A single flop couldn’t kill the Dark Universe

polygon.com:

It’s an enduring internet joke, and understandably so: Repost that infamously tweeted photo of multiple stars lining up to herald the creation of the Dark Universe, the extended cinematic universe planned to kick off with the release of 2017’s Tom Cruise-led The Mummy and discussed in the press since 2014.

The blueprint appeared simple: Universal’s equivalent of the Marvel or DC movies would integrate its famous Universal Monster characters into a multifilm and presumably multimedia franchise, powered by some of the biggest names in Hollywood. Johnny Depp would play the Invisible Man! Javier Bardem would play Frankenstein’s Monster! Russell Crowe already shot his part as Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde in The Mummy! These stars were photographed (or at least composited) together with Cruise! It was all happening!

And then, of course, it didn’t. Cruise’sMummy didn’t even make Scorpion King money in North America, and the whole project was scotched. More than half a decade later, the photo is still trotted out as an example of Hollywood hubris. Presumably that official Dark Universe account remains active (and, as such, open to reposts) as a monument, to remind other architects of shared universes that they ought to stay humble, lest they turn into an evergreen joke.

At the same time, this year has served as a potent reminder that, in its way, the Dark Universe never really went anywhere. Though the Universal Monsters haven’t ever matched their initial 25-year classic period, where a less tightly linked (but still interrelated) universe produced nearly 50 movies (and at its peak released them at a Marvel-like pace of three or four per year), they’ve been back in action for another quarter-century at this point, equaling the