Archaeologist Commentary: The Mummy Returns

Sequels go harder than the originals. Would that make them more or less accurate? It certainly makes them more of an experience to dive into. Watch to experience a magical world of Egypt in 1933 and join us as we sort through the fiction and non.

The Mummy Returns (2001) starts with the story of the Scorpion King, played by Dwayne The Rock Johnson in his theatrical debut, who lost a battle at Thebes “5000 years ago” (3067 BCE) and almost died after the rest of his men while walking home through the desert. According to the storyteller, Ardeth Bay, he “makes a pact with the dark god Anubis” to trade his soul for conquering his enemies, and answers in the affirmative with a scorpion. Once the Scorpion King takes a bite of the arachnid, an oasis pops up around him, and he gets command of Anubis’ whole army of anubis-like, jackal-headed warriors, “and like an evil flood they washed away all that lay before them”.

For one thing, in 3067 BCE, Egypt was in the early stages of the Early Dynastic Period (c. 3150–2686 BCE), following the unification of Upper and Lower Egypt. This era saw the consolidation of power by the first pharaohs, with kings like Hor-Aha (successor to Narmer) strengthening centralised control and establishing the capital near Memphis (Shaw, 2000). Thebes is thought to have been inhabited from around 3200 BCE, but the earliest monuments in the city itself date from the 11th dynasty (c. 21st century BCE), when the rulers of Thebes united Egypt and made Thebes the capital of Upper Egypt (The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica 2020). It was the eponymous capital of Waset, the fourth nome of Upper Egypt. At the time, it was still a small trading post, while Memphis served as the royal residence of the Old Kingdom pharaohs, so it wouldn’t have looked anything like the city in the movie. 

An obviously huge accuracy problem is that Anubis didn’t have an army in any part of the mythology and it is perfectly clear by now that he wasn’t evil or a conqueror. Although there are examples from both sides, modern media often emphasizes the frightening aspects of death, frequently portraying Anubis as an evil ruler or leader of the undead. There were zero myths in which Anubis had warriors that acted “like an evil flood, they washed away all that lay before them”. Also, it's kinda weird that he was allowed to conquer, but then he never even got to lead before Anubis took his soul to serve him. Additionally, a common modern visual trope shows him wearing a Nemes (the striped pharaonic headdress), as seen in The Mummy Returns, but this is rarely supported by ancient depictions. 

What is also strange is that the Scorpion King’s golden bracelet, which guides the characters to the pyramid in the centre of the oasis, was already worn by the King during the first battle, with the jackal's head on the scorpion's body. It makes some sense why he wanted to make a pact with him, but like... why did he already combine them?

• Look at 5000-year-old armour, shields, and weapons for Egyptian & Akkadian (according to the Scorpion King movie, he was “The Akkadian”; no clue who he rules, though).

Many cultures around the world revered scorpions. Mesoamerica, China, Tibet, but this movie does have a setting, so let’s focus on that. The most poignant cultural context for the story is the veneration of scorpions in ancient Egypt, where the goddess Serqet (Serket) was the divine personification of the scorpion, without the head of one, luckily.

Serket (also Serqet, Selkis, Selket) is an ancient Egyptian goddess of protection, scorpions, venom, healing, and magic, venerated as a great Mother Goddess from the Predynastic Period (c. 6000–3150 BCE). Her full name, translated as “She Who Causes the Throat to Breathe,” reflects her power to protect against and heal scorpion stings and breathing difficulties, and amulets bearing her name were worn for this reason. 

She guarded early kings (the Scorpion Kings), and her worship spread from the Delta into Upper Egypt. Depicted as a beautiful woman with arms outstretched in a protective pose and a scorpion on her head—often without stinger or claws to emphasize her benevolent role—she was associated with the primordial waters of Nun and later rode on the solar barque of Ra defending him from the serpent Apophis. In myth, she appears alongside Isis, Nephthys, and Neith as a nurturing goddess who nurses kings and, in some versions of the Osiris cycle, protects Isis in childbirth and watches over the infant Horus in the marshes, sending her scorpions as bodyguards. (Mark 2016) 

As the Osiris religion gained prominence, many of Serket’s early motherly attributes were absorbed by Isis, and Serket’s role shifted toward death, judgment, and the afterlife. She became one of the guardian deities who watch over souls on the watery route to paradise, helping the justified dead to breathe again and punishing the wicked with suffocating venom. In royal funerary practice, she protected the intestines of the deceased king through her association with Qebhesenuef, one of the Four Sons of Horus, whose canopic jar she guarded. Although she had no major temples, Serket remained highly influential as patron goddess of physicians: her priests and priestesses, the Followers of Serket, practiced medicine within the Per‑Ankh (“House of Life”), combining careful diagnosis with powerful spells that invoked her to draw out poison and disease. Through this healing role, Serket’s protection extended from birth and everyday dangers, such as scorpion stings, to the afterlife (Mark 2016).

