMMY RETURNS (2001), empowered her by making her the reincarnation of an Egyptian princess with martial arts skills.

Really.

As fun as the first two Mummy movies are, they, like their predecessors, have always been works of eroticized cultural appropriation, and it’s hard to think of a more blatant act of that than Rachel Weisz in an Egyptian bikini. THE MUMMY RETURNS would also see Brendan Fraser suddenly realize that he’s a member of the Medjai, the ancient Egyptian nomadic mystic warriors that defend the earth from ancient Egyptian threats. Because Brendan Fraser sure looks like an Egyptian to me. This is bearing in mind that there was next to no Egyptian or Middle Eastern North African (MENA) actor in the main cast.



#022 Evelyn O'Connell
Team: No Affiliation
Range: 4
Points: 40
Keywords: O'Connells & Carnahans, Scientist, Mystical, Warrior

5 9 16 1

5 9 16 1

5 9 16 1

7 11 18 2

7 11 18 2

7 11 18 2

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

Saving Rick From Himself: When an adjacent friendly character with the O'Connells & Carnahans keyword is targeted by an an attack, once per turn, you may have the attacker reroll that attack.
Devastatingly Clumsy: Sidestep. When Evie or an adjacent friendly character would critically miss, instead of normal effects, you may knock back the targeted opposing character.
Nefertiti's Combat Training: Blades/Claws/Fangs & Flurry.

Jonathan Carnahan, played by John Hannah, is one of the film’s many comic relief characters, and is sort of seen as a slightly less weaselly version of Beni, Imhotep’s crony and Rick’s former comrade.

Throughout the Mummy trilogy, Jonathan is out for his own self-enrichment and hedonistic pursuits of alcohol and women… but he’s low-key fluent in Egyptian hieroglyphics, a sharpshooter, and handy in a gunfight. Why?

This fan theory suggests that Jonathan lived through WWI, presumably lost all his friends in it, and decided to never live another day sober. I kinda love that theory. The depth, nuance, and tragedy of it made Jonathan go from my least favorite character in the franchise to someone I enjoy seeing on screen.



#023 Jonathan Carnahan
Team: No Affiliation
Range: 5
Points: 50
Keywords: O'Connells & Carnahans, Scientist, Soldier, Celebrity

7 10 18 2

7 10 17 2

7 10 17 2

7 11 18 2

7 11 18 2

7 11 18 2

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

Sharing My Family's Wealth: Whenever a friendly character with the O'Connells and Carnahans keyword hits an opposing character equipped with an Object, Jonathan may equip that Object and score 1 Mission Point.
Surprisingly Good Sharpshooter: 10 and Ranged Combat Expert.

Huh, that actually makes a lot of sense! I hadn't heard that theory before, but it goes a long way to add a lot more depth to his character.

Haven't had too much to say since it's been a very long time since I last saw this one. These dials and essays are definitely giving me the itch to go back, haha!

I really liked the 2014 Wolf Man movie with Benicio del Toro and Anthony Hopkins. Interested to see someone do the dial for the main Wolf Man character from this film.

Haha MUMMY 1999 is a staple in the circles I travel. It holds the hell up, one of the rare horror-comedy-adventure films where it feels like all three genres play well together without one getting more focus than the others. It helps that it's all delivered incredibly well. I struggle to think of a gag that doesn't land, a scare that isn't at least a little creepy, or a setpiece that isn't gripping. Big recommend!
Ah, I agree, that's a good movie with a ton of beautifully executed scenes. I'm looking forward to discussing that as well, because it feels underrated in the fandom.

I'll be posting one dial a day for awhile, so hang tight-- we'll definitely get there!

Israeli actor Oded Fehr plays Ardeth Bay (spelled differently from THE MUMMY 1932’s “Ardath Bey” for some reason), a mystical Egyptian nomadic warrior of the Medjai. Great as he is in the role, Biblically & pentateuchally-speaking, an Israeli playing an Egyptian is hilarious to me.

In the first MUMMY, the Medjai are oddly ineffectual. They watch the British plunder the lost -and forbidden!- city of Hamunaptra and do nothing. When the British are on the verge of discovering Imhotep, the Medjai attack to ward them off, but don’t actually kill anyone when they know full well that the British could awaken an apocalyptic evil. When the British do just that, the Medjai are barely present, few in number and minimal in defense against Imhotep’s forces.

