Universal Digging Up 'The Mummy'

Universal's loose remake of 1932's Boris Karloff classic 'The Mummy' was a huge hit back in 1999, grossing a respectable $416 million worldwide. It soon paved the way for two equally successful sequels, a spin-off and even a popular theme park ride. The most recent entry in the series - 2008's 'The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor' - continued to pull in large numbers of audiences around the world, despite receiving a fierce critical mauling.

It's hardly surprising that Universal have today announced plans to reboot the series, with the help of 'Prometheus' co-writer Jon Spaihts and returning series producer Sean Daniel. Spaihts has already excitedly talked up his plans for the reboot with Variety, which will take the series in a new direction after the recent slew of straight-to-video Scorpion King sequels. "I see it as the sort of opportunity I had with 'Prometheus': to go back to a franchise's roots in dark, scary source material and simultaneously open it up to an epic scale we haven't seen before" says Spaihts. As of yet, it remains unclear if Spaihts and producer Daniel's have plans to tie their reboot in with the adventures of Brendan Fraser's Rick O€™Connell and the cheeky CGI japes of Arnold Vosloo's Imhotep. Perhaps there could even be plans to create something that's closer to the iconic 1932 original. As long as it's an improvement on Scorpion King 3: Battle For Redemption, we'll be somewhat happy.