The other culture important in the movie is ancient Mesopotamia, since the Scorpion King is Akkadian. Either way, the scorpion goddess Ishhara was highly revered as a goddess of love, fertility, and marital union. Additionally, mythological scorpion-men (Aqrabuamelu) acted as guardians in temples and portals associated with the sun god Shamash. 

I’m sure you all heard me saying that Serket guarded the Scorpion Kings, well you heard right, there were two Kings called the Scorpion Kings roughly 5000 years ago. The King called Scorpion I, who ruled around 3300 BCE in Upper Egypt, likely from Thinis, was likely one of the earliest verifiable Egyptian rulers (Görsdorf et al. 1997; Dreyer 1998). His tomb, designated U-j in the Abydos royal cemetery, yielded significant artefacts, including imported wine jars, gaming pieces, and an ivory sceptre. It also contained some of the earliest examples of Egyptian pictographic writing and labeling, underscoring his importance in early Egyptian history.

In 1995, researchers uncovered a 5,000-year-old marking during the Theban Desert Road Survey, which features the symbols of Scorpion and illustrates his victory over another protodynastic ruler, possibly Naqada's king. The graffito also references the defeated king or location, also marked in U-j, his tomb, called "Bull's Head," likely referring to Taurus (the Bull). It is believed that after defeating Naqada's ruler, Scorpion I, he united Upper Egypt by entering into a union with the royal house of Nekhen at Thinis (Secrets of Egypt 2008; Curiosmos 2019).

Scorpion II (also known as King Scorpion, possibly Selk or Weha) was a Protodynastic ruler of Upper Egypt, possibly in Neken (called Hierakonpolis by the Greeks), sometime between 3200 and 3000 BCE. But his precise identity and relationship to early kings such as Narmer and Ka are still debated (Menu, 1996; Wilkinson, 1999). He is best known from the large ceremonial Scorpion Macehead from Hierakonpolis, which shows him wearing the White Crown of Upper Egypt and performing a ritual agricultural act, thought to be cutting the first furrow or opening irrigation dikes, and surrounded by attendants and divine standards. A possible second, now‑lost image with the Red Crown hints at claims over both Upper and Lower Egypt (Baumgärtel & Morenz, 1998; Ciałowicz, 2001; Shaw & Nicholson, 1995). While earlier interpretations characterized him as a ruthless conqueror, contemporary archaeology views him as a key figure in establishing Egyptian civilization, contributing to its prosperity, order, and early unification. Evidence from ivory tags, rock and vessel inscriptions, and a Nubian rock carving at Gebel Sheikh Suliman suggests that he ruled important nomes, fought Nubian enemies, and played a significant role in the early political unification and consolidation of the Nile Valley (Hoffman, 1980; Midant‑Reynes, 2000). Other material culture of his time reflects expanding long‑distance trade, increasingly complex irrigation systems as a base of royal power, and a rich symbolic world of gods, standards, and hybrid creatures that shows strong but temporary Mesopotamian artistic influence (Redford, 1992; Ehret, 2023). Despite this Near Eastern influence, modern scholarship emphasizes that Egyptian civilization itself developed indigenously within the Nile Valley, with deep African roots, and that foreign motifs were adapted into a distinctly Egyptian cultural and political framework (Ehret, 2023). His tomb has not been definitively identified, though there are proposed burial sites with scorpion‑marked ivory tags at Umm El‑Qa’ab (tomb B50) and Hierakonpolis (HK6‑1) (Kaiser & Dreyer, 1982; Quibell, Green, & Petrie, 1900).

So, it sure seems like one of these Scorpion Kings could be the one that the movie’s King is based on. But then, why Anubis? Since Anubis was known as a protector of tombs as far back as the Old Kingdom, ca. 3100 BCE, which could have been why the King would pray to him.

By the way, there weren’t any battles that lasted 7 years that took place at Thebes (or Memphis, which they confused it with). In the first movie, the writers called Cairo Thebes instead. Since the Scorpion King supposedly died in Thebes, he would have actually died where Luxor is now. I guess they brought it to Cairo, which they called Thebes, where Pharaoh Seti I lived and then died in 1280 BCE, almost 2000 years later.

The oasis of Ahm Shere was never a real place or even a place in Egyptian Mythology. It doesn’t even mean anything in Arabic or any other language. I got curious to see if it could even map with anything if the subtitle spelt it wrong. The closest I could get would be transliterated as Ahim Shere - Sighing Share, but from English it translates differently, so who knows what they were going for, other than it sounds cool.

