Homages to other monster films

Anyone else catching nods to other films in the Universal Monster pantheon?

For instance, the featurette shows Ahmanet in chains within the Prodigium facility. Naturally she escapes at some point. This immediately calls to mind The Bride of Frankenstein, in which the Frankenstein Monster was captured and chained up but eventually escaped as well.

Ahmanet seems to reach Europe via military aircraft, as we see in the trailer, but the plane crashes and aside from Jenny Halsey escaping by parachute, everyone on the plane dies...except for Nick Morton (Tom Cruise), thanks to a curse. This calls to mind the original Dracula in which the titular Count reaches England by sea, with everyone else on board dead except for Renfield.

With Nick Morton being cursed by Ahmanet, there is the possibility that he might become a mummy himself by the end. There are several undead medieval crusaders in the film. In one interview, director Alex Kurtzman mentioned crusaders sacking Egypt and bringing the plunder back to Europe. I'm guessing that not only were these crusaders cursed after what they did, but Nick Morton was affected with the same curse, hence why he rose from the dead after the plane crash. If in fact he is becoming a mummy himself, this puts him in a position somewhat similar to Larry Talbot, as a doomed protagonist desperate to fight a curse beyond his control who eventually succumbs to it and transforms into a monster. It must be noted however that this is just speculation based on what seem to be clues scattered through various interviews, the trailer, and the featurette.







Warning! The Monster is loose!