Indiana Jones 5 officially announced

[Psab keel]

 

[Jaitea]

I haven't seen the film, so I can't speak from the perspective of a viewer, but what I've heard about the film is that it's not set up in and of itself to have Helena replace Indy. Like, she doesn't pick up the hat or the whip or whatever. It introduces her character, and maybe someone will make "The Adventures of Helena Shaw" or something, but that's not a "replacement" to Indy per se.

So why the "regrets and failures" angle? Because it doesn't make any sense to have everything be hunky dory and still tell another story. Like, what's the drama? What's the complication? What makes it anything other than a rote, by the numbers, boring formulaic outing with an increasingly aged, increasingly unconvincing-as-an-action-hero star, if you don't also inject that element of melancholy? What exactly is the journey for the character in the film as a character if their life outside of this adventure is all shiny and wonderful? If there's no personal drama, what makes that story compelling, and why would you bother telling it if it isn't compelling?

But the thing is,....that regrets & failures angle sadly doesn't make a compelling instance in this film,....& it's been overused in....everything

Picard, Han, Luke & Leia in the sequel trilogy,..Obi-Wan in the Kenobi tv series, & now Nick Fury in the Secret Invasion series

When 'The Crystal Skull' came out, we caught up with Indy after a bit of a time jump, in that time he had lost his father, his colleague & friend Marcus Brody & his relationship with Marion had obviously failed,...but did we have regrets & failures?...no because we had inventive, creative writers who had respect & love for the characters

Hollywood needs to step up & be more creative

J

 

[Solo4114]

But the thing is,....that regrets & failures angle sadly doesn't make a compelling instance in this film,....& it's been overused in....everything

Picard, Han, Luke & Leia in the sequel trilogy,..Obi-Wan in the Kenobi tv series, & now Nick Fury in the Secret Invasion series

When 'The Crystal Skull' came out, we caught up with Indy after a bit of a time jump, in that time he had lost his father, his colleague & friend Marcus Brody & his relationship with Marion had obviously failed,...but did we have regrets & failures?...no because we had inventive, creative writers who had respect & love for the characters

Hollywood needs to step up & be more creative

J

I mean, yes, I agree, be more creative, but that also basically means "Stop trying to reinvigorate your 30+ year old franchises with new entries featuring the same actors." And...so far Hollywood seems kinda reluctant to do that.

If you go back to that well, though, this is pretty much what's gonna happen. It won't work otherwise. Ford was an incredibly fit 65-year-old when he filmed Crystal Skull. He could pull of Indy in his late 50s/early 60s and still kind of a badass, albeit one who is undoubtedly older.

He's 80 now. He was 79 when he filmed Dial. And again, he looks amazing for his age, but he's still his age. Patrick Stewart is 82. Mark Hamill is a spry 71. Carrie Fisher was 70 when she died.

If you want to tell stories about the characters these actors played, and use these actors in those same roles...yeah, pretty much this is the kind of story you're left with.

Fans say "Be more creative" or "Do it differently," but in truth, what I think fans actually want is something impossible: they want the characters and the actors who play them to exist in stasis. They want MORE but they don't accept that they can't have more unless they also take the passage of time as part of the bargain. And I'll be honest, although lots of people here say "They could just do a more upbeat, fun romp with Indy like they did before," I don't think they'd actually be happy with it. Like I said previously, I think it would still ring false and feel inauthentic if they just did another romp that's no real different from the older stuff. And at the same time, a story that really grapples with the age of these characters is unsettling and unsatisfying.

My message is simple. First, Hollywood should move on from these franchises and instead focus on using them as settings within which to tell stories. The MCU isn't about The Avengers. It's a setting within which to tell stories with superpowered individuals. Star Wars isn't about the Skywalker family. It's a setting within which to tell stories. Indiana Jones...doesn't really work as a "setting," I'd say. You could have a new character exist in some world that is one where Dr. Henry Jones, Jr. also exists and maybe gets a quick reference in passing, but you can't really capitalize on it as a setting. So, either you re-cast Ford's character, or you move on.

Second, audiences need to move on. Hollywood gives audiences what it thinks they want. It doesn't always guess right, but it generally does pretty well, and the only way it gauges how well it did is ticket sales. I think Dial of Destiny is proving that maaaaaybe audiences are starting to move on from the franchises that dominated the 80s and 90s, and maaaaaaybe legacy sequels aren't actually all that easy to make successfully. But time will tell. Dial may just be its own thing, or it may be about a summer where lots of people are tightening their belts and feeling the pinch of other larger economic forces. I don't know, but I guess we'll see what Hollywood decides is "the real reason" in a few months.