Rick’s tattoo is brought up for the first time in the movie. The wrist tattoo marks him as a Medjai, the ancient, sacred society of warriors tasked with guarding the City of the Dead (Hamunaptra) and protecting the world from dark curses. In the movie's lore, after being orphaned at a young age, he unknowingly received the mark but kept it concealed under a leather wristband for most of his life. Getting this tattoo marked Rick's destiny. The parts of the tattoo are: the Eye of Horus, at the center of the design, is the ancient Egyptian symbol of protection, power, and good health. The eye is framed by what are likely falcon wings, representing the pharaoh as the living embodiment of Horus, a god of royalty/kingship, and sits above a stylised pyramid, another major symbol of divine power and ancient Egyptian royalty. I’ll talk about this more when the movie gets to it*. When Ardeth Bay brings up the call-and-response and says he’s a Magai, couldn’t someone have put it on Rick and then taught him the response? It’s not a birthmark. Being a medjai requires a lot of discipline and training. They were bodyguards for the pharaoh and then kept the mummy dead. What have they been up to lately - stopping grave robbers, hopefully.

Corral snakes are venomous, colored red, black, and white, and found in Africa. Red with black-and-white stripes is a pretty common colour combination; they just have different percentages and patterns. So, to make sure the actors were safe, they probably got a bunch of non-venomous milk snakes, based on the snakes' colour patterns for the actual movie.

Egyptian burials were sometimes stacked on top of one another in family vaults or elite tombs, but they were still in coffins. The tomb they’re in seems more like the layout of the priests’ vault in the NYC catacombs, or like the underground catacombs scene in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. The ancient Egyptians took burying people extremely seriously and wouldn’t bury a body without some wrappings. Even common people would be naturally ‘mummified’ after being wrapped and buried in the desert. It’s so wrong that there are a ton of scattered bones on the floor. It would have been extremely disrespectful to the bodies; they never would have buried people that way; they wouldn’t have gotten into the afterlife. The only explanation is that grave robbers came in and tossed the bones around. Really, for the movie, it adds to the horror premise.

• Why would a princess know about the bracelet's location? We learn later that she was its protector. But the question of why the path goes through a burial chamber still stands; those would have been separate, so the bodies wouldn’t be disturbed.

•  Is that site supposed to match a real place? Where are they supposed to be? The location tag doesn’t specify

• There were gilded doors. There’s no way to know whether the movie’s set was supposed to look like a solid gold door, so I’m going to assume they went for gilding.

• Did they lock guards in with a single treasure - the bracelet? Things we’ll never know.

Ancient Egyptians invented the pin tumbler lock, a mechanical system that predates modern locks by over 4,000 years. They did not, however, invent combination locks like the one shown in the movie; those were developed much later by civilizations in the Middle Ages and the 19th century.

Already know that they didn’t have stupid, elaborate booby traps that would destroy a whole building. A bunch of tombs have halls that lead to empty rooms and pit traps that grave robbers can get lost in or get stuck in. A lot of the time, however, the builders were the ones who came back to rob them because they already knew the directions and the hidden chambers.

• Alex knocks down the columns like dominoes in a visual nod to Evie in the first movie.

In the movie, an excavation is underway in Humanaptra, uncovering Imhotep, the Book of the Living, and the Book of the Dead. The Book of the Living doesn’t actually exist, and the Book of the Dead isn’t an actual book, at least not historically; it’s a collection of texts that were carved and painted in pyramids, on tomb walls, and on/in coffins. 

• Must be fairly close to the site in the last scene, the minions get there that same night. Presumably.

• Scarabs are the flesh-eaters again; they are not, but it is a horror adventure movie. The goddess Khepri would be so disappointed after bringing Re back to life every night.

• Found Imhotep in resin? Amber? He fell into a pit of liquid souls in the last movie… Did those harden?

Rick brings up the ‘tropical drinks with little umbrellas’, but depending on which origin myth you subscribe to, they may not have existed yet. The writers probably went with Donn Beach, owner of Don the Beachcomber in Hollywood, California, as the one credited with starting the trend of using cocktail umbrellas around 1932, after collecting South Pacific souvenirs. He sold these to Victor Bergeron of Trader Vic's, who used them until WWII. Another myth is that the Hawaiian bartender Harry K. Yee, popular during the 1950s Tiki craze, introduced umbrellas to drinks in 1959, possibly using stock bar ornaments or exchanging ideas with Beach in Hawaii after WWII. The Tiki trend wasn’t even getting big until well after the Great Depression and WWII, when people had more wealth to spend. Not to say that they couldn’t have existed, just that Rick knowing about them in 1933 seems unlikely.

The Scorpion King is supposed to rise every 5000 years… but if his whole story and subsequent death all happened 5000 years ago, how do they know? It’s never happened before. Was there a tablet made with the whole story? “If someone doesn’t kill him, he’s going to wipe out the world” - “that’s always the story”. Apocalypses in mythology don’t present themselves this way; they're almost always cyclical, see the Norse Ragnarök or Hindu Yuga cycles for 2 examples, and the death and rebirth of Re, the Sun, daily. There is the idea of the second death in Egyptian mythology, but that’s a personal thing if a person doesn’t pass the scale test against the feather of Ma’at, and their soul is devoured by Amut. More of the end-of-the-world theme arose in Zoroastrianism as the Final Renovation. Known as Frashokereti, this event marks the permanent end of historical, chronological time. Following a final battle led by the saviour figure Saoshyant, the dead are resurrected, and a river of molten metal destroys all evil and imperfection. While the world as we know it completely ends, everything is basically paradise (Gardiner 2006). So, not much worry about the end.

