Although everyone has heard of the hugely popular “The Mummy” film from 1999, very few people are aware that this film series even gave rise to an animated series that followed the same thrilling tales of misplaced scrolls and mummies in Ancient Egypt!
The animated program, an action-oriented fantasy animation that chronicled a family’s adventures after an evil mummy comes to life and turns on them, was partly based on the same story as the films.
Universal Cartoon Studios created “The Mummy,” which made its television debut in 2001 on the Kids’ W.B. network. In this long-forgotten presentation from decades ago, let us examine it in depth and go into the world of mummies and ancient mythology!
What The Cartoon Television Series Is All About
Universal Studios was trying to profit on the success of the Mummy series once it became widely popular by creating a television show based on it. The show, which Tom Pugsley and Greg Klein created, has a total of 26 episodes, all of which are now streamable on Paramount.
It was based on the history of “Imhotep,” a wicked high priest in ancient Egypt who strove to dominate the entire world. Before he could even find the manacle, the townspeople mummified him alive to put an end to his craziness. He needed the “scroll of Thebes” and the “Manacle of Osiris” to become the most powerful being.
The manacle of Osiris was once again unearthed by Evy O’Connell during one of her archaeological digs almost three thousand years later, in 1920. As a result, Imhotep’s mummy came to life once more, and the malevolent High Priest came back ready to rule the world even more so than before. The O’Connell family, particularly Alex, gets entangled in a world of misplaced scrolls and manacles while attempting to flee the High Priest’s onslaught and ensure the survival of mankind.
Although the show was largely based on the films, the makers made sure that there were no visual similarities between the characters since they did not want to use studio funds to acquire the rights. Let us examine some of the show’s main figures and the part they performed in “The Mummy”!
Main Characters Of The Cartoon
Alex O’Connell was the show’s main protagonist, and he had traveled to Egypt with his family due to a promotion at his mother’s workplace. He was a twelve-year-old boy who was incredibly well-educated in languages and ancient world histories.
Alex was homeschooled by his parents and had a curious, imaginative perception of the world. Alex liked to step out and explore things, which more often than not landed him into trouble or caused problems that could have been avoided. In one such instance, Alex carelessly handled the ‘manacle of Osiris’, which then latched itself to his hand and landed him in trouble with Imhotep himself. Though Alex could be a little reckless at times, he was a good-natured boy who understood the seriousness of the situations and acknowledged the responsibilities that came with the manacle.
Alex was born to Rick and Evy O’Connell, who also play important roles in Alex’s adventures while fighting Imhotep and ensuring the world’s safety.
While Rick used a gun in the Mummy movies, it was replaced with a whip in the cartoons to make it more suitable for the young audience.
Evy O’Connell was a highly skilled architect who was also the reincarnation of the Egyptian Princess ‘Nefertiti.’
The O’Connells were also accompanied by Jonathan Carnahan, Evy’s irresponsible elder brother, who often got into trouble and created problems for the rest of them.
The O’Connells had some help from the ‘Medjai,’ who were a local group of people in ancient Egypt. The leader of the Medjai, Ardeth Bay, often accompanied Alex and his family on their adventures and even fought fiercely against Imhotep on various occasions.
Imhotep was the evil High Priest, who wished to take over the world and served as the show’s main antagonist. After being mummified alive thousands of years ago, he was brought back to life by Colin Weasler, and he immediately set out to fulfill his long-suspended mission of conquering the world. Though the O’Connells often thwarted him, Imhotep did not give up and always strived to find new ways to pursue his mission.
Imhotep’s backstory was edited in the cartoon series, and certain elements of it were left out, as they were inappropriate in nature for a young audience. ‘Anck-Su-Namun,’ Imhotep’s former lover, was edited out of the show during the first season for the same reason, but she was later incorporated in the second season.
Imhotep often got some help from Colin Weasler, Evy’s rival at work, who had come all the way to Egypt out of jealousy. Colin was responsible for reviving Imhotep by using the book of the dead, and he was willing to even team up with the evil High Priest just to establish his superiority over Evy. While Colin initially has no choice but to obey Imhotep, he soon starts taking pleasure in his work and even greedily expects to rule the world under Imhotep’s wing. He was considered the animated version of Beni Gabor from the Mummy movies and had a typical cunning, egotistical and cowardly persona.
