Line #43 Film/TheMummyTombOfTheDragonEmperor


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5	[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/themummytotde.png]]
6	[[caption-width-right:350:''[[TagLine The adventure of a thousand lifetimes.]]'']]
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8	->''"The curse must never be lifted... or the Emperor will rise again, to enslave all of man-kind. On that dark day, there will be nothing and no one, to save us."''
9	-->-- '''Zi Yuan'''
10
11	''The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor'' is the 2008 sequel to ''Film/TheMummyReturns'' and the final entry in ''Film/TheMummyTrilogy''. The film is directed by Creator/RobCohen, with the screenplay by Alfred Gough and Miles Millar. It was released on August 1, 2008.
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13	In Ancient China, the tyrannical Dragon Emperor (Creator/JetLi) united the kingdoms under his rule after he acquired magical powers. After betraying Zi Yuan (Creator/MichelleYeoh), the woman who helped him, he is sealed away, seemingly for good. In 1946, Rick and Evelyn O'Connell (Creator/BrendanFraser and Creator/MariaBello) and their son Alex (Creator/LukeFord) go on an archeological survey in Shanghai when two members of a rogue military faction release the Emperor to use him to reunite the wartorn country by any means necessary.
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15	The film also stars Creator/JohnHannah as Jonathan Carnahan, Creator/RussellWong as General Ming Guo, Creator/AnthonyWong as General Yang, Creator/LiamCunningham as Mad Dog Maguire and Creator/IsabellaLeong as Lin.
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17	----
18	!!This film provides examples of:
19
20	* AlternativeForeignThemeSong: The Japanese dub of ''The Dragon Emperor'' uses [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=se9G-gkdZY4 "Memories"]] by Manami Kurose as its image song.
21	* AnnoyingArrows: A RainOfArrows is fired at the undead army. They spend a couple minutes pulling them out then get back to the fighting.
22	* AntiVillain: The Dragon Emperor's living minions Yang and Choi. Their country has been locked in a vicious civil war for years, and it seems like the only man who can unite China is the one who did it in the first place. Made especially so by [[spoiler: their very heroic deaths: Choi trying to pull Yang out of machinery while he yells at her to save herself.]]
23	* BackToBackBadasses: Evy and Rick, first with rifles, then pistols, then swiped swords, until eventually they're exhausted, leaning back to back to keep each other standing up.
24	* BareHandedBladeBlock: Zi Yuan manages to catch the Emperor's sword thrust. [[spoiler: She then lets go and sacrifices herself to grab the cursed dagger from the Emperor's belt.]]
25	* BigDamnHeroes: Jonathan arrives at the final battle to take on the Emperor's terracotta army with a pair of UsefulNotes/WorldWarII planes.
26	-->'''Evy:''' Jonathan certainly knows how to make an entrance.
27	* BigfootSasquatchAndYeti: Lin summons a small army of Yetis to aid the heroes.
28	* CoolVersusAwesome: Terracotta warriors versus a skeleton army.
29	* ContinuityNod: In the final battle against the Emperor, Alex draws a divide symbol on the sand ground for Rick to remember his "divide and conquer" strategy. This links back to ''Film/TheMummyReturns'', where a kidnapped Alex constantly made sand sculptures as signals for Rick and Evy to find him.
30	* DeathByCameo: One of the three assassins killed by the Emperor in the flashback scene (the third, who got a knife through the throat) is Creator/WuJing, then a rising star in the film industry. Regrettably, this is the closest Wu Jing would get to fighting Jet Li.
31	* DisappearedDad: Lin wasn't able to know Ming as the Emperor killed him before she was born. They briefly meet in the final battle before his undead form crumbles back to dust.
32	* ElementalPowers: The Emperor, and they make sure to establish that he uses the Chinese, rather than Western, elements.
33	* FullNameUltimatum: Rick to Alex.
34	--> '''Rick:''' Alexander Rupert O'Connell, you get on the back of this horse, '''this instant!'''