And of course, in Christianity's Book of Revelation, the world experiences cataclysmic plagues, the return of Jesus, and the final judgment (Armageddon). Afterwards, the current material earth and sky are entirely destroyed and rolled up like a scroll. While believers are taken to a New Jerusalem, the existing universe is permanently dissolved without being physically "reborn" into a new era of history (Britannica Editors 2026). In what stories is that actually a plot line before Christianity, and more so, superheroes? Those have world-ending consequences that the hero must save the day from, but the story stops short of reaching the prophecy storyline. And why would someone wipe out all life? Then you have no one to rule over.

More of the legend is that Ramesses IV, 3000 years ago, which is close enough to right, died in 1148 BCE, only off by 81 years. Ramesses IV undertook building projects and sent men to mine turquoise in Sinai, but he reigned for only 6 years after becoming pharaoh at 12. So, not sure why the writers chose him especially. Plus, the story said that it was the last successful expedition to Ahm Shere, but none of them ever returned. How is that successful? How would they even know that they made it? Quoting Pirates of the Caribbean, “Where do the stories come from, I wonder?” And Alexander the Great, Caesar, and Napoleon all failed, I suppose; at least all their men didn’t die.

Bad guys must have been on the same transportation  (or next) as the heroes, because they pull up in the car while Rick and Evie are having their conversation, not even 10 minutes later… why didn’t they attack them before? Maybe either or both took private ships or planes - I don’t know how they traveled.

Ancient Egyptian calendars and year tracking included:

• Regnal Years: Official government years reset with each new pharaoh. Documents were dated by the monarch, e.g., "Year 5 of the reign of Ramesses II."

• The Civil Calendar: A 365-day administrative year used for daily life and taxes. It had 12 months of 30 days plus 5 extra festival days. Because it lacked a leap year, it slowly rotated through the solar year over a 1,460-year cycle known as the Sothic cycle.

• The Lunar/Religious Calendar: A 354-day calendar tracking lunar phases. It was used to schedule specific religious rituals, temple ceremonies, and agricultural festivals. To keep it roughly aligned with the seasons, a 13th month was added every few years.

But none of these calendars had a “year of the Scorpion”. It was made up for the movie.

• Alex is shown the Great Pyramids of Giza, like they look now, or presumably in 1933, without the white stone covering that would have been there originally, but there’s a temple there and a small pyramid; are those still there at that angle? Where’s the sphinx?

• Then shows a lot of different landscapes, the Nile, desert, oasis, mountains, before landing on Karnak. But Karnak is just upriver; you could’ve literally just taken a boat from Cairo (before the dam was built).

• How was the sceptre-spear at Hamonapatra in the first movie if it was so closely tied to the Scorpion Kings' defeat? And why was Evie having visions at the other site if she was in Thebes, but actually in Cairo with her father when he died… I guess they could’ve travelled to Thebes, though they did just conflate them in the first movie.

• How did Anckensunamun know where Imhotep was? He isn’t where he was initially buried, and how would she even know that? She died both times before he did. And, if it’s the same soul (which gets even more confusing when Imhotep does the ritual to bring Anckensunamun’s soul back), how did she come back in the 1st movie for the short period of time? Did the living soul leave the body or travel to the underworld to come back from the river of souls?

• “- Bring about the next apocalypse”… what was the last one?

• “You lighten up, you big trouble, you - get in the car.” Perfect, no notes.

• 7 days till the Scorpion King and the army of Anubis wipe out the world… unless they can stop him. Sounds more like a prophecy, 'cause it wouldn’t have even started without the character's intervention. Ardeth Bay does say it’s fate, so they don’t shy away from it. And they need that ticking clock.

• The bad guys want Imhotep to kill the Scorpion King, but he lost his powers and immortality at the end of the last movie. Why does he get his powers back?

• The wake-up chant is different from the first movie, which could make sense; he’s not cursed in the same way, so a different spell would be needed (no plagues this time). The chant also wakes up a bunch of other mummies in the museum. Which presumably present zero problems to the people who come into work the next morning.

“A couple of years ago, this would’ve seemed really strange to me.” Yes, it’s a joke about the 2 years in between the movies, but it’s like, Rick, dude, you have an 8-year-old kid. It was 1926 when the first movie took place… that’s a 7-year difference. It should be at least a 9-year difference… someone didn’t do the baby math. 

• Shouldn’t Imhotep have recognized the princess in the last movie? 

• Why would the bracelet suck you dry? I guess it’s an incentive not to put it on, plus the defleshing of the arm in the pyramid when you wake up the Scorpion King. How would people make it in 7 days? Oh yeah, they’d use the Nile. All the stops weren’t far from its shores. But they never had to anyway.

• Could Imhotep just kill Alex and put the bracelet on himself?