Exploring the story arc
The show kicked off with an episode titled ‘The Summoning’, which first aired on television on September 29, 2001. It begins with a tiny segment wherein Alex O’Connell wanders the streets of Egypt when he almost loses his balance and runs into his dad Rick. The two of them approach Alex’s mother Evy, who seems caught up with finding items at an archaeological site. While Evy comes across a vintage bowl, Alex wanders around the ruins and opens a mysterious door. It releases a bunch of bats, and the whole structure collapses behind them while the O’Connell family runs to safety.
As the show’s intro starts playing, the narrator talks about Imhotep and his desire to conquer the world with the help of the scrolls of Thebes and the Manacle of Osiris.
The story then returns to the present day three thousand years later, where Evy O’Connell gets praised by her superiors at work at a museum. She had just discovered an important ‘book of the dead’, and was even offered a promotion to visit Egypt and carry out excavations on site.
Alex and Rick are thrilled for Evy’s promotion, and the family sets out to Egypt the very next day. They are also joined by ‘Uncle Jonathan’, Alex’s irresponsible uncle, who seems to be getting into trouble all the time. They soon land in Egypt, and Evy immediately checks out her excavation site, ‘the Temple of Hamunaptra.’ They enter the temple, and Jonathan accidentally discovers the temple’s vault while losing his balance and falling into a pit.
An excited Evy explores the place when she finds the ‘Manacle of Osiris.’ She tells her family about the history of the manacle, and how it was made by ‘Osiris,’ king of the underworld, in order to defeat his enemies on earth. The manacle can move mountains, blot out the sun, set the seas on fire, and even raise the dead.
Later that day, Colin Weasler also shows up in Egypt and sneaks into the tomb of the High Priest by subduing the guards. It seems that he is jealous of Evy for getting the promotion and that he is here with the mission of sabotaging Evy’s excavations.
While Colin tries to resurrect the High Priest’s mummy, Alex plays around with the manacle and ends up locking it around his hand. The mummy rises to life, and Colin struggles to subdue it as the High Priest emerges from within the bandages in optimal form. He seems to be in perfect condition, and he even summons skeletons to do his bidding and obtain the manacle of Osiris and the scrolls of Thebes. The High Priest is determined to take over the world, and he first decides to find the manacle at the temple of Hamunaptra.
In a different part of the city, Alex struggles to get the manacle off his hand, while his parents return to their tent. Colin shows up with the High Priest and introduces him as his new friend ‘Imhotep.’ Evy blames Colin for stealing the book of the dead to resurrect the High Priest, while Imhotep’s soldiers start approaching Alex in order to get their hands on the manacle.
A fight breaks out, and Ardeth Bay, leader of the Medjai of Egypt, eventually comes to the O’Connell family’s rescue. Imhotep stirs up a hurricane and then takes Alex away with him while the rest figure out what is going on. Ardeth then assures Evy that no harm will come to Alex and that Imhotep won’t act out until he gets his hands on the scrolls of Thebes. He further tells them that Imhotep needs Alex to be safe until he can read the instructions on the scroll and separate the manacle from Alex’s hands.
Evy suggests that they should get their hands on the scrolls before Imhotep, and Ardeth reveals that the scrolls were rumored to be buried with King Dozer at his pyramid in Sakura.
They hurry to the pyramids, but Imhotep outruns them and breaks into the pyramids before them. Colin also accompanies him, and Imhotep orders Colin to find the scrolls in the king’s royal chambers while he prepares Alex for the separation ritual in the grand gallery.
Imhotep uses magic to bind Alex within the pyramid and even sends magical bugs to the O’Connell’s airplane so that they cannot sabotage his plan. However, Evy manages to get rid of the bugs on their plane, and they soon land outside the pyramid in Sakura.
