If only the Mummy had never returned

The third Mummy installment dutifully sends its characters to China where they participate in international competitions of mummy fencing, yeti vaulting and synchronised senselessness.

The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor finds Rick O'Connell (Brendan Fraser) and wife Evelyn (Maria Bello) heading East in hope of recapturing the adrenaline of adventure. The British aristocrat-adventurers retired following the Second World War and are begging to get back in the mummy-slaying game.

Directed by Rob Cohen, who takes over the reins from Stephen Sommers, the film opens with a historical backdrop: a ludicrously extravagant tale of "a mythic battle between good and evil played out in ancient China," we are informed. Egypt no longer has the trademark on mummies, it seems.

Jet Li is the Dragon Emperor, a bad dude who, in 200 BCE – as this film tells it – built the Great Wall of China by working thousands of servants to death. In his search for immortality, he is tricked and he and his army are mummified in a giant tomb.

A few thousand years later, enter the O'Connell's grown son Alex (Luke Ford), who is just as intrepid as his parents. He uncovers the tomb, which has been styled on a real archeological find: China's Terracotta Army, the thousands of clay soldiers found in 1974. They've been re-imagined as mummies frozen in time, complete with mummified horses.

If this sounds absurd, it is. Like recent films such as 300 or the new Indiana Jones, Tomb of the Dragon Emperor uses history like a prop. These movies revel in telling tales, but dodgy history does not lead to anything but myths. Younger generations are going to have some funky ideas about the past.

Alex's find leads to considerable trouble that unlocks further mysteries. There's an impressive chase scene through Shanghai and a battle between thousands – raised from the dead. (Its a lot like the climax of the 1992 cult film Army of Darkness without the comedy.)

The action is so relentless that Fraser has little room for any comic work, which is a shame. He has to utter at one point: "Here we go again!"

With the jawline of a matinee idol but the geeky clumsiness to make him interesting, Fraser seemed poised for a more mature career after his performances in 1998's Gods and Monsters and 2002's The Quiet American. But this summer, he's packed the double whammy of the 3-D Journey to the Center of the Earth and this third Mummy – a combination that deserves a penance of at least a dozen indie films.

What's even more shocking is it's been seven years since The Mummy Returns and fans will surely be surprised that their hero (Fraser, who is 39 in real life) has seeded ground to a younger actor.

Luke Ford may have the bangs to be Fraser's heir apparent, but he has nothing else to supply.

Ultimately, there's something fitting to today's Hollywood about a nine-year-old franchise devoted to raising grotesques from the dead. Sequel- and remake-crazy Hollywood could learn from the Mummy series: better to leave it buried.

The Number

$107m: First-weekend box-office revenues of The Mummy: Tomb of The Dragon Emperor as against a budget of $145m, according to boxofficemojo.com