Through Me Chapter 19 & The Horrific Mummy 3

Through Me Chapter Nineteen has finally been posted. I actually don't really know what to say which is why I didn't bother leaving an Author's Note ... maybe 'Oh boy' might cover it?

Anyway, the Beijing Olympics starts tomorrow! Time flies. Four years ago, when I was in Beijing and staring up at that countdown clock thing they had, I was like wow, it's going to take forever.

Forever rolls by pretty quickly, apparently.

Other news: I watched The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor over the weekend.



Don't go see it. Honestly, I knew it wasn't going to be completely stellar, but it was so disappointing, it made me angry - as in "gimme back my ticket money" angry.


WARNING: THERE MAY BE SOME SPOILERS FOLLOWING THIS.

But whatever, you probably have better things to do than to sit through this movie and scoff at it like I did so you probably won't even be watching it.

REASONS WHY MUMMY 3 DIDN'T LIVE UP TO THE HYPE

First: The cast is pretty ... not great. I don't even see the point in replacing Rachel Weisz with another actress. Her role wasn't necessary and it might have worked better if they'd simply killed off the character. Particularly if they were going to throw in a two second father-son reconciliation drama thing. The mom's death would have perhaps made it more poignant.

And don't even get me started about Mr. Older Alex, the darling son. That boy/man (played by Luke Ford) seemed more like Brendan Fraser's younger brother rather than his son. The character is written like he's an immature, arrogant frat boy who still somehow gets the girl in the end. I thought the kid Alex from Mummy 2 was actually portrayed in a more precocious, smarter way. It was like ... what messed up the cutie? Oh right, lack of "paternal support". Cue developmental issues.

Plus, he absolutely butchered the Mandarin pronunciation to pieces. I know, I know, it's not his primary language and what do people care when there are those nifty, little subtitles at the bottom of the screen. Still. There won't be one Chinese person in the audience who wouldn't grimace and cringe in embarrassment for this man when he tries to do his "threaten the Chinese Emperor with cool Chinese putdowns" spiel. Why did they feel the need to make the actor do this asides from the rule that all heroes must say something witty before they face down the villain? Unless his purpose was actually to make the Emperor hysterically confused.


"Kung Pao Chicken Ho Fun Fortune Cookie! Hao, Hao."


"WTF did he just call me?"

Props to the Chinese cast though for doing a pretty good job with their English dialogue and their cool action scenes though - except Jet Li's role could have probably been played by a random Joe with all the CG they did.

Second: They tried to be funny. Key word being tried. Punchlines were delivered horribly (Luke Ford, the actor who plays Alex O'Connell doesn't quite have Brendan Fraser's knack of presenting certain comedic lines. Poor man. Just don't try. Ditto for your Mandarin skills.) and there was not one huge moment of laughter from the audience throughout the movie, unless you count the chemistry with the barfing yak.

I believe the comedic highlight of the whole experience was during the previews when they showed the Madagascar 2 trailer.


"I'm furry and cute and I probably hold more charisma in one big googly eye of mine than Alex O'Connell's whole Emperor slaying self!"


Third: There's something sad when you start rooting for the bad guy to kill everyone and to take over the world. Because Team Good had that loser Alex (did I mention how I don't care for that Alex character?), Jet Li looked way too cool to be taken down. Except, naturally, of course he lost. Because the whole point of the Emperor getting the powers to shapeshift into horrific monsters like dragons was moot since of course, Emperor would only use his powers to fly and roar fire into the sky before choosing to listen to Brendan's taunting in the end to go hand-to-hand combat and allow himself to be stabbed in the back. Excellent.

Moving along now, I'm working on the next chapters. The next chapter to Through Me should churn out faster. Until then, hope you're all having a great summer!