THE Mummy's release opens a portal to a brand new shared cinematic universe, which will draw together monsters and ghouls from classic Universal Cinema. Dark Universe is set to reflect the Marvel Cinematic Universe, with a series of remakes of the studio's 1930s monster films.
Explaining the concept in a recent Metro interview, The Mummy's writer and director Alex Kurtzman said: "I’m a lifelong fan of the universal monsters, I love these monsters, and I think it’s such a special genre into itself.
"Chris Morgan, who is my partner in the Universal Monsters, and I are working on all of [the films] as producers, and the idea is that we’re going to do one a year, and that we’ve set a tone in this film but different directors will be able to come in on different films and bring their imprint, and unique vision to the idea of these monster movies."
Despite the aim of releasing one film a year, the next movie, Bride Of Frankenstein directed by Bill Condon (Beauty and the Beast), won't be in cinemas until early 2019. The Wolf Man, The Invisible Man, The Creature From The Black Lagoon, as well as Van Helsing, have also now all been named as upcoming films. Universal have also confirmed Javiar Bardem will play Frankenstein's monster and Johnny Depp will play the Invisible Man in future releases.
Kurtzman says he wants the Mummy "to honour the heritage and the history of the original Karloff film ... and also bring something new to the table, bring it into the modern day by making the Mummy into a woman".
He expects the series will generate a whole new genre and has said that some of the films' characters may "grow and expand and maybe even spin off", adding: "I think that digging into deep mythologies about monsters around the world is fair game for us, as well and connecting the monsters that we know to some surprising monsters could also be really interesting."
While Kurtzman is setting the tone for future releases, Universal hopes each director will bring with them their own unique insights and ideas, shaping the universe as it expands. The film company has also suggested that each movie will be connected by Prodigium, an organisation run by Dr Henry Jekyll to track and analyse monsters throughout the world.
Despite Universal's self-proclaimed respect for original horror and innovation, not everyone is pleased with the idea. Writing in Forbes, Dani Di Placido suggests that: “Unless these characters are reimagined practically beyond recognition, there’s little incentive to pay the price for a cinema ticket ... True horror can’t exist in a shared universe. A monster is only scary if it’s unique and unknown. If it’s just another creature in a world chock-full of them, then it’s forgettable.”
Given that some of these familiar characters having already become tired stereotypes, there seems to be a concern that the films will forget about the horror and de-robe the creatures of their fearfulness, horseshoeing them into yet more stereotypical action movies.
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