Jonathan the Mummy: Jonathan Carnahan and Actor John Hannah

Jonathan Carnahan is the brother of the librarian Evelyn Carnahan, and his recklessness sets the first film in motion. He is played by John Hannah, who is billed third in the mummy 1999, behind Brendan Fraser as Rick O'Connell and Rachel Weisz as Evelyn. The film was directed by Stephen Sommers and released in the US on May 7, 1999.

In that first film Jonathan gets hold of a puzzle box that points to the lost city of Hamunaptra, and Evelyn follows the clue. He is the reason the group heads into the desert at all. The credits give his name as Jonathan Carnahan in all three of his films.

He is a regular in the main saga, but he is not in every film on the hub. He does not appear in the scorpion king, the 2002 spin-off set thousands of years earlier, and he has no place in The Mummy (1932) or The Mummy (2017). If you are weighing up the mummy characters by screen time, he sits in the second tier behind rick oconnell and evelyn the mummy.

Jonathan's closest bond is with his sister Evelyn, and through her he becomes part of the O'Connell family. In the first film the two search for Hamunaptra together, and by the second film Evelyn has married Rick. That makes Jonathan the uncle of Alex, the boy who puts on the golden bracelet linked to the Scorpion King. See alex o'connell the mummy for how that thread develops.

His dealings with Rick are the lighter half of the ensemble. Rick is the soldier of fortune whom the Carnahans free from a Cairo prison, and Jonathan is the relative whose find leads the group toward the next dig. Ardeth Bay is a more serious ally, a Medjai who has spent his life guarding against Imhotep's return and who fights beside the family in the first two films. Izzy, the pilot with the airship, is another friend in the second film.

On the other side, Jonathan's rivals in the first film are Beni Gabor and the American treasure hunters, and the film's main threat is imhotep mummy, who needs Evelyn as a sacrifice to bring Anck-su-namun back. For the full list of antagonists across the saga, see the mummy villains.

In my opinion, Jonathan's most important moment is the one that starts everything: the puzzle box in The Mummy (1999). Without it there is no trip to Hamunaptra, no golden book and no Imhotep. Not many supporting characters in a franchise carry that much plot weight in their first scene, and it explains why the saga needs him even when he is not the one fighting the mummy.

His second-best moment, perhaps, is helping Alex use the Book of the Dead to bring Evelyn back in The Mummy Returns (2001). It is a rare occasion where the comic relief is trusted with the emotional job, and the film lets him carry it. It also sets him apart from Rick, who ends the Scorpion King with a spear while Jonathan and a child solve their scene with a book.

The third is the Peru ending of The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor (2008), when he leaves with the Eye of Shangri-La and the film hints at another mummy to find. It could be argued that this is the most useful moment for the future, because it gives any later film a reason to bring him back. If you are new to the saga, start with the mummy movies in order and let Jonathan's three films come to you in sequence, or see who plays alongside him on the the mummy cast page.