Chapter 33
THE SPRINKLER Chapter Thirty-Three
5.1.2026
Editor – Mykal - Content – Technical - Layout
Research & Editor – Mike - Content - Layout
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Chapter 33
A Monthly Film-First Dispatch
Psycho Studios (Phoenix)
Film Image of the Month
The Mummy 1932: This classic tale is one of our favorite Universal Monsters films. Great human condition story, great cast and groundbreaking effects for its time. The film is too short!
This film in black and white, released over 90 years ago is quite the contrast to the 2026 Mummy film. We’ll stick with the classic(s) until someone kills a remake!
EDITOR’S NOTE
We are embarking on a new layout and content for our newsletter The Sprinkler. Mykal was instrumental with editing our previous format which had too many irons in the fire. This chapter and moving forward will include:
Film: New release review, and our Psycho Scale.
From the Vault: Films from the 1930s through the 1980s. Simply a watch suggestion.
VHS Corner: One film suggested, do you own a VCR?
Music: This is about music that is directly linked to a film or films. One soundtrack suggested.
**We use the Psycho Scale when reviewing with a score, it is 0-Psycho (10) and these scores are real and true.
FILM
New Release
Lee Cronin’s The Mummy – 2026 Rated R – runtime 2h 14m
By the Numbers:
Budget - $22 million – Box Office $65 million
Lee Cronin (Who?) steps into familiar territory with a title that carries decades of weight and expectation. The Mummy has always lived somewhere between adventure and horror, depending on the era. This version makes a deliberate pivot. It wants to be darker. More intimate. More psychological. It wants to trade spectacle for dread. That is the right instinct to want to be different. The execution just does not get there; the movie has points where it is unwatchable.
The premise is strong. A family is reunited with their long missing daughter, who returns in a state that is not just wrong, but deeply unsettling. She is not the child they lost. She is something else. That idea alone should carry the film. It is personal. It is disturbing. It opens the door for a grounded kind of horror that works on a slow burn. For a stretch, the movie feels like it understands that. However, this guy is not a fan of horror movies driven by a child or children.
Early on, there is tension. The atmosphere leans into unease instead of noise. The Egypt thread adds texture. A buried structure. A sarcophagus. Something ancient that should have stayed sealed. There are moments where the film almost locks into a rhythm that could have been effective, like this could be good.
Then the film starts to drift, and you can feel it’s going to go sideways. Which it does.
Instead of tightening its grip, the story keeps expanding outward. New elements arrive one after another. A kidnapping. A mysterious figure tied to the past. An ancient demon with a name and a mythology that demands explanation. Rituals. Translations. Layers of backstory that pile on top of each other. Morse code becomes a plot device. Letters become clues. Every new idea pulls attention away from the core tension rather than sharpening it. Are you kidding me? Morse code?
This is where the movie begins to lose itself and audiences that appreciate good film.
There is a difference between complexity and clutter. This leans toward clutter and ridiculousness. The emotional center is a family dealing with the return of their daughter, and that should be the anchor. Instead, the film keeps cutting away from that anchor to explain something else. It becomes less about what the characters feel and more about what the plot needs to explain. Back and forth, back and forth.
The horror suffers because of that. Horror? Oh boy!
There are images that should land. A child who is no longer fully human. A body marked by something ancient. A family watching someone they love slip away in real time. Those are powerful ideas. They should be enough. But the film rarely trusts them. It fills the space with grandeur and mechanics, and the tension drains out. Where’s the tension?
The performances do what they can. There are moments where you can feel the actors reaching for something grounded and real, especially in the quieter scenes. When the movie slows down, you get glimpses of what it could have been. A more contained story. A more personal descent into something dark. Those moments are not sustained long enough to matter.
The pace of the film is chaotic, and coming in at over two hours it is hard to wrap one’s brain around it. The tone is another issue.
The film wants to be serious and heavy, but it never fully commits. It moves between grounded horror and larger supernatural spectacle without finding a balance. When it leans into scale, it feels exhausted. When it pulls back, it feels like it is about to find its footing, only to pivot again. That push and pull creates a distance between the audience and the story. Push and pull.