• There are 5 canopic jars again, like in the first movie. This is wrong; there were only 4 sons of Horus represented on the tops of the jars …insert jar stuff.

• “Where is all this stuff written?” Good question, Johnathon. Same questions as before: one, who learned all this to write it down in the first place, and two, how would things be passed down if no one who saw it ever lived to tell about it?

I appreciate the eye on the bow of the airship.

• There is/was a train running through Egypt, not going straight through the desert, but following the Nile?

• Did trains have emergency stop chords in the toilet?

• Did Alex know where they were stopping when he pulled the chord or did he just get extremely lucky (probably the latter)

What did Karnak look like in ‘33? It was being built up, but fairly put together. It wouldn’t have been abandoned, especially since it’s in present-day Luxor! There’s a whole city around it, and it’s right near the Nile and the Valley of the Kings and Queens is pretty close to where a ton of archaeological work is currently going on.

In fact, in the Valley of the Queens, access to Nefertari’s tomb was restricted to the public in 1933 (Osborne, 2015).

And…in the Valley of the Kings, there was ongoing clearance of King Tut’s Tomb that was discovered in 1922. Mostly, this was known as the year Howard Carter published the final volume of his 3-volume set, titled The Tomb of Tut·Ankh·Amen Discovered by the late Earl of Carnarvon and Howard Carter. And the book about the two other mummies found in the tomb, Tut’s unborn children, was published by Douglas Derry in 1933.

The bracelet does seem to be showing the ancient appearance of the sites… but how ancient? Karnak didn’t exist when the pyramids were built, and the pyramids didn’t yet exist in 5000 BCE, when the Scorpion King died. They were built roughly between 2700 BCE and 1700 BCE, 1000-2000 years later. Plus, as I mentioned before, in the first flash, they showed the pyramids stripped of the white stone outer layer, which wouldn’t have been stripped until later. Then they flash to the temple of Isis on Philae, which wasn’t built until the reign of Nectanebo I from 380 to 362 BCE. His ancient Egyptian royal titulary was Nekhtnebef, and he became the founding pharaoh of the Thirtieth and last native dynasty after deposing and killing Nepherites II. But most of the ruins date from the Ptolemaic Kingdom, especially during the reigns of Ptolemy II Philadelphus, Ptolemy V Epiphanes, and Ptolemy VI Philometor (282–145 BC), with Roman work visible in Philae dedicated to Ammon-Osiris (SpottingHistory.com 2026). They are really jumping around in the timeline. Plus, in 1933, the site on the original island would have been partially flooded because of the Aswan Low Dam, which was built in 1902 (Murray, T. (2007). Milestones in archaeology: A chronological encyclopedia (p. 464). ABC-CLIO). But at least it would be on the original island, because the entire site was drained, systematically taken apart and rebuilt on the island of Agilkia in the 1960s before the new Aswan High Dam was completed in 1970 (De Simone 2024).

• I wonder if Ancient Egyptians did the tsk tsk tsk thing, but I don’t think we’ll even know the answer to that question.

• Peraguin Falcons - Falconry in Egypt

• In the fight scene:

There don’t seem to be any examples of inscribed wall art depicting two women fighting, and, more specifically, using two daggers each. 

The daggers are also Hollywood inventions; the real daggers had a very different shape, generally wide-bladed, not stiletto-shaped, and the wrist guard is all wrong.

Are the clothes accurate? 

• Did women wear basically bikinis with a wrap skirt? More so, did women fight? With gymnastics?

For the most part, no. If you look at the stele and paintings depicting women dancing and performing acrobatics, they are actually wearing less, many times basically a thong with a belt, necklaces, sometimes bracelets around the arms and bands around the legs. Other performers would wear jewelry with full dresses, while some would wear sheer dresses, long or short.  But can’t show most of that in a movie.

• The back of the throne, two child Horuses (Horusi?)… mirror images.

• In Seti I’s court, are there any pieces that depict gatherings like this?

• Would fighters have worn masks? Seems so impractical… but was that and the stele accurate? Any examples? * Were the masks to hide the stunt doubles? 

Cool jewellery work with Imhotep’s necklace, Kephri in gold and presumably jade or faience, and the pharaoh is wearing the large eye (of Horus/Re) with Nekbut and Wadjet, but he’s only wearing the crown of Lower Egypt. I guess it's a choice because he has been carved on walls wearing the crown of lower egypt, the red crown - Deshret, even though at least one shows him with the crown of upper Egypt, the white crown - Hedjet, or the Blue crown (Khepresh) for when he went into battle, but much more commonly depicted was the Nemes headdress (Egypt Exploration Society 2019).

In the movie, he had a tiny bush of a beard, but in art, he was shown either with no beard at all or wearing the royal beard.

