I’ve been winding down from a difficult week for the last two nights by rewatching The Mummy trilogy, which isn’t actually a trilogy but more a double feature of The Mummy and The Mummy Returns with an added spin-off of The Scorpion King. If you haven’t seen them, romance fans, treat yourself someday because it is all there – adventure, mystery, fantasy and real romance. Okay, mystery may be a stretch so call it suspense if you want but it’s all in one very nice package in all three movies minus the blood and gore traditionally associated with horror or action/adventure films.
The Mummy is about how Evelyn Carnahan and her brother, Jonathan, hire Rick O’Connell to help her find the Lost City of the Dead. Naturally they manage to unleash and defeat The Mummy and fall in love in the process. And that’s just the short summary. It is an absolutely fabulous action/adventure tale all the way around, which is good since I really don’t do horror well at all.
The Mummy Returns picks up 9 years later when the now married O’Connells have to rescue their son from the same mummy who’s back and trying to acquire the Scorpion King’s invincible army. What’s truly fascinating from a romance standpoint is while this one isn’t about anyone falling in love there is an extremely poignant contrast drawn between Rick and Evelyn’s love and the mummy Imhotep and the love of his life, Anck Su Namun.
The Scorpion King is the pure adventure back story of how a hired assassin called Mathayus becomes a king well before he becomes the mostly scorpion monster of The Mummy Returns. It’s also a very nice love story between Mathayus and Cassandra, the sorceress. Amazingly, The Rock is a very convincing romantic lead.
Yes, it is. This marathon of watching them all started because I lucked up on all three for less than $10 each when I was out shopping the other day. I couldn’t believe how much I enjoyed rewatching them again. All of them. In fact, in a completely different way, The Scorpion King is as good or better than the other two.
And then after rewatching them, I found out the same guy produced and wrote the script for Van Helsing, which I also really liked because of the adventure, fantasy, mystery & romance combination. Even if that one didn’t quite have a “romantic” HEA, which was probably to be expected because it sure seemed like he was setting up a sequel to me.
Oh, I love The Mummy movies! Some of my all time favs. And you’re right. It is all there.