 

[pengbuzz]

But the thing is,....that regrets & failures angle sadly doesn't make a compelling instance in this film,....& it's been overused in....everything

Picard, Han, Luke & Leia in the sequel trilogy,..Obi-Wan in the Kenobi tv series, & now Nick Fury in the Secret Invasion series

When 'The Crystal Skull' came out, we caught up with Indy after a bit of a time jump, in that time he had lost his father, his colleague & friend Marcus Brody & his relationship with Marion had obviously failed,...but did we have regrets & failures?...no because we had inventive, creative writers who had respect & love for the characters

Hollywood needs to step up & be more creative

J

Agreed.

A good example of the "regrets and failures" angle is Kirk in Star Trek II; but that was handled appropriately, and Kirk showed vulnerability twice when appropriate. The first time was in front of Carol Marcus when they were alone in the Storage Area for the Genesis Cave inside the planetoid Regula. Kirk admitted how he was feeling to her: old. Worn out. Khan had escaped Ceti Alpha V, stolen a ship and marooned its' crew, murdered people close to Carol, all to get at the Genesis Project and trick Kirk into a trap he laid for him. His ship was heavily damaged, a fellow captain dead, a trusted crewmember (Chekov) compromised and injured badly, and a madman was waiting out there to finish the Enterprise off.

Only to find out his son David hated his guts. That alone would take the starch out of most folks.

The second time was when Spock sacrificed himself to save the ship from Khan's last-gasp effort to use the Genesis Device as an ad-hock doomsday weapon. Kirk got the call from McCoy in Engineering and saw Spock's empty chair, and you could tell his heart had sank. As he ran, he must have been hoping against hope it wasn't him. But his worst fears had been confirmed when he got there, and they literally had to hold him back from rushing into the Dilithium Reaction Room.

The way he sank down against the bulkhead after Spock died... he had just lost his best friend of many years.

That said: on the bridge of the Enterprise and in front of everyone , he was still Admiral Kirk and still in command; he didn't wallow in his mistakes, whine about Khan or his damaged ship, and he certainly didn't act like an entirely different person because of all that. He didn't become a reclusive drunk, coward, hermit or buffoon.

There are ways to handle this kind of thing, and there are ways not to. WoK is the first; DoD is the second.

 

[Cephus]

This isn't some grand "wymynist" conspiracy. It's just trying to expand the appeal of an IP to a broader market. In general terms, I have no issue with more representation in media. That's a good thing. Even when it's done poorly or hamfistedly, I think it ultimately produces good end results in the grander scheme. Probably not the intended good results, but good results nonetheless.

Except, under Kathleen Kennedy, it absolutely is. Here's the reality. Most fans of these franchises don't give a crap about gender. We never have. We loved watching Tomb Raider and playing the games every bit as much as we loved watching Indy. I've never gone into a Tomb Raider game and said "damn, I wish I could play a male character!" I don't care! I love Ripley and Sarah Connor and all of the female action stars that have been out there. Atomic Blonde, even Milla Jovovich in the Resident Alien movies, she was good. Never once have I ever watched a movie and said "I wish I didn't have to watch women!"

The problem are the people who are saying "damn, I hate men!" It's the people who are insisting that the only thing that makes a movie good is the gender (or race or whatever) of the person in the lead. That's the problem. We don't need more representation, we need people to grow up and stop giving a crap.

I also don't think this is a conscious effort to "tear down" anyone. Or at least, to the extent that there is tearing down happening, it's not the corporations or the directors or the writers or even the audiences doing it. Not directly, anyway.

Absolutely they are and in every single movie that Disney owns. They absolutely did that with Luke Skywalker. They absolutely did that with Han Solo and they absolutely did it with Indiana Jones. Did they do that to Princess Leia? Of course not, because she's female. Now some of it might be because Hollywood has forgotten how to write. They don't know how to write new characters that resonates with an audience so they figure if they tear down the old ones, then the audience will have no choice but to like the new ones. It doesn't actually work. All of their female lead characters are obnoxious Mary Sues who don't have to learn anything. They were already perfect! Rey. Captain Marvel. Helena. The list goes on and on. Nowhere do we see them struggle on-screen. They don't have to go on a journey of improvement because women don't have to improve! That would suggest that they weren't perfect all along! Therefore, they turn all the existing characters into pathetic simps, and to be honest, they did the same thing with Poe and Finn, especially so that Rey could shine. She had to be unquestionably the best. Luke, Han and Leia were a team. They depended on each other. The new Disney movies turned into the Rey show. Indy 5 was the Helena show, with Indy just along for the ride. It is absolutely done on purpose. It's sad that some people can't see it.

Time and age do all the "tearing down" necessary. They make it so that actors in their 70s and 80s, even when they're in great shape (and many are) are simply not able to play the same roles they did in their 30s-50s. They just can't do it. Not convincingly, or at least not convincingly in a consistent manner. So, if you can't just act like anywhere from 20-40 years haven't gone by, what can you do? What stories can you tell, if you can't literally do another one just like the other one?