Evy and the group rush inside and then order Imhotep to release Alex. However, the high priest summons his armies of the dead, who start attacking Evy and her team. They struggle to fend for themselves when Alex’s manacle shoots magical lighting in the room, subduing the dead soldiers for a while. Alex even finds the book of the dead lying around, and he tells his mom that she can send the soldiers back by using it. She casts a spell, which even weakens Imhotep as he starts returning to his dead form. However, Colin intervenes at the last minute and gets rid of the book of the dead.
As the episode comes to an end, Imhotep returns to his peak physical form, but he temporarily leaves the O’Connells alone as he sets out to locate the scroll of Thebes. Alex reunites with his family, who get ready to face Imhotep very soon as he is set to return to get the manacle.
In the next episode, titled ‘A Candle in the Darkness,’ Alex throws a tantrum over finishing his language homework and is not very happy about having to study on vacation. While Evy stresses on the importance of studying, Alex soon gets distracted by his uncle Jonathan, who offers to show him around the place. They come across the ‘Library of Alexandria’, and Alex decides to go in and check the place out. However, an earthquake breaks out and Alex and Jonathan seek shelter while waiting for it to pass.
Alex ends up zoning out, and his manacle seems to be causing strange instances wherein he sees visions of himself in the darkness. As Alex comes back to his senses, he spots a hole that has opened up in the library structure. Alex persuades Jonathan to go in with him, and the two enter the library. They come across a tiny model of Egypt inside the library, and find some sort of a treasure map. He decides to jot down a sketch of the treasure map depicted in the model when he hears the sound of other people entering the place.
Alex and Jonathan go into hiding, and discover that Imhotep and Colin have also made their way inside the hidden library. The two of them end up running into Jonathan and Alex, who escape the library at the last minute on Jonathan’s scooter.
Alex and Jonathan return safely to their tent, where a worried Evy scolds them for setting out on their own. Alex then shows her the map he found at the library, and Evy traces a secret location marked on the map. It seems to lead to a secret annex to the library, and they wonder if the scrolls are in there.
They decide to set out at first light to look for this secret annex in their plane and soon arrive at the location. They enter the place, while Imhotep and Colin watch from afar and seem to have an evil plan in place.
At the annex, Evy and Rick decide to go in and look for the scrolls, while Alex and Jonathan are sent back to their aircraft. However, Alex soon gets restless and decides to go all alone. Jonathan too follows him, and the team comes together in a room where Evy and Rick have located some scrolls. However, Imhotep and Colin soon corner them, and the evil High Priest also summons shadow demons to retrieve the scrolls from Evy’s clutches.
Alex acts fast to find the shadow demons’ weaknesses, and they scare them away with some light. Evy then burns these scrolls and reveals that she learned the location of the ‘Scroll of Thebes’ before burning the scrolls. She tells them that the scrolls are in the fifth dynasty room when an unexpected attack by Imhotep separates the group.
They all decide to regroup in the fifth dynasty room, and Evy and Jonathan locate a few more scrolls while Alex and Rick fight off some more shadow demons. Imhotep then shows up and demands Evy hand him the scrolls, but the rest of her family shows up just in time. They prepare to deflect all the demons with fires, and Alex finally finds some mechanical wheels in the place that can be used as weapons.
He uses his language of knowledge to figure out the workings of the wheel, which opens up and fires strong blasts that get rid of all the shadow demons.
Once again, Imhotep tries to get his hands on the scrolls, but Alex’s manacle emits a strong, powerful light that scares the Mummy away.
The O’Connells escape the library annex just as another earthquake hits and only manage to find one piece of paper that has some information leading to the original ‘scrolls of Thebes.’ Evy reads the paper, which states that ‘Alexander the Great’ himself checked the scrolls out and never returned them.
As the episode comes to an end, Evy declares that they need to find Alexander’s lost diaries that could be anywhere ranging from Europe to China to India.