35	* GenreBlindness: Jonathan shouldn't have ''openly stated'' he was moving to Peru because there were no mummies there.
36	%% * Getting Crap Past The Radar: Due to overwhelming and persistent misuse, GCPTR is on-page examples only until 01 June 2021. If you are reading this in the future, please check the trope page to make sure your example fits the current definition.
37	* GreenEyedMonster: The Emperor killed Ming in jealousy after Zi Yuan chose him.
38	* HalfTheManHeUsedToBe: A bisected soldier is briefly seen crawling after Rick in the final fight.
39	* HereWeGoAgain: Rick {{invoke\|d trope}}s the trope to the letter when the Emperor comes back to life.
40	* HeroicSacrifice:
41	** [[spoiler: Zi Yuan (who had already sacrificed her immortality to raise General Ming's army) allows the Emperor to mortally wound her with his sword in order to get back the dagger that can kill him.]]
42	** Also when [[spoiler: Han throws a sword at Alex while his back is turned, only for Rick to push Alex out of the way and as a result Rick is mortally wounded by the sword instead of his son.]]
43	* LaterInstallmentWeirdness: Inevitably, owing to being released a good seven years after the first two movies leads to some of these:
44	** Evie has been Darrin-ed from Rachel Weisz to Maria Bello, for starters.
45	** The absence of Imhotep, Ardeth Bay, the Medjai in general and change in setting from Egyptian myths to Chinese ones, the only references to Egypt being a few statues seen in Rick's house at the start and outfits of the dancers in Shanghai's Club Imhotep later on. The (discarded) SequelHook suggest that should a fourth movie be made, it will follow this new template by setting the next installment in Peru.
46	** The film's BigBad doesn't have any past connections to the O'Connells. In comparison, Evelyn turns out to be reincarnated from the Pharaoh's daughter and witnessed her father being killed by the first villain Imhotep in her past life, while Rick is descended from warriors fated to kill the Scorpion King. The only connection Alex O'Connell has with the titular Emperor is uncovering the tomb.
47	* LeaningOnTheFourthWall: When we meet Maria Bello as Evy, she refers to a character in her novel based on her and Rick's adventures as being "a completely different person."
48	* LighterAndSofter: This film has less emphasis on horror than the previous two films.
49	* LiteralAssKicking: Lin drop-kicks one of Yang's mooks before a Yeti kicks him in the butt and [[PunchedAcrossTheRoom sends him flying]].
50	* MayflyDecemberRomance: Alex and the 2,000-year-old Lin fall in love. She later [[spoiler: has to give up her immortality, enabling her to spend her life with him]].
51	* {{Narrator}}: This time around, Freda Foh Shen narrates the film's opening.
52	* NightOfTheLivingMooks: [[spoiler: The counter-undead raised to fight the Dragon Emperor.]]
53	* ObservationOnOriginality: The film merrily hits every action/adventure movie trope right on the mark. Nothing in the movie is a surprise, but it's not a bad film for it.
54	* PoorCommunicationKills: [[spoiler:Roger Wilson]] ends up killed by the Dragon Emperor not long after the latter's resurrection, thanks to Gen. Yang failing to mention him as an ally of theirs, [[spoiler:Wilson]] not speaking Chinese, and the fighting going on between them and the O'Connells.
55	* PreMortemOneLiner: Rick says "Now you can rule... in hell." seconds before [[spoiler:the Dragon Emperor explodes]].
56	* PrettyInMink: There are a few fox wraps, in addition to the winter coats in the mountains.
57	* PunctuatedPounding: Rick when gunning down the Emperor's troops at the Great Wall.
58	--> '''Rick:''' I! [''bang!''] Really! [''bang!''] Hate! [''bang!''] ''Mummies''! [''bang!'']
59	* PuttingOnTheReich: Yang sports a Nazi-style uniform. See ShownTheirWork below.
60	* ReallySevenHundredYearsOld: Lin, who's over 2,000 years old, having received an immortal life from her mother.
