A lot of franchises have that one installment that fans quietly wish hadn’t been made. For The Mummy, that movie is almost always The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor. The 2008 sequel took the action out of Egypt, recast a major character and one of the series’ most beloved stars, and never quite captured the lightning-in-a-bottle chemistry that made the first two films so rewatchable. And now, as excitement builds for the upcoming The Mummy 4, it sounds like the filmmakers might be leaning into the same head canon many fans have held for years.
Directing duo Radio Silence, Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett, recently spoke with Entertainment Weekly about officially bringing Brendan Fraser and Rachel Weisz back for the long-awaited sequel. During the conversation, the franchise timeline came up, specifically whether Tomb of the Dragon Emperor still counts as canon in the story they’re telling. Bettinelli-Olpin’s answer was… pretty telling:
Well, Rachel is in this one.
And just to make sure the message landed, Gillett left nothing to the imagination. He added:
That should answer the question for you.
If that sounds like a polite way of saying the third movie doesn’t factor into their plans, you’re probably not alone in thinking that. To be fair, The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor has always been something of an outlier in the franchise. Rachel Weisz opted not to return as Evelyn O’Connell, reportedly due to issues with the script, leaving Maria Bello to step into the role. Recasting a franchise character, especially someone so beloved as Evelyn and in one of the best action movie franchises, is a thankless task. Bello is an incredibly talented performer, but taking over such a role was always going to be a tough assignment.
The film also shifted the series’ setting from Egypt to China and swapped out director Stephen Sommers, who had helmed the first two movies. The result wasn’t without its fans, but the tone felt noticeably different. For many viewers, the absence of the Fraser-Weisz dynamic left a pretty big hole at the center of the story.
That’s part of what makes the upcoming sequel so exciting. Brendan Fraser and Rachel Weisz returning to the bigscreen together as Rick and Evie O’Connell feels less like a simple nostalgia play and more like a deliberate effort to reconnect the franchise with what worked in the first place. And honestly, it’s hard not to get a little sentimental about that.
As for The Mummy 4, many of the details are still being kept under wraps. The filmmakers have made it clear they want the movie to capture the spirit of the original two films, but there’s still no official word on which other franchise veterans might appear alongside Fraser and Weisz.
That said, fans are already crossing their fingers for a few familiar faces. John Hannah’s Jonathan Carnahan, Evelyn’s lovable con artist brother, delivered some of the franchise’s funniest moments. And Oded Fehr’s Ardeth Bay, the stoic Medjai warrior who helped guide Rick through the chaos, remains one of the coolest supporting characters the series ever introduced.
Whether those characters return or not, one thing seems clear from Radio Silence’s comments, and that is that The Mummy 4 is looking backward to move forward. And if that means quietly pretending the third movie never happened? I have a feeling a lot of fans will happily go along with that.
The fourth installment in the Fraser/Weisz Mummy saga is currently slated to hit theaters on May 19, 2028. In the meantime, you can revisit the original trilogy with a Hulu subscription.
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