Universal clearly has huge plans for their rebooted Universal Monsters franchise, officially known as Dark Universe, and with the release of THE MUMMY just a little over a week away, we'll soon have a much better idea of what they have in store for us. As a big Universal Monsters fan, I'm attempting to remain optimistic about the new movies, but I haven't been totally blown away by what we've seen of THE MUMMY so far. That said, Tom Cruise rarely disappoints when it comes to pure entertainment value, so I'm reasonably sure that, at the very least, I'll enjoy myself. The latest clip from the Alex Kurtzman film finds the Dark Universe's new hero facing off against Princess Ahmanet (Sofia Boutella) and not faring nearly as well as he had hoped.
That "kick her ass" line hasn't gotten any better since the last time we heard it. I'll be interested to see how THE MUMMY performs at the box-office, early projections has the film on track for a $40 million opening domestically but says that it should do significantly better overseas. That's not great, but with a budget of just $125 million, it could be more than enough to justify further films in the Dark Universe franchise. Speaking of the new series, Universal's press-release last week confirmed which element will be binding these films together: Dr. Henry Jekyll's (Russell Crowe) mysterious Prodigium organization.
At its organizing principle, Dark Universe films are connected by a mysterious multi-national organization known as Prodigium. Led by the enigmatic and brilliant Dr. Henry Jekyll, Prodigium’s mission is to track, study and—when necessary—destroy evil embodied in the form of monsters in our world. Working outside the aegis of any government, and with practices concealed by millennia of secrecy, Prodigium protects the public from knowledge of the evil that exists just beyond the thin membrane of civilized society…and will go to any length to contain it.
THE MUMMY will hit theaters on June 9th.