I vaguely remember watching Mummies Alive in middle school. It was never something that I was in love with but I would catch it whenever it was on. In the days before Netflix and such widespread internet usage you sort of watched what was on. That being said, my revisit to Mummies Alive was pleasant. Aside from some bad puns (which might be required material for most kids cartoons) it was pretty well done and there wasn’t as much to poke fun at as I expected. So this might be a slight departure from the usual “Neverbot’s Make Fun Of Old Cartoons Hour”.
But only slightly.
Mummies Alive aired for one season starting in 1997, there were 42 episodes, which seems like a lot for one season. But they were asleep for 3500 years and apparently had a lot to say.
Ep. 1 Ra. Ra. Ra.
Nutshell: The big bad guy is Scarab a.k.a. Mr. Stone when he needs to appear human and interact with folks. He moved a few truckloads of Egyptian artifacts including mummies and sarcophagi to a museum in order to attract the reincarnated Prince Rapses. Presley (Rapses) is unwittingly drawn to it as he has no memory of his former life. Scarab shows up to capture him and the mummies awaken to defend the prince. There are four mummies in total; Ja-kal, Rath, Armon, and Nefer-Tina.
Oh and Prince Rapses dead cat. Kahti.
Let’s begin.
The setup: two men arrive at a tomb in Egypt. One is an explorer type, the other seems to be a guide. The explore begins to read a warning inscribed on the tomb. “Woe to him who breaks the seal for he-” He’s cut short when the door opens. He steps inside and see a bunch of markings but they aren’t glyps, they are hash marks. As if someone has been counting days. Was someone imprisoned inside? Yes… yes, they were. Suddenly a nefarious looking character appears, makes some ominous noises and then attacks.
Cut to modern day, two kids (Presley and friend) are skateboarding around town. You know how kids love their skateboards. One of them takes off down the street being reckless and such and the other follows. They arrive outside of a giant Sphinx, the museum where Presley’s mom is working on an Egypt exhibit, hence the giant Sphinx (for the slow).
Mom is busy so Presley goes to find a snack. When he hears an ominous sound strangely reminiscent of the big bad guy in the tomb. Is it the same dude? Again yes, we’re dealing with 90’s kids cartoons. If you think something ties together it most probably does. Herman Melville didn’t write Mummies Alive. Sorry.
The ominous tone is followed soon after by a clear voice saying “come back to me my son”. But don’t be fooled. It’s not Presley’s dead dad from eons past. It’s that jerk with Egyptian OCD.
Presley proceeds to wander through the exhibit alone looking for the voice. Cause that’s what you should do when you discover you’re being watched by persons unknown when ancient artifacts are involved. Didn’t this kid see any move ever?
Presley wanders into a room with many Egyptian artifacts, including mummies and sarcophagi. Suddenly he begins to glow. Radiation poisoning? Nope, ancient magic!
A statue comes to life and attacks him. I just knew this was going to happen. I mean, didn’t you? Presley hides in a sarcophagus but it’s thrown open a moment later and standing above him as that OCD jerk with a Vader-esque breathing problem. Though I suppose three thousand years in a tomb is sufficient reason to have severe asthma.
Scarab grabs the boy and intends to take his revenge for being entombed for 3500 years by the Presley’s father.
WITH THE STRENGTH OF RA!
Four mummies appear, combine with spirits and become kick ass corpse warriors. Each of the mummies combines powers with an Egyptian god and acquires cool armor enhancements. Ja-kal combines with the falcon, Rath with the snake, Armon with the ram, and Nefer takes the power of the cat. To be clear, the power of the cat gives her sharp claws and the ability to rock a whip, not just the ability to lick her own back and be condescending, which is what my cat does. Armon is missing his right arm but when combining with the ram and with the strength of Ra he gets a gold replacement arm which he proceeds to hit things with.
A fight ensues, you guessed it, good guys win, bad guy runs away. Er… rather, flies away through a newly made hole in the roof. Presley insists they have to get out of there as there is no way he can explain any of this to his mother.
The mummies throw the cat through the hole in the ceiling and use a dangling piece of his wrapping as a rope. I’m not sure exactly how much animal spirit armor enhancements weigh so I couldn’t do an exact calculation but I think it’s safe to say that must be some industrial strength toilet paper they used to wrap the cat.
Once the boy is safe outside they transform back into your every day garden variety mummy. You know, to be less suspicious looking. Just kidding that’s not the reason why. They explain that they use magic to beef up but that the magic gets sleepy or something and they have to rest in their sarcophagi to recharge.
At this point they go back to Presley’s house and realize that Nefer is in fact Nefer-tina. They never knew she was a girl. I don’t know how, it was totally obvious. Eyeball decay… maybe.
Mr Stone arrives at the museum and demands that the artifacts be sent back to Egypt. The museum protests but he offers ten million dollars to settle the dispute. This obviously causes a problem for the mummies. With their sarcophagi sent back to Egypt they won’t be able to recharge their magic and will apparently die… again.
Everything is being loaded into a truck and when the mummies and Presley realize the problem they make chase in a horseless chariot (car… that they steal) powered by magic. Nefer-Tina drives… badly. She almost kills a kid. When she swerves to avoid hitting him she tosses the other three mummies out of the car. They run and catch up and everyone learns a valuable lesson about wearing seatbelts. Safety first kids.
The mummies leap out of the car and onto the truck like four dead James Bond’s. Presley gets out of the car and sees Scarab flying after them. The truck gets stopped by the police who turns out to be a dark magic powered crony. Scarab catches up and demands that the truck be destroyed along with everything inside. That’s when Presley catches up.
Scarab attempts to capture Presley, not knowing his protectors are in the truck.
WITH THE STRENGTH OF RA! Again.
“Let’s kick Tut.” They say this. Because Tut rhymes with butt. Get it!
The bad guys focus their energy on destroying the truck. Destroy the truck and you destroy the mummies. One of the mummies attempts to drive the truck away and the fight moves to the trucks rooftop. After a few moments only Presley and Scarab are left on the roof, it seems like Presley is toast but he’s saved by a low hanging overpass. Thank Ra!
Scarab vows to destroy the mummies even if he has to shatter the world to do it. Standard bad guy stuff. The mummies take Presley home and promise to be close by as it is their duty to protect their prince.
You can watch the first episode below or if you’re sucked in, follow the videos to the YouTube channel and it looks like every episode is there. It’s even put into a playlist that plays automatically so you don’t have to stop eating your snacks.
Cheers.
Part One
Part Two
Part Three