In the third episode, ‘Against the Elements,’ the O’Connell family travels to India in order to look for Alexander’s lost diary. Alex locates one of the diaries inside an old temple, while Jonathan accidentally causes the temple to fall to its ruins. Rick even calls him a ‘good luck charm in reverse,’ and they soon escape the place. However, Jonathan gets left behind, and Alex then uses the diary as a wedge to keep the place from falling before his uncle can escape. Though Jonathan manages to escape, the diary ends up getting crushed under the weight of the temple.
Alex later reveals that he managed to save an important paper from the diaries, and Evy deciphers the words on it that state that Alexander left the scrolls in the ancient Egyptian city of Memphis.
Evy and Rick leave to arrange transportation, and they find four huge elephants to take them across India. They later switch to a ship that will take them all the way across continents and to Memphis.
Back in Egypt, one of Colin’s men disguises as a guide to spy on the O’Connells in India and then report their activities to Colin. Colin then advises Imhotep to hurry soon to reach Memphis, but the High Priest takes a break and first finds the ‘Staff of Set’ that can control the elemental forces of nature. ‘Set’ was known as the Egyptian god of chaos, and anyone who held the sword could control earth, water, fire, and air.
Imhotep uses the staff to stir up trouble for the O’Connells, who face a water dragon while crossing the water and almost get thrown off their boat.
Finally, Ardeth Bay comes to their rescue and the group safely reaches the deserts of Egypt. They build a campfire for the night, and later ponder over the day’s events. Evy even figures out that Imhotep must have the Staff of Set since it is impossible to conjure a water dragon without it.
Evy decides to visit the palace where the scrolls are likely to be found, and they head there to find the palace buried under sand and stones. They dig through the place and finally make their way to its entrance when Imhotep shows up with the Staff of Set. He uses the staff to conjure soldiers made of sand, who then attack Evy and the rest of their party. While Colin follows Imhotep inside the palace, he clutches Alex and drags him along as a hostage. While Alex struggles to free himself from Colin’s grasp, his parents fight the sand soldiers and follow him inside.
They try to save him, but Imhotep conjures up a hurricane with the help of his staff, and both Rick and Evy get sucked into it. Alex then frees himself from Colin’s grasp by knocking him out and even gets his hands on Colin’s belt. He then flings the belt to his parents, who are in the midst of a whirlwind, and they cling to it and safely land on the ground.
In the meantime, Jonathan and Ardeth Bay continue to fight the sand soldiers outside the palace. Jonathan finally finds a stick of dynamite and blows them up, getting rid of them for good.
Inside the palace, Imhotep conjures lions made out of fire and sends them to attack Alex and the O’Connells. Evy instructs Alex to go find the scrolls of Thebes while they stay back and defend themselves from the lions.
Imhotep finally locates an ancient box himself and opens it, expecting to see the scrolls here. However, he is shocked to find it empty, except for a stray mongoose called Tut that Alex had rescued earlier and hidden inside the box.
While Imhotep screams in frustration, Alex shows up with his Staff of Set and asks Imhotep if he has lost something. Alex then uses the staff to turn the fire lions against Imhotep, and the High priest once again finds himself cornered by the young boy. Imhotep declares that they will not be so lucky when he comes for them next time and then disappears in the cracks.
Alex, Evy, and the others regroup outside the palace, and they wonder what to do next since they couldn’t find the scrolls here. Evy states that they just need to trace Alexander’s steps and explore Greece, Armenia, Asia Minor, and wherever they must go in order to find the scrolls. Alex’s parents even agree to let him keep the stray mongoose, and the episode ends on a happy note.
In the next episode, titled ‘The Deep Blue Sea,’ Alex and his family head off to Greece to find the rest of Alexander’s diary. They find some inscriptions on ancient monumental slabs in Greece, and they decipher them to find some bits from Alexander’s diaries. The last entry in his diary states that he left the scrolls for safekeeping in the ship ‘Athena’ that was last seen in the ancient city of Minosos.
However, Minosos had been swallowed by the sea in 400 B.C. and was now only a lost city. While Evy thinks about their next course of action, Imhotep shows up in Greece and catches Alex and the others off-guard. Imhotep demands to get what is rightfully his and tries to attack Evy when Alex steps in and uses the power of his manacle to blast Imhotep into the ground.
