Trivia / The Mummy Returns

• Acting for Two: Naturally Rachel Weisz and Patricia Velasquez both play their current characters, as well as their past lives.
• Actor-Inspired Element:
  • John Hannah came up with the idea to fill the bathtub with bubbles. He slipped getting out and injured his knee.
  • Shaun Parkes suggested Izzy having four silver teeth (Stephen Sommers just wanted one).
• Celebrity Voice Actor: The Japanese version had another famous professional wrestler, Nobuhiko Takada, voicing Mathayus.
• Christmas Rushed: The digital effects of the Scorpion King had to be rushed, and were completed only eight days before the film's release.
• Cowboy Be Bop At His Computer: When the film was aired on TV, the plot was mistakenly described as being about "resurrecting Isis", and Alex was said to be eleven years old.
• Dyeing for Your Art: As Imhotep appears in more scenes regenerated (and has more Shirtless Scenes), Arnold Vosloo had his entire body shaved twice a day.
• Fake Nationality: The Scorpion King is Dwayne Johnson, an American of sub-Saharan African and Polynesian descent, playing an ancient warrior from the area of modern day northern Iraq.
• Friendship on the Set: Unlike their characters, Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje and Freddie Boath got along with each other.
• Hey, It's That Place!: You may have seen the O'Connells' house in the original The Omen. More recently, it was used as Wayne Manor in Batman Begins.
• Never Work with Children or Animals: Well partly. Stephen Sommers gave the film an eight year Time Skip from the first because he "didn't want to work with babies".
• No Stunt Double: Rachel Weisz and Patricia Velasquez trained for five months for their fight scene. They did the fight without any stunt women.
• On-Set Injury:
  • Brendan Fraser tore a spinal disk, cracked a rib, and injured his knees. Dwayne Johnson suffered from food poisoning and sunstroke. He lost over 10 pounds and said it was "the worst I have ever felt in my life".
  • John Hannah slipped and injured his knee filming the bathroom scene.
• One-Book Author: This was Freddie Boath's first and only feature film role. He'd appear in a few TV shows before leaving acting altogether in 2013.
• The Other Darrin:
  • Of the music variety - Alan Silvestri did the score for Returns, taking over for Jerry Goldsmith.
  • The game naturally recasts everyone such as James Horan doing Rick and Kevin Michael Richardson doing Imhotep.
• Pop-Culture Urban Legends: Despite reports to the contrary, director Stephen Sommers does NOT have a cameo as the man in the bathtub at Izzy's place. However, he does provide the "voice" of the man, heard faintly humming, as Sommers himself explains on the film's audio commentary.
• Promoted Fanboy: Freddie Boath passed on a role in Harry Potter to do this film, because the first one was one of his favourites. He even helped consult a lot of the cast and crew on details from the first.
• Referenced by...: Endless Nightmare: Shrine, the only installment of the series set in Egypt, have Anubian monsters lifted straight from the climax of The Mummy Returns as recurring enemies.
• Star-Making Role: This made Dwayne Johnson a movie star and led to him transitioning to films from wrestling permanently.
• Tribute to Fido: Izzy is named after Stephen Sommers' dog.
• What Could Have Been:
  • According to the video game tie-in, the Scorpion King was supposed to conquer Sumer 6,000 years before the events of the film. They changed it to Thebes 5,000 years earlier to make it more understandable.
  • Notice how four mummy guards chase out of the museum, but only three are killed? The fourth was meant to pop up and attack Alex once the bus had stopped. But the director felt the audience would have had enough of the scene, and cut the last part.
  • The O'Connells were going to live in an apartment, but it was thought that a Big Fancy House would look better for a fight scene. The fight scene itself was going to take place in a casino owned by Jonathan. But as the budget wouldn't allow for building another set, they just had it in the house instead.
  • Evey's past life was going to be called Nefertiti. But the director realised the Narm in the name and changed it to Nefertiri.
  • A small detail cut from the film but remaining in the novelization; the Scorpion King has his followers scalp themselves as a sign of fealty, and did so himself. A single remnant of this can be seen in the final product, when Imhotep slaps his head while declaring loyalty to the Scorpion King — in the novels, he rips his own flesh off to prove his loyalty. This is also how the curator would survive in the jungle, he would scalp himself so the monsters would leave him along thinking he is a servant of the Scorpion King. Presumably this was cut for being too gruesome, especially if it was going to be shown multiple times.
  • Earlier designs for the Scorpion King's monstrous form had him look more inhuman and unrecognizable.
  • Originally, Jerry Goldsmith was going to return to score the film, but was unable to due to a health issue and for his hatred of the first movie.
  • Orignially, in one scene, Rachel Weisz was supposed to run through a real crumbling set, but her contract wouldn't allow it.
• Word of God: The Scorpion King in this movie was a look-alike descendant of the one from The Scorpion King.

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