In THE MUMMY RETURNS, the Medjai suddenly number in the thousands. Must’ve been a big recruitment drive after the first movie!

While Oded Fehr has great deadpan comic delivery and intensity in THE MUMMY and all his other roles, he primarily seems here to look and act “ethnically,” which has to feel insulting to MENA people.



#024 Ardeth Bay
Team: No Affiliation
Range: 7
Points: 50
Keywords: Medjai, O'Connells & Carnahans, Mystical, Warrior

8 11 18 3

8 11 17 3

7 10 18 3

7 10 18 2

6 11 18 2

6 11 17 2

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

Holy Warrior of God: Ardeth Bay ignores damage from the Mystics Team Ability.
Horus the Messenger Falcon: FREE: generate a Horus bystander [MAX: 1] within 4 squares of Ardeth Bay.

#024b Horus
Team: No Affiliation
Range: 0

10 8 16 1

UPDATED 09/25/23 - Thanks, No-Name!

Kevin J. O'Connor plays Beni Gabor, Rick’s French Foreign Legion former comrade, and a spineless, traitorous crony of Imhotep’s. He’s a fun stock crony character, one whose backstabbing and self-preservation tactics knows no depths. You love to hate him, and you spend the whole movie waiting to see him die. And he does pretty damn badly!

One of MUMMY director Stephen Sommers’ favorite actor collaborators, O’Connor also appeared in Sommers’ movies DEEP RISING (a favorite of mine!), VAN HELSING as Igor, and G.I. JOE: THE RISE OF COBRA as Dr. Mindbender.



#025 Beni Gabor
Team: No Affiliation
Range: 5
Points: 30
Keywords: Mummy, Villager, Spy

6 10 17 2

6 10 17 2

6 10 16 1

6 10 16 1

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

"Goodbye, Beni.": When Beni is KO'd, do not remove him from the game. Instead, after resolutions, place him in the square he last occupied on click #1. He is now friendly to the player to the left’s force. Each time Beni is KOed this game, the player who initially fielded him scores 3 Mission Points. Safeguard: Pulse Wave.

That's such a cool way to handle a traitor character! I know there have been other dials with the "When this character is ko'd swap forces effect." But none of them ever really felt worth it to me. Adding in Mission Points is a neat way to add a little extra incentive. Now you almost want to get Beni ko'd and your opponent is incentivized to do what they can to keep him alive, most likely to the detriment of their own team thanks to that Mastermind.

The only thing that is problematic with Ardeth’s dial is that there’s nothing stopping him from flooding the field with Horuses, just pop a new one out for Free each turn.

I admit to really enjoying that first Fraser Mummy movie. The franchise basically existed on a level of diminishing returns, but the charms of the cast always kept it at least watchable. Which I guess is probably why nobody really cares about Scorpion King? Mummy sans Fraser is a no-go?

Also, is Black Adam a remake of Scorpion King?

Many thanks, friend! Glad this one feels interesting and crunchy! Haha Beni is a shameless survivor, changing alliances at the first indication that he's next to someone more powerful. It's hilarious how far he goes, even pulling out a chain of religious icons to try each of them on Imhotep. It's also funny to me that Stephen Sommers cast him -in literally all of their collaborations- as a crony of some kind.
Ooh, many thanks for the feedback, friend! I appreciate it! I've updated the dial accordingly and sent you some rep for the catch!

It's funny, I know some folks who are wild about THE SCORPION KING, but I got bored when I attempted to watch it. Despite the Dwayne the Rock Johnson's charisma, especially at this point in his career, it didn't always feel like he had it in his movie career. To me, THE SCORPION KING felt like CONAN THE BARBARIAN (1982) without the intensity, horror, violence, sex, romance... and therefore the point. Maybe I should try it again someday. It is, after all, monster movies-adjacent and the one that made Dwayne the Rock Johnson famous.

Y'know... Spielberg considered JAWS (1975) a sequel to DUEL (1971) (big thing hunts smaller thing and both movies have 4-letter titles), so it wouldn't surprise me if Dwayne the Rock Johnson considered every sword and sandal movie a sequel to THE SCORPION KING. He's signed on to a few of them over the years, and, cynically, he seems pretty comfortable being cast in mediterranean & MENA roles : /

THE MUMMY balances its disparate genres (action, adventure, comedy, romance, and horror) deftly, with one always blending with and feeding into the next seemlessly. It’s an incredibly difficult balancing act that’s easy to screw up, as successors like THE MUMMY: TOMB OF THE DRAGON EMPEROR (2008) and THE MUMMY (2017) would demonstrate. THE MUMMY and THE MUMMY RETURNS almost impossibly know how to let each of their elements breathe and have their time without tonal dissonance or stepping on each other.