While the High Priest falls unconscious, Alex and the rest of them escape the place, and Evy takes some pieces of the monument’s slab with her. She tries to decipher it, and Alex then uses the manacle to make some sense of the inscriptions written on the slab. He then gets a strange vision of himself in a library in Minosos, and he discovers that the lost city can be found on the coast of Crete. He also sees himself finding the ship’s log in this library while the building starts crumbling down and sinks into the sea.
He returns to his senses, and shares his visions with his parents. Rick wonders how they will find a lost city that is probably now buried under the city, and Evy states that she might know a way.
As they reach the coast of Crete, a large submarine comes ashore and a man named ‘Dimitri Helios’ steps out of it. He approaches Evy and then agrees to help them find the lost city. Rick and Alex get on Dimitri’s submarine along with Evy, and Dimitri even lets Alex drive the submarine for a while. However, their smooth sailing is interrupted when Imhotep shows up in the form of a ‘waterspout’ and hijacks their submarine. Imhotep starts tearing a hole in the submarine, and the vessel soon starts sinking.
They are just about to sink into an abyss, but Dimitri manages to bring the submarine to a stop at the last minute. While the submarine stops, Alex offers to repair all the holes caused by Imhotep, when the vessel loses balance and topples further into the abyss. They end up locating the lost city of Minosos, while Imhotep conjures up a sea monster and sends it after them. Alex makes a map to locate the Athena ship’s logs inside the lost city, and Dimitri reveals that he doesn’t have enough SCUBA suits for everyone to step out of the submarine.
Finally, Alex, Dimitri, and Rick set out to find the ship’s logs while Evy stays back on the submarine to repair it. However, Alex and Dimitri find themselves cornered by Imhotep’s sea monster while a frantic Evy watches her son struggle to fend off the monster.
Eventually, Imhotep orders the sea monster to find Athena’s logs, and the monster leaves Alex alone. He returns to the submarine with Dimitri, whose air supply was cut off. While Dimitri catches his breath, Alex sets off by himself to go after Rick and warn him about the sea monster.
The father-son duo works together, and Rick even locates Athena’s logs at the library in the lost city. However, the records seem to be booby-trapped, and the sea monster returns to attack Rick the second he picks them up. Alex then shows up to help his father, and the two of them manage to escape the library as the place starts crashing down on its own. The sea monster ends up getting trapped under the debris, while Alex and Rick return safely to the ship.
Evy is overjoyed to find that her family is safe, and they even thank Dimitri for taking them on such a risky adventure. Finally, Dimitri brings the submarine back to the sea’s shore, while Evy states that she cannot wait to translate Athena’s logs and hopefully locate the scrolls.
In this way, Alex and his family went on various adventures across places to find the scroll of Thebes and also keep the manacle safe. They often ran into Imhotep, who constantly showed up in their paths and created more obstacles as he tried to obtain the manacle from Alex’s hand and become the most powerful being in the world!
What Happened To The Series?
After releasing two seasons from 2001 to 2003, the show was not renewed for another season, primarily due to a dip in ratings and also because it failed to be as successful as the movie franchise. The creators had tried their best to keep things interesting and had even renamed the second season ‘The Mummy: Secrets of the Medjai’. Despite the efforts on the part of the creators, the show did not manage to take off and was eventually called off in 2003. However, the writers did ensure a proper ending to the series and tied up all loose ends in a decently wrapped-up final episode in 2003. The finale also left some room for a sequel, just in case, there were to be any potential developments in the future.
Conclusion
Though the animated cartoon did not match the movies in terms of success, it was still a pretty solid attempt at bringing the tales of ancient Egypt to T.V cartoons. The show was packed with elements of fantasy, history, and adventures across the world, and it explored a wide variety of aspects related to the mummies of ancient Egypt and historical artifacts from those ages. All the characters’ story arcs were rich and filled with action, and the voice actors also did a tremendous job bringing them to life. To conclude, The Mummy is a thoroughly enjoyable animated series that deserves more attention and is definitely worth a watch!