The Mummy: Tomb Of The Dragon Emperor

Before we start, the first thing the movie taught me is how utter replaceable and unimportant Rachel Weisz is as an actress. Nobody goes to see Mummy movies to see Rachel Weisz. It feels like a good reality check for that specific actress. What was she thinking?

Time to review the movie. The question in the back of my mind from the first returned: Why does this movie have to suck? Why can't it be better? There is no reason it needs to be this poor. At all. It's a choice the producers made. And it's a choice most producers of blockbuster movies during this era made, which is why Marvel Studios saw an opening, swooped in, and conquered Hollywood. You want to complain about how crappy Marvel Studios movies are, Scorsese? I am willing to bet they wouldn't even bother EXISTING if bad films like The Mummy: Tomb Of The Dragon Emperor didn't make hundreds of millions of dollars at the box office. Don't like what Marvel has done to Hollywood, Marty? Blame your peers and the people who made movies like this. They made Marvel Studios not just inevitable, but an actual necessity.

Speaking of which, I am due a second look at Smallville. I've never been a crazy fan, but this tells me it must have been far worse than I remembered. Al Gough and Miles Millar wrote the screenplay to this bad movie. And I'm sure Brannon Braga and Ronald D Moore don't want the rest of their TV careers defined by Star Trek: Generations, but yeah, when you get a couple of TV writers to do a huge Hollywood movie and they suck so much, you take notice. For the record, I don't think Avengers: Age Of Ultron would be as widely hated as it is today if it weren't written and directed by Joss Whedon. Beloved TV people butcher a famous franchise, people notice. See also J.J. Abrams' entire relationship to Star Trek.

What else? My garbage disposal isn't working. I pressed the button tonight to grind up some food and it made a whirring and died. This is a garbage disposal in 2023. You press the button, garbage it supposed to get sucked. And it's a no-go for 2023, until my landlord gets it together. So thinking about this, I'm realizing exactly how stupid Hollywood's notions of booby traps in adventure movies actually are. They still work after thousands of years? Who actually tested these huge elaborate Rube Goldberg devices to make sure they worked? And if they tested well did that mean they invariably had to rebuilt the pyramid the booby trap destroyed? And how the hell do these things work EXACTLY as intended, with no human error 2000 years later? Weren't people shorter back then? Wouldn't the heights of the arrow launchers be different?

I swear to God I got the board game Mouse Trap to work correctly once or twice. It was a hassle, and ordeal, but I did it. But I was freaking THERE. I wouldn't set up the game and leave for 2000 years confident it would delight the archeologists who found it in the exact same position I left it 2 millennia ago, and how it worked flawlessly for them the first time out.

Did I mention when I press the button my garbage disposal does nothing? Because that feels relevant.

Weird seeing Liam Cunningham clean-shaven. Like SUPER weird. I actually don't think there exist too many people on Earth who look better bearded than clean-shaven. Cunningham is one of those one in a given hundred. Weird.

Yeti, and dragons, and shapeshifters. I feel like all of these new supernatural concepts at once are violating the premise. It's stopped being the Universe of The Mummy and essentially turned in DC Comics. They are telling the story wrong if that happens.

There is no reason this movie needed to be this bad. And I also suspect this mean Smallville is even crappier than I remembered. **.