It says much about the great flexibility of the horror genre that THE MUMMY and THE MUMMY RETURNS can be minorly spooky with their scarab swarms, shambling mummies, and Pygmy mummies and these movies are still considered to be legit horror movies in their own right, despite scares being this series’ lowest priority.

Another fun thing about THE MUMMY’s genre hybridization? It’s the same tone that would be adopted by Marvel Studio’s MCU films, creating what is usually a perfect, broad audiences-pleasing mix of adventure, comedy, spectacle, and dramatic payoff.



#026 Scarab Swarm
Team: No Affiliation
Range: 0
Points: 50
Keywords: Mystical, Animal, Past

6 10 18 1

6 10 18 1

6 10 17 1

7 11 17 2

7 11 17 2

7 11 17 2

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

Crawling Under the Skin... and Into the Brain: Steal Energy. // When Scarab Swarm hits with a close attack, they may move the hit character up to half their speed value and place themselves adjacent to that character.

Lol, so where do I really stand on THE MUMMY? I love it! It’s a fun romp that constantly keeps me entertained. It’s genuinely exciting, funny, and romantic, and the horror violence is always just legit enough to work without overloading everything else. I love that it and its sequel use a mix of practical and digital effects for its monster effects, making images that mostly have held up over the years (giving The Scorpion King the side-eye, though).

I love Winston, the WWI pilot who spends his days in drunken abandon, yearning for the day that he joins his squad mates in the afterlife. I love half-decayed Imhotep murdering people like it’s a 90s slasher movie. I love Rick & Evelyn’s funny, bickering, passionate romance. I love the scarabs. I love that this is just a damn fun time.

Sure, it’s got some optics issues, but it has so, so much to redeem them, that I’ve watched this several times.



#027 Mummy Guard
Team: No Affiliation
Range: 0
Points: 25
Keywords: Mummy, Monster, Mystical, Past

6 10 18 1

6 10 18 1

5 9 17 1

5 9 17 1

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

"These guys don't use doors.": Improved Movement: Ignores & Destroys Blocking Terrain
Falling Apart: Mummy Guard cannot be healed.

THE MUMMY was a critical and financial success for Universal. It would spawn two sequels, a spin-off series (THE SCORPION KING), a cartoon series, and a great roller coaster at Universal Studios Theme Park that has been in operation for just over 20 years.

Several of THE MUMMY’s ideas were cannibalized for THE MUMMY (2017), because if you can’t improve upon perfection, you’ve gotta steal from it.

The Mummy definitely proves that fun can definitely take massive precedence over other things. Like you said, there are definitely problematic elements to the films, no real shock there. But when you're having this much fun, problematic elements can easily be forgiven.

And I think that's why things kinda fell apart for The Mummy at the end of this trilogy and in the Tom Cruise version. Because when you boil it down, the key factor - are they fun? When you're not having fun, typically speaking, your attention diverts to nitpicking when it wouldn't otherwise.

I can't tell you how many dumb movies I've loved because I was enjoying myself, and how many equally dumb movies I can't help but nitpick because they're just plain dull. Like I absolutely love Eight Legged Freaks. It's a big dumb early 2000s homage to 50s B-movies about gigantic radioactive spiders. The giant spiders periodically make silly chipmunk sounds for no particular reason. It geefully holds to standard b-movie tropes like the paranoid crank being (sorta) right, the washed-up has-been returning home to be the hero, the greedy politician who, through carelessness refuses to do anything until the problem is practically apocalyptic. The expert kid who understands the situation perfectly and nobody takes seriously until it's almost too late. The orchestral score heavily relies on "The Itsy Bitsy Spider".

So much of Eight Legged Freaks would make it something to just be derided and mocked for how silly and dumb it is. But much like The Mummy, it balances its comedy and horror beautifully, making for what is, in my eyes, a perfect cinematic experience. Seriously - if you've never seen this one, track it down immediately.

Haha agreed, EIGHT LEGGED FREAKS is a ton of fun. Haven't seen it in a long time, but it's such a loving send-up of monster B-movies. My favorite part is when the spider is fighting the cat in the walls and they both keep making Looney Tunes-style impressions in the plaster.