YMMV / The Mummy Returns

• Alternate Character Interpretation: Did Anck-su-namun always value her own life over Imhotep's? Or has her resolve been weakened by the trauma of being killed and sent to the underworld twice in the last film? Or is Meelah's consciousness overpowering her in the moment, and her sense of self-preservation overcame Anuck-su-namun's memories?
• Awesome Music: Alan Silvestri's reworked score for The Mummy Returns arguably surpasses the original's score by Jerry Goldsmith.
• Base-Breaking Character: In contrast to how beloved she was in the first film, Evy's portrayal here is more divisive. She has matured considerably in the eight year Time Skip, as well as becoming a mother, meaning that she's less of an Adorkable Cute Clumsy Girl. Some are fine with it, feeling it was the natural evolution of the character, and like how she has become a full fledged Action Girl. Others however feel she has changed too much from what originally made her special, leaning more into the Women Are Wiser trope, and there being less emphasis on her smarts than before.
• Broken Base: Some people criticize Mathayus' depiction as bloodthirsty while some fans prefer this version instead.
• Catharsis Factor: Even after all the horrible things he has done, Imhotep's actual death end's up far too pitiful to be satisfying. Anck-su-namun on the other hand, after she murdered the Pharaoh (not that he was entirely innocent) right in front of his daughter, murdered Evy in front of her entire family, and left Imhotep to die even after all he did for her, her death via being Eaten Alive by Scarabs might hit the spot (especially considering that it is the same way Imhotep died the first time for trying to help her all those years ago).
• Complete Monster: The Scorpion King, the wicked descendant of the heroic Mathayus, led an army to conquer the world. Upon defeat, he vowed himself to the dark god Anubis and was gifted with Anubis's mighty army with which he used to brutally exterminate countless innocent lives and entire cities that lay before him. Claimed by Anubis, he awakens many centuries later, intending to use his army to eradicate all who live.
• Contested Sequel: While it didn't get as well-received as the first film, it was still met with positive enough reactions. Fans aren't likely to call Fanon Discontinuity on it as they are for the third film. It seems to hang on what you preferred about the first film; the second drops a lot of the characterization in favor of plot twists and action spectacles.
• Critical Dissonance: Rotten Tomatoes has the critics score at 47% while the audience score is 63%.
• Cry for the Devil: By the end of the film you can't help but feel sorry for Imhotep as he throws himself into the pit.
• Evil Is Cool: Anubis has an entire Badass Army of jackal-men. Those guys are sweet! Also Lock-Nah, by far Imhotep's most charismatic and competent follower across his two movies.
• Fan Fic Fuel: In the Time Skip between first and second movie, Evy and Rick have now become famed explorers and adventurers with a huge mansion and collection of treasures. Leaves a lot of room for imagining what they got up to in all those years.
• Fanon Discontinuity: Most fans prefer to ignore the third film and pretend the trilogy ends here.
• Harsher in Hindsight:
  • The Reveal that Evy is actually Nefertiri reincarnated, with a flashback of Rachel Weisz playing her in Ancient Egypt seems sadly prophetic of the controversy surrounding Exodus: Gods and Kings and Gods of Egypt regarding white actors playing Egyptian characters. While it's justified here (we can assume Nefertiri didn't really look like Evy and using Rachel Weisz is more convenient to tell the audience it's her past life) it's arguably more notable that this film did at least cast actual Middle-Eastern actors in the roles (save for Dwayne Johnson and Patricia Velasquez, who were at least brown-skinned).
  • Evy bringing her son, Alex, on an expedition in Egypt at the beginning of the movie became this when Evy's actress, Rachel Weisz, refused to return for the third film, The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor, due to not wanting to travel to China after having just giving birth.
• He's Just Hiding: Some fans like to think that Shafek (the Mook who is always dodging attacks as a Running Gag) survives being speared, as the last time he's on camera, his eyes are still open and his head seems to still be moving.
• Hilarious in Hindsight:
  • Evy being killed and resurrected is amusing when you take into account how many films after this would have Rachel Weisz as a Posthumous Character - Constantine, The Constant Gardener and The Fountain. And then The Lovely Bones, where her daughter fills that role.
  • Evy also brings her son along on the expedition at the start. It turns out Rachel Weisz wouldn't feel the same way, as the reason she didn't come back for the third film was not wanting to travel after having just given birth.
  • Joe Dixon, playing Jacques, is devoured by Imhotep, who killed Pharaoh Seti. In the stage version of The Prince of Egypt, Dixon played Seti himself.
• Moral Event Horizon: After literally going to hell for her, Anck-su-namun abandons Imhotep when he asks her to save him. She arguably crossed it twice earlier when she tricked the English men into opening the chest, thus making them easy prey for Imhotep, or when she cruelly stabbed Evy to death right in front of her brother, husband and son.
• Narm:
  • The Scorpion King, due to Special Effects Failure.
  • When the Spear is slo-mo at the Scorpion King, he does a slo-mo "HUH???" It's super-Narmish.
  • O'Connell stabs the Scorpion King. Cue Imhotep from stage right with dramatic pose: "Niyaaaaaaah!" This could be a regular, non-narmy dramatic moment if not for arguably being a beat too late, and the fact that his front foot is visible as he stands offscreen to do the dramatic pose before yelling, making it look and feel like Arnold Vosloo missed his cue. Here is that glorious moment, in case you're wondering.. The CG Scorpion King looks up from his impalement as if to say "WTF is wrong with you?"
  • The establishing shot of London, with St. Paul's, Tower Bridge, and Parliament all seemingly crowded together on one block like the caption wouldn't be enough to let us know where we are.
