Rick and Evie O’Connell’s next adventure finally has a name. Universal Pictures officially revealed The Mummy: Book of the Dead as the title for the long-awaited reunion of Brendan Fraser and Rachel Weisz, with this all-new thrill ride set to hit theaters on October 15, 2027.
Personally, I went into The Mummy back in 1999 with a grudge on my shoulder. I viewed it as a thinly veiled Raiders of the Lost Ark rip-off. My parents loved it at the time, but it took me a couple decades to come around on Rick O’Connell as our unofficial Indiana Jones replacement. Like that franchise, The Mummy is finally investing in a legacy sequel. My excitement for this continuation of Universal’s most rebooted Monster is at a quarter of a tank. I know the generation below mine loves this series. I’m happy they’re getting another movie.
Universal marked their big announcement with a fresh logo and a reminder that this retro-nostalgic requel opens in exactly one year, just in time for Halloween 2027. That gives fans of the original 1999 The Mummy a little over 12 months to prepare for another expedition into the ancient world, where the local attractions tend to include crusty tombs and angry bug-filled corpses. At least one person really should read the warning on the wall.
The title is a fittingly ominous one for a franchise that has spent decades finding creative ways to make ancient Egyptian history everybody’s problem. The Mummy: Book of the Dead also sounds like the sort of back shelf novel you probably shouldn’t borrow from the library, unless the library has a very forgiving policy about supernatural shenanigans.
The most important piece of news, as I already discussed, is the return of Fraser as adventurer Rick O’Connell and Weisz as Egyptologist Evelyn O’Connell. The pair starred together in 1999’s The Mummy and its 2001 sequel, The Mummy Returns. Weisz did not return for 2008’s The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor, making this new film a reunion nearly 26 years after Rick and Evie’s last shared big-screen adventure. 26 years is a lot of dust on creaky bones. Hope they’re up for the challenge.
They won’t be traveling alone. John Hannah is returning as Evie’s brother Jonathan, while Kevin J. O’Connor and Oded Fehr are also back in the franchise. New additions to the cast include Michael Johnston and Numan Acar.
Behind the camera, Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett, the filmmaking duo known as Radio Silence, are directing from a screenplay by David Coggeshall. The directors have previously worked on Ready or Not and the recent Scream films, so they know their way around a movie that can turn a seemingly ordinary situation into a very bad afternoon.
Universal has not revealed the plot. We don’t yet know what brings Rick and Evie back into danger or which ancient menace will be making their lives difficult this time. For now, the title and release date are the big pieces of news, with the studio keeping the finer details locked away like something behind a suspiciously heavy stone door.
The new movie also arrives in a rather crowded year for people who enjoy things crawling out of the sand. Lee Cronin’s The Mummy has given the classic monster a separate horror-minded treatment. It seemed like trash at first glance, but that little mummified girl had me reeling with the kind of excitement usually reserved for something I’d find in the bowels of Tubi. I’m saying, I liked it. It was a ton of fun. Better than Evil Dead Rise, which after a couple watches, I’m still lukewarm on.
The Mummy: Book of the Dead is the next chapter in the action-adventure series that began with Fraser and Weisz. If nothing else, the title should help everyone keep their cursed artifacts properly labeled.
After years of waiting for Rick and Evie to return, fans finally have an official name and a theatrical date. The Mummy: Book of the Dead opens October 15, 2027. Try to avoid opening any mysterious tie-in novels between now and then.
