New “The Mummy” Has A “Mummy” Problem

Next Friday sees the release of “Lee Cronin’s The Mummy,” a supernatural film from James Wan’s Atomic Monster, Jason Blum’s Blumhouse Productions and New Line Cinema.

The project is essentially a straight-up, tightly-budgeted and quite dark horror reimagining of the original “The Mummy” creature features from the early 20th century – not that dissimilar from films like 2020’s “The Invisible Man,” 2025’s “Wolf Man” and this year’s “The Bride” reinvented classic horror characters of the era with their own modern spins (though the latter had a much bigger budget).

There’s just one wrinkle. Last year came the news that Brendan Fraser and Rachel Weisz would be re-teaming on screen for a fourth film in Universal’s big-budget and action/adventure-centric “The Mummy” franchise. That’s still going ahead, but isn’t due out in cinemas until 2028.

Unfortunately, it has proven a bit of a headache for the marketing department for “Lee Cronin’s The Mummy”. It has gotten to the point that Blumhouse has gone to the unusual step of making daily posts on X, reminding fans that Brendan Fraser isn’t in the movie.

They’ve done it four times already, and every time it keeps getting funnier with the postings leading to memes, thousands of views and even some nostalgic hope Fraser makes a cameo (he doesn’t). That said, it is doing its job and has gotten people talking about the film.

The film opens April 17th and is reportedly targeting an opening in the $12-20 million range – the title one of the few non-tentpole wide release options available in the near future between the just released “The Super Mario Galaxy Movie” and the upcoming “Michael,” “The Devil Wears Prada 2” and “Mortal Kombat II”.