Hey folks, Harry here... Now Massawyrm went and sold himself to the world of junkets and the throes of 5 minute interviews to cover the release of the MUMMY RETURNS dvd... A monumental acheivement in the history of film... to be sure... mmmm.... Ahem... Anyway, I'm sure the disc is going to be filled with extras, and while the film is an insane goofy funhouse ride, I'm sure all that you will learn about the ILM side of things will make the disc far worth the five finger discount at Wal-Mart's everywhere... So without further ado, here's the lunger...

Hola all. Massawyrm here, just back from the west coast and chock full of stories that will make your head spin and your teeth sweat. It's a tale of high adventure, chock full of intrigue, romance, danger (well, okay, not too much danger) and surprise guests that just seem to endlessly come out of the woodwork like it was some kind of telethon in honor of Quint and myself. You see, at some point the gods looked down from on high, gazed upon the sad state of affairs the old Wyrm had slipped into and uttered something that would translate to us mortals as "Oh, sorry. Didn't mean to forget about you. Right then, here's a life altering, mind fucking adventure the likes of which no one will ever believe happened to you without the aid of clever embellishment." And thus I was gifted with just such an adventure. And like most adventures, this one began with our hero traveling along with his faithful companion, but ended up with him riding off alone into the sunset. That companion was Quint, who instead ran off halfway through on an equally important adventure of his very own.

Now, I know you're all dying to know just what the hell I'm talking about, but alas, today I will but touch upon the subject as I bring to you the highlights of the junket at the end of my adventure for The Mummy Returns.

For those of you unfamiliar with a press junket, its a gathering of press in one place by a studio, where they usually march out the stars in a press conference or round table atmosphere and you get to call out questions and sometimes, if you're lucky, meet the celebrities themselves in a limited one on one format. They're usually not the most popular events among critics, as they tend to bore the pants off of most everybody and you rarely get any scoops because everyone there is hearing the same answers.

But for the Mummy Returns, as with Boogiemen (which you can read about as Quint discusses the beginning of our adventures), Universal decided to throw a party. Now the Mummy Returns junket was one strange and awesome spectacle, as they set up a small pyramid next to the Santa Monica Pier overlooking the ocean.

I pulled up in a taxi just as the festivities were kicking off to the blaring soundtrack of the Mummy Returns. The smell of the ocean was strong, strong enough to pierce my cigarette dulled sense of smell and fill me full of childhood memories of serving as a cabin boy to a large group of lonely Greek sailors. It's a salty scent that often reminds me of Quint and the time we spent at sea...but I'm digressing. A small wooden pyramid had been constructed, and just as I stepped onto the hot sand to begin trudging my way toward the press core huddled around it, it erupted into a dazzling display of fireworks. At first I though that it was but a bad morning reaction to the mixing of Caffeine and Nicotine, which happens on occasion usually resulting in short fits wrought with visions of indie films of the future. But alas this was not the case. No, Universal was intent on blowing up the Santa Monica coastline at precisely 11 A.M. Pacific time. For a moment I stood in utter terror, the sheer breadth of their plan laid out before me in no uncertain terms. Explosions ripped through strategic points of the structure and the sound was almost deafening, even at my distance.

I looked down at my bags. No, I'd left the gym bag full of guns at John Woo's place. I was defenseless. I was the innocent bystander.

There is that moment in life, when all hell breaks loose, that you realize you are not John McClain. Everything movies had ever taught you, every little trick you ever picked up from MacGuyver suddenly becomes meaningless and you are left standing there on a beach in Santa Monica as Universal Studios tries to destroy it, knowing that you cannot save the day. You can not save the innocent bystanders, because you are one of them. You can do nothing but watch.

I froze and watched helplessly as the pyramid sizzled and popped with explosions.

And then a hero appeared. From out of the pyramid he emerged; a towering dark mass of muscles held taughtly together by a skin tight T-shirt and a $200 pair of sunglasses. The Rock, the peoples champion, had come to quell the insurgence.

The press corp was there to capture every fret filled moment, cameras snapping and flashes erupting in a volley luminescence that, for a brief moment, lit up The Rock as bright as the sun. He gave a single look and the explosions ceased. The plot defused. Such is the power of an action hero. He held out his arms a smiled for the cameras, victorious. Applause made it's way through the crowd and fans off to the side, held back by waist high metal fences and large men wearing grimaces, cried out "We love you Rocky!". I could only smirk, because obviously they didn't realize that that DVD had come out months ago. From their distance, and the way the sun was beating down on their heads, I could understand the mistake. But it still gave me a good chuckle.