The make-up is so muted on the women and basically non-existent on the men, even though EVERYONE would have worn make-up then; it was a ritual and a way to honor the gods. But why is the women’s make-up so muted? Because they’re following a very early-2000s style. Not brightly colored eyeshadow, light eyeliner, and barely any lip color. Ancient Egyptians wore bright blue eyeshadow, heavy eyeliner made of kohl, generally applied with the finger, and protected against the sun (like the lines on a football player’s face), and kept dust and bugs out of the eyes since it was a bit sticky, and red lips. Of course they were fighting, but you’d think they’d want the god’s favour. Their clothes are obviously made of modern materials, but I can’t even think of what material they were going for cause the Egyptians had linen. Probably the best option in such a hot climate. Plus, I have no clue what the double circle brooch thing is supposed to look like.

• Is it a period-accurate belt?

• Imhotep’s armbands and gauntlets? And yes, priests would shave their heads

Did Seti I have a daughter named Nefertiri? And a mistress/wife named Ancksenamun?

• Why did Seti take off his crown? Would he dress like that?

• Are the Magai’s tattoos right?

The revealing outfits weren’t only for performers; Nefertiri’s dress would more likely have ended under her breasts, but we can’t do that in a PG/PG-13 movie. But at least her makeup is a bit more accurate during this scene.

• The tiara is pretty, but accurate?

• What do the banners say?

They never did show the back of the room in the intro of the 1st movie; it did have the large curtain in the background. It was a good way to disguise the set that they didn’t show in the 1st; very sneaky. It was the same throne as in the fighting room. Reusing the set deco and just adding more fabric, snakes, and the Bastet statue to make it look distinct.

Nefertiri yells at the Magai to help her father, but they’re in the courtyard while he and his killers are in a room probably several stories up. How did they get up there so fast? They would have run up and started trying to break down the door within about 16 seconds. Must be way impressive speed runners. 

The curtain introduces another problem, not with history, but with the plot. The curtain is kinda see-through-able, but it would’ve been difficult to actually tell what was happening on the other side. The way I’d argue is that Nefertiri saw Imhotep and Ancksunamun kissing, but then she should have called the Magai sooner than after Imhotep took the Pharaoh’s sword. It could’ve been similar to how the priests saw what happened in the 1st movie, with the firelight making huge shadows on the curtain, I suppose. Also, the five stairs behind Ancksunamun don’t seem to be there in the 2nd movie.

Also, just rewatching the 1st movie, the pharaoh wasn’t speaking loudly at all, even though it carried so much in the 2nd. He didn’t say Ancksunamun as he walked through the room. In the 2nd, they cut out his pointing at the smudge on her shoulder.

Nefertiri reacts to his stabbing by jumping off the balcony… did she die?

The Priests take Imhotep through the curtain to the balcony. Where did they go to escape?

How is the same necklace Imhotep wore in the flashbash, the necklace he’s wearing around his neck in “present day”, especially looking so new and fresh? It should be tarnished metal and stone with delicate chordage (though he could’ve replaced that). More importantly, where and how did he even find it?

Once the flashback ended, Evie said it was her previous life. Why does she look the same? Being reincarnated wouldn’t have meant that you looked anything like the people you were reincarnated from, you’re not necessarily related (though I guess it could be possible), otherwise you could never have been another race, gender, or species, which is pretty against the major versions of reincarnation from Buddhism, Hinduism, Jainism, Shikism, plus the Jewish tradition of Kabbalah, and Indigenous & Other Traditions (Britannica Editors 2026). But, for movies, it’s got to be cinematic shorthand so we can recongize the characters that we care about. But let’s just follow the movie’s logic.

In her past life, Evie was the bracelet’s protector; Rick is a magai who would’ve protected her family line; and Alex leads the way to Ahm Shere. Without each of them playing their role, the story could’ve been VERY different, but the Scorpion King may have won. The prophecy that “was preordained thousands of years ago” really makes this story feel like a Greek drama… a Greek tragedy if you look at it from the perspectives of either Imhotep or the Scorpion King, but they’re the evil guys, so it’s ok. (Until you watch the Scorpion King movie.)

Yeah… the movie shows two palm trees by an open Karnak, with the train adjacent to it, which is accurate to the actual collection of Egypt railway company lines, which began opening in the 1850s and continued running on the same lines into the 1930s. Of course, they show the train going straight through the desert in several scenes when it was purposely built pretty close to the Nile, not too close that it would flood, but still (Restoration & Archiving Trust, 2004–2025). When they get to Karnak, there’s no Nile, even though in ancient times Karnak had quays and ports that would have been on the river (Charloux et al. 2021). Also, the movie doesn’t acknowledge that the city of Luxor has existed since ancient times as Thebes, and that it was still there in the 1930s and even today. While looking at the site’s wide shot, we see the lines of Amun sphinxes, which are accurate, but it also shows two colossi that are not near Karnak and are located on the opposite side of the Nile, on the way to the Valley of the Kings in the west. The wide shot omits the huge wall that marks the main entrance, which was definitely there in the 1930s, as it appears in pictures from the turn of the century (Picryl, 1900–1901). The huge columns are further into the temple area; they’re not by the entrance, and they don’t/didn’t have huge paintings on them. The hieroglyphs and other carvings, which would have been painted, were stacked in many rows. Still ridiculously impressive, the steles on the multitude of walls were larger. Lastly, I don’t remember window “grates” in any of the temples, especially since most of the complex is outside, or rather, uncovered.