Then guess what? They shouldn't have done it. They probably shouldn't have made Crystal Skull either, but at least Harrison Ford was still capable of being Indiana Jones then, sort of. It was done very badly, which is why most people don't like it, but you might be able to make a case for its existence. There is no reason for Indy 5 to exist at all. If Disney really cared, they could have made it a decade ago, back when they bought Lucasfilm. No, Star Wars, their cash cow, is dead. They killed it doing this crap. Now, they're just looking into the archives for anything that can make them a buck. Willow? They tried that and it failed miserably because they had no clue how to make it without "the message". Now they did the same thing with Indy. It's a dead franchise. Disney has no clue what made any of these properties popular in the first place. They just have an agenda to push and they push it in every single movie that they put out, which is why the entire company is cratering everywhere. Their stocks are at the lowest point since 1974. Their theme park attendance is at the lowest levels in a decade. Disney+ is losing billions a quarter. Every single thing with the Disney name on it dies.

Good riddance to it.

That leaves you with telling stories that embrace and steer into the fact that these actors (and thus, the characters) are older, instead of ignoring it. And that means telling stories about old heroes getting older. And that's hard to do without in some way "diminishing" them from their past glories. Because at the end of the day, any story you tell about them is going to do that if only by invoking the memory of a very clearly bygone past. If they try to do a story that acts like no time has passed, like the old warhorse can still fight just as well as they could back in the day, well, that'll look absurd and it'll just remind us of how artificial this all seems. CGIed, masked stuntmen stepping in for the geriatric star to punch badguys and jump from car to car and whatnot will not look convincing when we cut back to the withered star and try to act like they didn't just throw their back out. The flipside is that if you tell an honest story, one that acknowledges and confronts the obvious age of the actors/characters, then you're diminishing them by directly addressing the fact that they are diminished.

They could have easily done it in a way that was respectful of the Indiana Jones character. Just being old doesn't make you incompetent. Indiana Jones has always been resourceful. He could have figured out a creative way, if he was being handled by anyone who remorely respected the IP. Nobody at Disney does that though. They bought a property and now they want to do whatever they want to with it, expecting that the existing audience is too stupid to know any better.

I think they're figuring out just how wrong they were.

But that's not the fault of the story. That's the fault of time.

Eventually, everyone gets old and dies. Even our heroes. The only way to spare us that is to say "And they lived happily ever after," close the book, and not think about "And then what happened?"

But that's not how you keep making money off of an IP.

There are lots of ways to do it while remaining respectful to the characters and the lore. This is not remotely it. This is more a case of cultural pirates, driving the ship right into the ground because they think they can make a score.

 

[Analyzer]

These two comments kinda highlight the issue I keep bringing up: what the hell else does anyone expect these films to be if not "Our heroes are aged and struggling with it. They've had failures off-screen and now we see the repercussions of that."

It's perhaps less of an issue for Indiana Jones, but certainly for the Star Wars films, you literally cannot tell another story in that series without somehow undoing the victories of the Rebellion in the OT and have the story have any stakes whatsoever. Either it's some nothing, BS minor thing for the characters to deal with, or it's a huge threat and their "happily ever after" ending is undone.

So why the "regrets and failures" angle? Because it doesn't make any sense to have everything be hunky dory and still tell another story. Like, what's the drama? What's the complication? What makes it anything other than a rote, by the numbers, boring formulaic outing with an increasingly aged, increasingly unconvincing-as-an-action-hero star, if you don't also inject that element of melancholy? What exactly is the journey for the character in the film as a character if their life outside of this adventure is all shiny and wonderful? If there's no personal drama, what makes that story compelling, and why would you bother telling it if it isn't compelling?

This is the problem with all of these legacy sequels, especially if you've given your hero a happily-ever-after sendoff in one (or more!) previous entries. Put simply, if you already HAD happily-ever-after than any future story with that character is, by definition, a negation of "happily-ever-after" and becomes "happily-ever-after-except-for-that-time-when..."

I mean, what's the alternate universe version of Dial of Destiny that people expect? Indy is a happily married father and grandfather, tenured at Whatsahoosit University, adored by his students and respected by his peers. Then someone shows up and says "Indy! I've got a line of the Dial of Destiny! We need to go get it!" "The Dial of Destiny?! Why I've been searching for that for 30 years even though I never mentioned it before! Let's go!" Off they go, punchy punchy, car chase, shooty shooty, time-travel shenanigans, badguys defeated, and we're done. "Well, I'm sure glad we stopped those would-be time pirates!" "Me too, Indy! Let's do it again some time!" "Hahahaha!" [freeze frame on them laughing, roll credits]

This is what we want? Some anodyne, by-the-numbers boring romp? This is what people expected to get from James Mangold? Really? I dunno. It just seems to me like once you break the "happily-ever-after" seal and go back to the well, you're just asking for trouble. Either let the heroes have their ending and LEAVE IT ALONE, or be prepared for bummer starting points (at least) and probably a lot of navel gazing and examination of regret and such, the older the actors are.