As I got closer I saw that men with swords and women in skimpy, neo-Egyptian attire had swarmed the stage, keeping the press core at bay, lest they melt in the sheer radiance that is The Rock. For our protection, while he was in the sun, we were kept at least 20 feet away at all times. You never can be too careful. Melting the press core always leads to bad press. FDR said that once I think.

Then Arnold Vosloo stepped out and waved to the crowd, having backed up The Rock in some way, shape or form, a like a tall, well built, bald Kato. The two of them stood together, Arnold somehow immune to the effects of The Rock's vast corona, and they posed for pictures as the soundtrack continued to blare.

By this time I'd made my way through security, gotten a badge and stowed my luggage in the press tent. Boy howdy was I ready to meet these guys. I mean, they had single handedly saved hordes of reporters from a fate worse than repeated viewings of Zoolander. These were the kind of guys I'd come to L.A. to meet. So with that in mind I made my way back to the Press only area to meet the gents and get a few words to share with all of you nice folks.

There I was met by one of those evil minion security guard types who checked to see if I had a cameraman and seeing that I didn't insisted that only electronic media was allowed in the press only backstage area. At that I kindly inquired as to the definition of electronic media, for obvious reasons, and he in turn politely asked me not to be such a smart ass. So I beat a hasty retreat. I stepped back and watched the show.

And yet, in true Massawyrmian fashion (something you folks will understand more when I post the rest of my adventures) this worked to my advantage. You see, as I stepped back into some shade, I looked over to see none other than Stephen Sommers, the auteur of the Mummy Returns himself, standing no more than five feet from me. He had ducked back into some shade to avoid the limelight and let his actors enjoy their moment in the sun. So I introduced myself. Mr. Sommers of course is familiar with AICN and asked me to send a greeting to Harry, to which I agreed and he began to rap with me about the DVD.

Now I had seen the DVD a week before, so he began to ask me what I thought of various features and we discussed the intricacies of each section. Nothing too exciting for you folks, as its all stuff you can see on the disc. Just geek chat. So I asked him "So what do you have cooked up for the Special Edition?" To this he smiled and shook his head. There was to be NO special edition. This is the definitive. As we talked he discussed how the initial release of the Mummy did so well that they took a look and found a wealth of stuff they could put on another one. At the time the Mummy came out, the studios hadn't quite realized how important special features were to the sale of a disc (and as many of us will attest, we'll pass up a DVD of a film we love if there's just nothing cool on it) but when they came to, they had decided to release another disc, The Ultimate Edition. Well, according to Sommers, all of his movies from here on out will come out as full on, extras loaded DVD's without the need to buy a follow up disc.

Now personally I have to applaud that. It was clear to me that Sommers loves doing what he's doing as much as many of us who love watching what he does. And to see that he wants to give us what we're looking for, rather than trying to bilk us for more cash at a later date puts him right there in Massawyrm's old cool book. Kudos.

Smiling Jack Ruby was on hand to ask a few questions himself, many of which covered old Ruby's fascination with Deep Rising. There's obviously some issues floating around a DVD Special Edition of Deep Rising (remember, he said from here on out) but there's nothing definite either way. The best I could gather from the conversation is that it's being looked at.

Well, as I could see that The Rock had been ushered down into the pit, I tried once more to bask in his glow, but the security guard once more intervened. Since I wasn't going to get to speak to the People's Champion just yet, I decided to retreat into the Press tent to munch on the People's Strudel. Hell, "if ya can't meet them, eat their food" I always say. So I chowed down and chatted with the 13th Street boys until it was our chance to chat with the big man.

Now I have to diverge for a moment from the story to discuss The Rock. You see, what we have in cinema today is a total absence, a blight if you will, of viable action heroes. Now I'm not talking about great actors, I'm talking action heroes. There's a distinct difference. I'm not saying that action heroes can't be great actors, just look at Charlton Hesston and Sean Connery. But a true cinematic hero needs that special something, that perfect mix of physique, charisma and that look in their eye that says "I'm gonna kill every last mother fucking one of ya and there ain't a god damned thing you can do about it." Up until recently, we haven't had that in anyone under the age of fifty. I mean Arnold and Sly are great, but c'mon, there's just not much steam left in those two to keep it up. Van Damme and Segal have become cocktail party jokes, unable to capture action fans imagination in any real sense since the early to mid '90's. And Ford and Willis have both become too stately in their recent years to be able to pull off the action that we fell in love with them for. I'm not even gonna go into Chuck Norris.