I don’t know the footprint of the actual island of Philae, since it’s well under the water now, but I’m certain it was much larger than the one the movie shows, because the real temple has more buildings that are left out. All of which were rebuilt on the higher-elevation island that I got to explore.

The temple of Abu Simbel is the next site they visit, which was built during Ramesses II’s reign, also called Ramesses the Great, the Pharaoh after Seti I. This site was also built close to the Nile in ancient times, into the mountains along the riverbank, again avoiding the direct flood zone but still within a short walking distance. Just like the Temple of Isis, Abu Simbel was also relocated, moving 65 meters higher and 200 meters inland to an artificial hill to save it from being submerged by Lake Nasser when the dam was being built in the 1960s (Kiniry 2018; Photo credit: Frans Lemmens/Alamy)

Then they go… somewhere. No label, no exposition, just some desert location. It’s weird that they seem to be traveling inland when all the actual sites were located right alongside the Nile, as most cities were. People definitely prefer to live with a safe when flooding, but an easy walk to water, especially when everything else is a bone-dry desert.

Evie does say that they were flying over the Blue Nile, which meant they’re “out of Egypt by now” and that “in ancient times all this still belonged to the Upper Kingdom”. That’s a pretty period-dependent statement. Nubia, a historic region in northeastern Africa along the Nile River, was where Sudan, from around 3500 to 1640 BCE, had early relations and trade with the A-Group Nubians, who coexisted with Upper Egypt's Naqada culture. Subsequently, the Kerma civilization emerged as a significant trading hub in Upper Nubia until Egyptian expansion during the Middle Kingdom, when Egypt established territories and forts in the region. During the New Kingdom (1550–1069 BCE), Egypt conquered Nubia, leading to extensive cultural assimilation and the integration of Nubians into the Egyptian military, notably the Medjay. During the 25th Dynasty and the Kushite period (circa 747–656 BCE), Nubian Kings of Kush successfully conquered Egypt, with pharaohs like Piye, Shabaka, and Taharqa ruling a unified Egyptian-Nubian empire. Later, during the Greco-Roman period (circa 300 BCE – 300 CE), northern Nubia became part of Greco-Roman Egypt, while the Meroitic Kingdom prospered further south (History Guild, nd). So what is “ancient times”? I guess she’s being general for simplicity's sake.

Holy shit, where is there a waterfall crashing down into the Nile? Oh right, there aren’t, not in Egypt, not in Sudan. The two natural waterfalls on the Nile are the Murchison Falls on the Victoria Nile in Uganda and the Blue Nile Falls in Ethiopia. But both of them are part of the one Nile River, and they flow north, just like the rest of the river. The movie, however, flips the river’s direction. The Nile flows from Upper Egypt to Lower Egypt, so named because it runs from the mountains in the south to the delta and the Mediterranean Sea in the north. The airship is following the river, meaning they’d be going north, while all the sites have been taking them further and further south, which is why they’re flying over Sudan.

How did the airship get further downriver of Imhotep’s party without them seeing it? And if they did know, which could be why Imhotep knew to send the magic Nile water wave downriver at the heroes, why is Alex making a randomly elaborate arrow in the sand?

Once the heroes make it to the oasis, which in reality is not so big, nor jungle-y, you can hear monkeys. It’s actually cool that they are included, not just because it’s a jungle environment, but because monkeys were actually traded from Nubia into Egypt as pets and baboons were prized as rare and expensive mummies. Specifically, the Papio hamadryas (sacred baboon) was deeply revered. They were associated with the sun god Re and were the primary sacred animals of Thoth/Toth, the god of wisdom, knowledge, writing, and the moon. They were mummified and kept in colonies at temples. Isotope testing on mummified baboons confirms that the Egyptians imported these revered animals directly from regions spanning present-day Ethiopia, Eritrea, and Somalia (Rapp Learn, 2024). Real ones that is. From the Middle Kingdom onward, many of the baboon mummies traded to or made in Egypt were fakes, with the head carved from wood, the body stuffed with vegetation or other material for the limbs, and jars used as the body. While these might be sacrilegious in some sense, the creation of art on tomb walls and as items become real in the afterlife, so maybe, just like ushabtis, these fake baboons would have come to life and fulfilled their purpose in the field of reeds.