61	* RainOfArrows: Fittingly used by the terracotta army, but they abandoned the strategy when they remembered their opponents were undead.
62	* SequelGoesForeign: No more Egypt, it's China this time around.
63	* SequelHook: The movie ends with Jonathan resolving to move to Peru. As he drives off, ''Mummies were later discovered in Peru'' appears on the screen. Though considering the timing and that no further movies have been made, this may just have been reinforcing Jonathan's status as the ButtMonkey.
64	* ShoutOut: Jonathan runs a nightclub themed off his, Evy, and Rick's adventures against the (previous) Mummy. [[Film/AbbottAndCostelloMeetTheMummy Abbott and Costello did similar.]]
65	* ShownTheirWork: Several points in the film.
66	** The British government agent warns the O'Connells that post-war China is a very dangerous place. This is true because right after Japan's defeat in World War II, the Communists and the Nationalists resumed their fighting in 1946, reigniting the Chinese Civil War. Additionally, there were warlords around the Chinese countryside. The film takes place in 1946-1947, which would make complete sense.
67	** Yang, the rogue KMT officer, sports a Nazi-style uniform. The Third Reich did supply the Nationalist Chinese with German-made weapons, equipment, and uniforms from 1938-1941, in what is now known at the Sino-German Cooperation.
68	** Though it looks like a throwaway joke, there really are mummies in Peru (see the Chinchorro mummies). However, they were discovered about thirty years before the setting of this film.
69	* SomeoneToRememberHimBy: Zi Yuan was apparently pregnant by Ming when the Emperor killed him, and transmitted immortality to their daughter Lin. Thus they were briefly able to see each other two thousand years later in the final battle.
70	* SpannerInTheWorks: The people who sealed the Emperor away put his mummy in a statue, the idea being that anyone who tries to raise him would instead raise a eunuch, which was in the coffin as decoy. This plan almost works... till the mummy raising water is accidentally splashed on the emperor's statue.
71	* StaircaseTumble: While Alex fights one of Yang's mooks near the entrance to Shangri-La, a Yeti grabs said mook and sends him tumbling down the stairs.
72	* TakenForGranite: Probably the most horrific origin story of the Terracotta Warriors ever conceived. Explains why every face is unique...
73	* TearOffYourFace: The Emperor's terracotta face frequently cracks and falls off, only to rebuild itself. At one point he rips it off deliberately and hurls the resulting death mask as a weapon.
74	* TemptingFate: Jonathan states that he's moving to Peru after selling his bar to a Russian pilot, and states that at least that place doesn't have mummies. A narrative quote then appears stating that after his arrival, mummies were discovered in Peru.
75	* ThrowingYourSwordAlwaysWorks: The Dragon Emperor throwing his sword at Rick. Although being able to make it fly around on a whim it probably helped.
76	* UseYourHead: Since the Emperor's fighting skills surpass his, Rick has to play a little more creative by delivering two headbutts on him in order to stagger him, allowing him to follow up with several more blows.
77	* VillainBall:
78	** The villains make sure that the O'Connells are the ones to deliver the Eye of Shangri-la to the museum. No reason is really given for this, they get Evey to translate the writing on it but Ancient Chinese isn't her specialty so why they would need her specifically is still unclear.
79	** The Dragon Emperor himself does this 2000 years earlier, killing General Ming out of jealousy, and thinking Zi Yuan, ''a powerful witch'', wouldn't take any vengeance on him.
80	* WellIntentionedExtremist: Yang and Choi. They resurrected the Dragon Emperor only so they could end China's civil war.
81	* WhoWantsToLiveForever: Lin, once she realizes that she's in love with Alex. Her mother took care of that problem.
82	* YouCantThwartStageOne: The O'Connells' efforts to try and stop the Emperor from entering Shangri-La turn out to be for naught when [[spoiler:he follows the heroes to Shangri-La and finally regains his human form]].

Context Film / TheMummyTombOfTheDragonEmperor