By Liam de Brun
What many people view as Tom Cruise’s ‘worst ever film’ has been added to Netflix ahead of the property’s upcoming reboot. Fans of the acting legend recently headed on a final adventure with Ethan Hunt as Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning released in May. The final outing of Cruise’s Impossible Mission Force team as they took on a rogue artificial intelligence, had the actor’s fans have been in a reflective mood. Bursting on the scene in the 1980s in Risky Business, Top Gun, Rain Man, The Colour of Money, Cocktail and Born on the Fourth of July, Cruise quickly cemented himself as one of Hollywood’s biggest stars . Working with auteur directors in the 1990s such as Sydney Pollack, Paul Thomas Anderson and even Stanley Kubrick, Cruise continued to deliver hit-after-hit. Sadly the 2000s were not all joy for Cruise, failing to gain any awards’ buzz for war film Valkyrie and War of the Worlds being considered a lesser Steven Spielberg film at the time of its release. While he would go on to see the Mission Impossible franchise explode in the 2010s and Top Gun: Maverick become his highest-grossing film in 2022, there’s one Cruise film that even his biggest fans didn’t like. Released in 2017, The Mummy is an American fantasy action-adventure film directed by Star Trek writer Alex Kurtzma. Serving as a reboot of the Mummy franchise Cruise stars as U.S. Army Sergeant Nick Morton, a soldier of fortune who accidentally unearths the ancient tomb of entrapped Egyptian princess Ahmanet. Filling out the ensemble cast is Kingsman’s Sofia Boutella, Peaky Blinders’ Annabelle Wallis, New Girls’ Jake Johnson, Law & Order’s Courtney B. Vance and Oscar winner Russell Crowe. Critics instantly turned their noses up at The Mummy, with it boasting a score of just 15% from over 300 reviews on Rotten Tomatoes. Its critical consensus reads: “Lacking the campy fun of the franchise’s most recent entries and failing to deliver many monster-movie thrills, The Mummy suggests a speedy unravelling for the Dark Universe.” Initially intended to kick-start the Dark Universe, a shared universe based on the classic Universal Monsters film series, all plans were pulled when it brought it $410 million worldwide against a reported budget of $195 million. The seemingly indestructible Cruise was awarded the Worst Actor Award at the 2018 Razzies, with Johnny Depp, Jamie Dornan, Zac Efron and Mark Wahlberg also nominated. Thankfully for those who still hold the 1932 classic and 1999 Brendan Fraiser versions of The Mummy close to their hearts, a new version is on the way. Directed by Evil Dead Rise’s Lee Cronin, the latest iteration of the horror icon hits the big screen next year and stars The Perfect Couple’s Jack Reynor. The Mummy is available to stream now on Netflix