Since Ahm Shere was literally along the Nile, you’d think it would’ve been much easier to find and get to. After all, people were constantly trading along the Nile for thousands of years. If it were real, the only explanation I can think of is that it is a segment of the Nile that does not flow north. The river briefly flows southwest through the Sahara Desert, an area famously known as the "Great Bend" of the Nile, in northern Sudan. It is one of several features formed by tectonic uplift over millions of years, driven by a large underground rock formation known as the Nubian Swell (McLendon, 2024). The area was supposed to be a “cursed” land or just really mystically dangerous because it wasn’t following the right cosmological orders. In the movie, it could explain why some ancient Egyptians didn’t go, but not at all in more recent history; it would have been nuts if EVERYONE who travelled up the Nile was never seen or heard from again. Where could the Kingdom of Punt be that Hatshepsut sent trading emissaries to? They obviously made it, as it was a real place, but even today, scholars have no solid theory about where Punt actually is.

It’s so cute that Ardeth Bay named his falcon Horus, after the falcon god; it’s just so sad that the bird gets shot.

There are several different species of bats

Egyptian Tomb Bat (Taphozous perforatus): A widespread desert species known for roosting in ancient structures and tombs along the Nile.

Egyptian Fruit Bat (Rousettus aegyptiacus): A highly social bat often found in large colonies inside deep, humid caves and historical ruins.

Lappet-eared Free-tailed Bat (Chaerephon major): A species with a native type specimen from the 5th Cataract of the Nile in northern Sudan.

Naked-rumped Tomb Bat (Taphozous nudiventris): A widespread insectivorous bat that frequently takes up residence in the deep, dark spaces of ancient Egyptian ruins

By the way, since Rick said they were out of Egypt, they would’ve crossed into Sudan. Meaning they would’ve had to go through a long zig-zag border crossing. The Egypt-Sudan border runs through the Nile River at the Wadi Halfa Salient around the 22nd parallel. During this period, prior to Sudan’s independence in 1956, the region was governed as the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan, an arrangement in which British administrators effectively managed the border between the two nations, preventing international disputes (Mohyeldeen 2020). There would definitely be paperwork involved, too slow, boring, and time-consuming for an action-adventure movie.

• Roman soldier’s crest, Eagle in the circle and skeletons in cages. Did the monkey mummies make those? 

• Are those monkeys or pygmies? They don’t have tails. How intelligent are they? Skulls on stakes. And Jonathon does say “What were those pygmy things?” though that could just refer to their size. 

• The curator does say Roman Legionnaires, Napoleon’s troops - I guess they did find the oasis after all, just never made it back… like everyone else.

• Shrunken heads - isn’t that a different place (Disneyland Jungle Cruise)? Me too, Johnathon. How do they do that?

• Evie’s aim is WAY TOO GOOD at that distance with a rifle from the 1930s or before.

• The sun wouldn’t rise that quickly, and if it were lighting the ground like that, it would’ve already hit the top of the pyramid

• Nice touch with the Anubis statues in the lines like Amun sphinxes in Karnak. Since Anubis’ magic created the oasis and pyramid.

• If the power was just going to be taken away, why did Imhotep need to do it? Why didn’t the Pygies attack the mummy or Ancksunamun?

• Why would the bracelet hole eat the guy’s flesh if that had been Alex… damn, or if it was the person who was planning to fight the Scorpion King, that’d be a huge hindrance. Basically, the hero needs to bring a patsy.

• Were there magic or prophetic weapons in Egyptian mythology?

• Is the Stork Ametaphis (I don’t think so)

• The CGI budget was spent on the Anubis army, adding wide shots, and adding to practical shots, leaving not enough for the Rock.

• The pharaoh, at least the guy wearing the Nemes crown, has the tattoo on his left arm; Rick has it on his right. The Madjay wore similar crowns in the movie, but not striped, are they trying to differentiate the special prophecy one, are they saying he is more special. If it is just any Madjay, couldn’t any of them save the world? If they weren’t all fighting the Anubis soldiers.

• How the fuck did Rick grab the spear from a standstill while in slow motion? Thought we wouldn’t notice that CGI shot.

• The dramatic “Nye” is amazing

• Is the river crack thing supposed to be the underworld? Like Hell or the river Styx. Styx is Greek… and Egyptian didn’t have a Hell. If you were a bad person, you’d fail to pass the weighing of the heart ceremony and your soul (the ka or ba) would be devoured by Amut and you’d cease to exist… which begs the question: if they would ensure that Imhotep would be devoured, why would they curse him so elaborately in the first place?

* In the climax of The Mummy Returns, according to IMDB, Rick discovers he is the reincarnation of a legendary Medjai warrior who defeated the Scorpion King… but Anubis just took him; he was never beaten before, cementing the true meaning and importance of his tattoo. But I don’t think this is really the case because the tattoo would be something that all Madjai have, so REALLY any one of the other Madjai COULD have beaten the Scorpion King if they weren’t battling Anubis warriors.

*Why would the Scorpion Kings' pyramid show the way to kill him?

I do feel a little heart twinge when Ancksunamun abandons Imhotep; she gets what she deserves, though- eaten by scarabs… maybe a bit harsh.

And the heroes get the diamond treasure, just more celebrating the rich, at least ½ white imperialist; it’s not like they are going to leave it with the Egyptian Museum in Cairo.

All follows the prophecy.

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