By the time the third act arrives, the film is juggling too many threads. Possession. Ritual transfer. Sacrifice. Control. It becomes a series of actions instead of a buildup of dread. The emotional payoff that should come from a father making a choice, from a family pushed to its limit, does not land the way it should. It feels rushed and over explained at the same time. Constant over-explaining. Mykal would hate that.
That is a difficult combination to recover from.
What stands out the most is the missed opportunity. The decision to move away from the traditional version of the mummy was the wrong one. Turning the monster into a child is absurd. I knew it when I saw the trailer for this feature, I would not like it. A child is the Mummy? I tried to have an open mind, and always give new movies a chance. I want them to be good! To no avail.
The film builds from the outside when it should have been digging deeper, more inside. It adds mythology instead staying on track and sticking with the main story. It explains instead of letting the audience sit with discomfort. In doing so, it loses any edge it may have had.
It is also not particularly frightening. Not scary! There are moments designed to unsettle, but they rarely stick. The film relies more on what is happening than how it feels. The difference matters. Horror works when it lingers. When it leaves something behind after the scene ends. Here, most of it passes quickly. The film is about gross and not horror.
The larger ideas do not fully connect. Themes of grief, family, and control are present, but they feel more like intentions than fully realized elements. They are introduced, but not explored in a way that gives them weight. The film feigns human condition without fully committing to it.
From a broader perspective, it is easy to see why this project exists. There is value in revisiting known properties with a different lens. Universal Monsters are iconic. There is an audience for darker remakes. There is space to do something new with something familiar. But those attempts only work when the execution is precise. This needed to be more disciplined. The film is all over the place.
It needed to pick a lane and stay in it. It decided not to.
As it stands, the film feels like it is caught between versions of itself. One version is a tight, unsettling family horror story. The other is a broader supernatural film loaded with mythology and plot. The final product tries to be both and ends up muddied.
There are pieces here that are entertaining. There are moments where the film almost finds something effective. But they are scattered. They do not build into something cool. They are glimpses of a better film that never fully comes together.
Bottom line. Not good.
There is a stronger movie underneath all of this, but it is buried under too many ideas and not enough focus. When it works, it works in small, quiet ways. When it does not, which is most of the time, it feels bloated and distant.
The film is hollow to say the least. Directed by Lee Cronin, who killed it with his rendition of Evil Dead Rise. The public is liking it once again, see budget and box office numbers above. Sigh. I know we could, can and will do better!
Psycho Scale: 3 out of 10 for both films.Stick with the original, The Mummy!
FROM THE VAULT (1930s–1980s)
Rosemary’s Baby 1968 Rated R – runtime 2h 14m
Rosemary’s Baby was controversial when it was released and today it remains controversial for many more reasons. A classic film that scared audiences before The Exorcist. Excellent acting, camera work and story.
VHS CORNER (Available only on videotape)
The Kindred 1987 Rated R – runtime 1h 32m
I vividly remember this film, and watching it on Beta believe it or not. An 80’s trip into sci-fi horror. I had the poster hanging in my spare room! Worth the time to find!
MUSIC(That collides with film)
Almost Famous 2000
This month’s soundtrack recommendation is 2000’s Almost Famous. 17 tracks on this eclectic album drive this film’s pace and tone!
CLOSING THOUGHT
We refrain from speaking to politics, religion and the strife across the globe. Film has been an incredible connection and enthusiastic distraction, hobby and life pursuit. 2026 is Psycho Studio’s year, and we look forward to sharing thoughts, experiences and the like. We will pull the curtain back and review our progress, our amazing intellectual property (IP) as well as the special journey we are on. We wish everyone a safe and happy year.
END
Mykal and I shared this credo with one another a couple years ago; it was poignant then & surely is today!
Be cool to one another
Please subscribe to our newsletter; back issues available with some great content!
We have thoroughly enjoyed writing this newsletter each month for almost three years! We will continue with our unique voice in a sea of sameness and will do so through 2026 with a newly streamlined format. Less is more!
Mykal and I wish everyone a great May! Be safe and stay psycho! We would love to hear from our audience. Comments, feedback and suggestions are welcome!
Email us at - psychostudios66@gmail.com
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The Sprinkler is dropped on the first of each month.
Mike & Mykal - Psycho Studios Phoenix – 5.1.2026
Thank you, Psychos! Chapter 33