So what are we left with? Pierce Brosnan and Ben Affleck. Uh, no. I like both those guys, don't get me wrong, but they don't have that action hero chemistry to really sell it to us. No. We have only two strong candidates right now. Vin Diesel and The Rock. I'll go into Vin Diesel in a later installment about my adventures. Right now, lets discuss The Rock.

All laughing and joking and sneering and flaming talkbacks aside. The Rock has it. He's a good looking man. He's built as if he was sculpted from marble. As any wrestling fan will tell you, he's one of the best ever on the mic. He's charismatic, intelligent, well spoken and can deliver his lines with such flair that he gets entire stadiums full of fans on their feet just to get the chance to say his lines with him. And those eyes. Look into those eyes just once and you're humbled. Even when he's being friendly, he's intimidating. Not in the Christopher Walken "Stop with the scooching" sort of way, but in the same way we used to see from Arnold. Back when Arnold was king.

Now I was talking to someone recently about "The Scorpion King" and they referred to it as Conan Lite. Okay, I can see their point, but I while pondering that it occurred to me that what film has lacked for almost 2 decades now is a good swords and sandals flick. Not just the old 40's, 50's and 60's swords and sandals flicks like Sinbad and Hercules, but those great 80's S&S flicks like Conan, The Beastmaster and Yor, Hunter from the Future. These are the films I grew up with, the heroes I longed to be. Maybe Arnie's got it in him to do King Conan. I pray to God every night that Marc Singer doesn't have it in him to make a 4th Beastmaster film. And well, there can never, ever be another Yor.

But with Arnie's current asking price, Lord only know when or if we'll see King Conan, so right about now I could definitely go for some Conan Lite. Give me swords, give me sorcery, but by god give me an action hero.

So that being said it came time for my two minutes with The Rock. As he stepped into the tent he took off his glasses and for the first time that morning, I saw his eyes. Up close and personal. They were piercing, cutting through the crowd like a flying guillotine and making us all a little nervous. You see, there are celebrities you meet who once you lay eyes on them, you see them for the real person they are; flesh and blood and imperfection. Nothing wrong with that, in fact, it's what's great about some celebrities, their down home identifiable quality that makes them all the more real. And then of course, there are those celebrities who are simply larger than life, who emanate an aura of cool so thick and forceful that it almost knocks you over the minute they make eye contact. I first felt that aura when I met Michael Landon as a teenager. I felt it again when I shook hands with The Rock.

Now I must say that I'm not a wrestling fan. Sure, I've watched it on and off since I was a kid, but I never really got INTO it. So meeting a wrestler never seemed like something that would knock the wind out of me, but this time, it did. There's just something about the man.

So I gathered myself together and tried to make the best of what little time I had. I figured any questions about the Scorpion King were out right. I mean anything we don't know about the film already he certainly wasn't going to let slip at a junket to a member of the press in a formal questioning. "So what's next? Do you have anything in the works for after The Scorpion King?"

"Yeah, we've got a few things in development." He went on to say that there was nothing solid, but he definitely had some things on his plate that he was considering and putting together. Very diplomatically he managed to say 'Yes, there is Massawyrm, but I can't tell YOU about it' without actually saying that or making me feel at the time like that's what he was saying.

"Well, after your great showing on SNL, have you considered doing any comedy?"

At this he laughed and nodded, as if for the first time that morning someone had asked him something unexpected. Or asked him something for the 80th time. He went on to say that there were a few things they were looking at (he kept using plurals so either he's got a case of the Royal personal pronouns or he's referring to his team; although I think it's that latter, wouldn't it be cool if it wasn't?) but that his main focus for the time being was action films. Alright, right on, fair enough. We all remember Suburban Commando. And the Nanny. And Santa with Muscles. On to the third question.

That's when he was yanked away on to the next group of reporters. There would be no third question, no lightning round, no final jeopardy. Moments later The Rock, Stephen Sommers and Arnold Vosloo (who I didn't get the chance to speak with) were spirited away, taken to their respective cars and returned to their everyday lives, free of cameras, flashbulbs and exploding pyramids. And free of third questions.

Lucky them. The third one was a doozy.

Until next time friends, smoke 'em if ya got 'em. I know I will.

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Massawyrm