  • The curator being killed by the terrible CGI Scorpion King ends up being unintentionally hilarious. With one rip across the chest his limbs go flying everywhere like a cherry bomb went off inside an action figure.
  • Anck-su-namun's death is so abrupt and easy that it comes off as a little ridiculous. As she is running though the collapsing temple, the doorway she came to caves in, she turns around and suddenly she is as the edge of a pit filled to the top with both scarabs and scorpions and she trips in where she is attacked and eaten. Between her tripping into a pit that just happens to be there and the questionable CGI, it actually looks kinda silly.
• Narm Charm:
  • The sequence of Evy dueling Meela (and the flashback to their duel in the past). Yes it's a Designated Girl Fight, yes it's partly for Fanservice and yes a tad ridiculous. But you can't deny it's a definite Awesome Moment for Evy.
  • The above-mentioned Big "NO!" by Imhotep during the climax also counts. It's so ridiculously-executed that it's hilarious.
  • As goofy-looking as Anck-su-namun's death looks, it's very poetic that, after she betrayed Imhotep, she dies the exact same way he was put to death for helping her all the way back in ancient Egypt.
• One-Scene Wonder: The Scorpion King, before his transformation; Dwayne Johnson's badassery is on fine display.
• Padding: The desert fight between the Medjai and the Army of Anubis was there just to give the Medjai something to do (perhaps to make up for them not getting to fight Imhotep's mummy priests in the first film). Taking place at a completely different location from where the pyramid duel with the Scorpion King is occurring, it comes off feeling like a rather pointless fight as Anubis' army would have all disappeared anyway once the Scorpion King was killed during the pyramid duel. Thus, making it seem like the Medjai fought them and lost some of their men for no reason.
• The Problem with Licensed Games: The PS2 video game is widely criticized for being simplistic with none of the actors involved. However, it gained some praise for featuring an alternate ending.
• Signature Scene:
  • Over 20 years later, the CGI Scorpion King scene remains the most widely-discussed and well-remembered aspect of the entire movie, even among laypeople, in large part thanks to its reputation as one of the premier modern examples of Special Effects Failure.
  • A more positive example is the duel between Evy and Anuck-su-namun. Specifically the one that happens in the present after Evy has been resurrected.
• Special Effects Failure: The film has several notable instances of this.
  • Dwayne Johnson's CGI form as the Scorpion King looks like something out of a video game cinematic. Interestingly, the scorpion parts of his body look very good; the human parts, not so much. Had they rigged Johnson up in a harness on the set and used CGI only for the scorpion parts, it may have worked out better.^note According to the film's VFX supervisor, Dwayne Johnson was only able to be on set for three days due to his WWE commitments, so there wasn't enough time to get him into a harness or get the facial references that they wanted.
  • When the armies of Anubis attack, many of the jackal soldiers in the background phase through the actors or die without having been attacked.
  • There is a CGI waterfall with some terrible fluid effects that look like they came from a Nintendo 64 game; even worse when they try to make it speak.
  • The CGI used on Imhotep's Mummy form is a failure of truly epic proportions. Due to the limits of technology (and ILM's resources being occupied with the production of The Phantom Menace), the 1999 Mummy is part CGI and part guy-in-makeup, making him look much more realistic in both his movements and his interactions with the actors. But here, he is entirely CGI, marking a firm clash of Special Effects Failure, with his lifeless eyes, jerky movements, dry and untextured body, and (there is no other way to put this) cheesy shit-eating grin. It doesn't help that the other cast members he interacts with apparently have no idea where he is meant to be at any one time, which draws unnecessary attention to the fact he isn't actually there.
  • Many of the scenes involving the dirigible (particularly in the canyon scene) suffer from truly awful blue-screening, with the mismatched lighting making it painfully obvious that it was superimposed over the environments after the fact.
  • While the CGI for the scarabs is mostly fine across the two movies, when Anck-su-namun falls into a pit of them at the end of movie, her face surrounded by the bugs doesn't even look close to being real.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character: Some viewers were disappointed at how the Scorpion King ended up having a mostly scorpion body, which was kept a surprise for the audience as well as the characters. This meant that the Rock's physicality, as expected of a professional wrestler, is only really glimpsed in the opening ancient battle. He was relegated to showing it off more in his spin-off movie.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
  • You have Imhotep and the Scorpion King, two ancient, incredibly powerful supernatural beings who are set to battle one another for control of an army of Anubis' warriors, with the fate of the world in the balance... only for Imhotep to conveniently lose all his awesome powers moments before the fight. This is so Rick can be the one to defeat both Imhotep and the Scorpion King (since he's the hero of the movie) in what amounts to basically a fist fight with a now-powerless Imhotep and having a lucky thrust with a Deus ex Machina spear, rather than seeing the Mummy with all his powers battle the Scorpion King in all their glory in an Evil Versus Evil conflict.
  • Additionally, if both Rick and Imhotep are to fight the Scorpion King and each other, you'd expect a potential Enemy Mine situation, or a Mêlée à Trois. Neither happens: the second the Scorpion King comes out the doors, Imhotep kneels and feigns loyalty to him to get him to attack Rick, and Imhotep then spends the rest of the scene watching them before making a failed effort to intervene and deal the killing blow at the very end.
• What Do You Mean, It's Not for Kids?: This movie once aired on Cartoon Network. However, this film is rated PG-13 for intense moments including the Mummy killing people on the train, Anubis' rotting corpse design, and the Scorpion King ripping apart the Curator on-screen, and Evy being stabbed to death and only being revived later, with some people wondering why [adult swim] didn't air it.

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