Universal Nearly Doomed The Mummy With a Low-Budget Gothic Reboot — Then Brendan Fraser Saved It

So, The Mummy is not done with us yet. A fourth movie is moving ahead, and the word is that some familiar faces are circling back. But before we talk about what this new one could be, it is worth revisiting how the 1999 film dodged a very different path at Universal. The behind-the-scenes twists are surprisingly spicy.

Where things stand now

Per The Hollywood Reporter, Brendan Fraser and Rachel Weisz are expected to reunite for a new Mummy sequel. The last time they played Rick and Evelyn O'Connell together was in 2001's The Mummy Returns. 2008's The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor brought Fraser back but swapped in Maria Bello as Evy.

This time, Stephen Sommers is not in the director's chair. The movie is set to be directed by Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett, the duo behind 2019's Ready or Not. Good fit on paper: they know how to make a crowd-pleasing genre ride.

The 1999 movie almost looked nothing like the 1999 movie

In a 1999 chat with The Digital Cinema's Scott Michael Bosco, director Stephen Sommers laid out how Universal originally wanted to go with a smaller, straight-up gothic horror version of The Mummy. Think more in the lane of 90s takes like Mary Shelley's Frankenstein and Mary Reilly — which did not exactly set the world on fire. Universal had even been developing an Anne Rice-inspired Mummy with names like John Sayles, Kevin Jarre, Joe Dante, and George Romero attached at various points, aiming for a $15–18 million budget.

Then Sommers blew the doors off that plan. He pitched his swashbuckling, pulp-adventure version for about an hour and a half — literally walking the studio through the story beat by beat and character by character — and convinced them to go big. Instead of the tight budget everyone else was boxed into, his version got made for close to $80 million. He has joked that the writers and directors who had been stuck in the low-budget lane probably were not thrilled with him for pulling that off.

"Hey, you've got the job!"

That, according to Sommers, was the call he got the very next day after his marathon pitch.

For the record, that swing paid off. The 1999 film starred Brendan Fraser as Rick O'Connell, Rachel Weisz as Evelyn O'Connell, and Arnold Vosloo as the resurrected big bad Imhotep, with Oded Fehr as warrior ally Ardeth Bay. It launched a smash-hit franchise and one of the most rewatchable adventure-horror hybrids of the era.

So what might The Mummy 4 be about?

If you remember the ending of 2008's The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor (the one with Jet Li as the Dragon Emperor and Maria Bello stepping in as Evy), there is a tag that points the O'Connells toward Peru. The film closes with the couple flirting with retirement — until the tease that mummies have just been unearthed in Peru. Given that Andean civilizations actually have a long, real-world history of mummy discoveries, that tease was not random. If Fraser and Weisz are back together, the Peru setup would be an easy baton to pick up.

If you are in the mood for more stylish monster cinema

• Nosferatu — Director: Robert Eggers — Release: December 25, 2024 — Where to watch: Prime Video
• The Bride — Director: Maggie Gyllenhaal — Release: March 6, 2026 — Where to watch: TBA
• Frankenstein — Director: Guillermo del Toro — Release: November 7, 2025 — Where to watch: Netflix
• Werwulf — Director: Robert Eggers — Release: December 25, 2024 — Where to watch: TBA

The original The Mummy is currently streaming on Amazon Prime Video if you want a refresher before the next adventure digs its way out of the desert.