Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor, The

Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert

Now why did I like this movie? It was just plain dumb fun, is why. It is absurd and preposterous, and proud of it.

The Onion (A.V. Club) Nathan Rabin

Dragon Emperor succeeds largely through sheer excess: It's doubtful that any idea was thrown out for being too implausible.

Seattle Post-Intelligencer William Arnold

Anyone in the market for an overblown and totally mindless adventure-comedy will certainly get his money's worth.

Time Richard Corliss

This Mummy movie is really two movies: a good adventure epic, with all the Chinese people, and a wan one, with O'Connells and the other the Westerners.

TV Guide Ken Fox

Still passable popcorn fare, even if you'll barely taste it before swallowing.

The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Jennie Punter

It's kind of fun but the twists and turns are all too familiar.

Entertainment Weekly Owen Gleiberman

After an hour of inert exposition, a race through Shanghai gooses the movie alive. Then it plunges back into torpor.

New York Post Kyle Smith

When I go to a Mummy movie, I don't want ninjas and yetis and men turned to stone. I want embalmed corpses and hieroglyphics. I want pharaoh. I want pyramids and sphinxes and Ace bandages. Did "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" take place on the Nile?

Philadelphia Inquirer Steven Rea

The movie bogs down in tiresome good guys vs. bad guys action cliches.

Baltimore Sun Michael Sragow

It's like an Indiana Jones movie without rhythm, wit or personality, just a desperate, headlong pace.

Christian Science Monitor Peter Rainer

There is one bit of good news. For all you abominable snowman fans out there, "The Mummy" is filled with yetis. And, boy, are they ever angry.

New York Daily News Elizabeth Weitzman

Boredom is the very basis of this sequel, at least at the beginning.

Los Angeles Times Kenneth Turan

Though the new film has some good things, it does not have enough of them to make the third time the charm.

Empire Staff (Not credited)

Competent, but so utterly bereft of any memorable moments that it becomes a bit of a bore. Perhaps it's time for a reboot – guy wrapped in bandages, shuffling around a pyramid, scaring people. You never know, it might just work.

Boston Globe Ty Burr

Despite exotic locations, epic cinematography, and much spectacular crash and bang, this "Mummy" feels like a threadbare toss-off.

ReelViews James Berardinelli

Feels perfunctory and obligatory and, despite the return of several familiar characters, is more like an afterthought than an organic third piece of a trilogy puzzle.

Chicago Tribune Michael Phillips

The film has one objective: to smack its audience in the face with fleeting, competing wows, over and over.

Portland Oregonian M. E. Russell

Shrill, unfunny third installment.

Village Voice Vadim Rizov

Strange how dreary it all is, and how tired Fraser seems.

Film Threat Felix Vasques Jr.

It's a damn shame when the dreaded third leg in the franchise feels like a pale imitation of an already pale imitator.

Washington Post Jane Horwitz

Tiresome and messy.

The Hollywood Reporter Frank Scheck

Too much of the proceedings are silly rather than horrifying, with the nadir being the appearance of some particularly athletic Yetis who briefly pitch in to lend a hand.

The New York Times Stephen Holden

The kindest thing to be said for this frantic, cluttered mess of cheesy computer-generated action-adventure clichés is that at least you can see how the estimated $175 million budget was spent.

Chicago Reader Andrea Gronvall

For a movie about the undead, this lacks any supernatural chills, and by the time its obligatory final showdown arrives, it seems as hollow as the terra cotta soldiers brought to life by CGI.

Rolling Stone Peter Travers

The new Mummy is, how can I put it? Just freakin' awful.

USA Today Mike Clark

Remarkably, the plot has much in common with "Hellboy II: The Golden Army," yet that bundle of fun has enough vision to make even its Barry Manilow interlude seem appropriate.

San Francisco Chronicle Mick LaSalle

As for Fraser, his clumsy humanity is endearing, but by now, assuming he has invested wisely, he should have enough money saved so as to not have to waste his talent anymore.

Charlotte Observer Lawrence Toppman

I'm afraid it just stinks.

Miami Herald Rene Rodriguez

Tomb is the kind of movie you sit through dreading the expository scenes, because the acting is so bad and the dialogue so pointedly written to make sure the little ones in the audience can keep up with the plot.

Variety Todd McCarthy

Reheating the ingredients can't disguise how stale they are, as setpiece after setpiece strains to whip up excitement, only to fall flat while reminding of previous sequences that did such things ever so much better.

Wall Street Journal Joe Morgenstern

The best news about this clangorous clunker is that it may well have vanquished the Mummy franchise.

Salon.com Stephanie Zacharek

It's impossible to tell what's going on at any given moment in Tomb of the Dragon Emperor; it's even harder to care about being able to tell.

Austin Chronicle Marc Savlov

Little more than a cluttered, noisy, and unsatisfying thrill ride to nowhere.