I guess I should clarify more, it was not so much the aged and struggling hero aspect as it was nearly the same basic storyline as Force Awakens, with the same actor even. It was like they took the Force Awakens script and translated it directly to Indiana Jones

I went into expecting Indy to be much more like his father from the Last Crusade so I was prepared for the "old man" Indy. I actually thought the the parts about them "Force" retiring him from his teaching job and him being a lost relic in the youth and culture of the 60's, but just could have done without the copy/paste Han Solo treatment family wise

 

[Zuiun]

Fans say "Be more creative" or "Do it differently," but in truth, what I think fans actually want is something impossible: they want the characters and the actors who play them to exist in stasis. They want MORE but they don't accept that they can't have more unless they also take the passage of time as part of the bargain. And I'll be honest, although lots of people here say "They could just do a more upbeat, fun romp with Indy like they did before," I don't think they'd actually be happy with it. Like I said previously, I think it would still ring false and feel inauthentic if they just did another romp that's no real different from the older stuff. And at the same time, a story that really grapples with the age of these characters is unsettling and unsatisfying.

THIS. This right here.

One of my biggest concerns going into Crystal Skull was the fact that part of what makes the Indiana Jones character so fun is how much he gets beat up. Even when Crystal Skull was made, Harrison Ford was getting to an age where it just didn't seem as much fun watching him take the abuse. And I think the filmmakers were trying to make it the "upbeat fun romp" like the previous movies. Other than a throw-away "ain't as easy as it used to be" line, Indy is running, jumping, and fighting pretty much just like the prior films. Even if you take out the ridiculous fridge scene, the rest of the film rings false because Indy *isn't* the same as before, and I think on some level viewers recognize it as try-hard.

And Indy not being the same as he was is even more the case now.

Dial of Destiny found some clever ways around this. Having Indy ride a horse was a brilliant way to create a thrilling chase scene that ultimately didn't require Indiana to do more than just hold on. But ultimately, with a character (and actor) of that age, there really isn't much of an option but to make the story more about that than the action.

Also, something stories need is character development.

Raiders had Indy learn to value a person (Marion) over the treasure.

Temple had Indy give up fortune and glory to be more altruistic.

Crusade gives Indy a reconciliation with his father and to learn that it's ok to let the treasure go.

Crystal Skull had much less of an arc than the prior films, with the only real "change" Indy had to go through was coming to terms with having a son, which other than a joke about staying in school, really doesn't seem to come off as all that much of a challenge to his character. Along side of the film's other problems, this could be part of the reason it doesn't resonate with fans. It was an attempt to keep Indy the same, to give the same ol' adventure, which is what they thought the fans wanted... and so did the fans. Except it doesn't work.

Indiana Jones required a character arc for Dial of Destiny. And like you mentioned in your post, characters of a certain age who are known for action, have a pretty limited range of possible interesting story arcs. Beginning the film with Indy on top of the world as he was at the end of Crystal Skull would have given him nowhere to go -- unless all of his happiness was ripped away from him on screen (which I don't think fans would have appreciated).

Just because the "old embittered gunslinger comes out of retirement for one last adventure" is a trope, doesn't mean it can't be told well. Clint Eastwood's The Unforgiven is an excellent example (and it seems clear was an inspiration for Dial of Destiny). I don't think Dial of Destiny is the best retelling of this trope, but I don't think it's the worst, either. And I also don't know what other story you could tell with an 80-year old character that would be believable.

And Indy's character arc for the film is to learn to accept his failures and grief and not give up on life.

 

[Jaitea]

And Indy's character arc for the film is to learn to accept his failures and grief and not give up on life.

Except, he does give up on life, he wants to die at the end of the film but receives a knock out punch to the face by an unlikeable character & forces him not to give up on life

J

 

[Solo4114]

I guess I should clarify more, it was not so much the aged and struggling hero aspect as it was nearly the same basic storyline as Force Awakens, with the same actor even. It was like they took the Force Awakens script and translated it directly to Indiana Jones

I went into expecting Indy to be much more like his father from the Last Crusade so I was prepared for the "old man" Indy. I actually thought the the parts about them "Force" retiring him from his teaching job and him being a lost relic in the youth and culture of the 60's, but just could have done without the copy/paste Han Solo treatment family wise

Ah, having not seen the film, I can't really speak to that. But I can see how it'd feel like a retread. Still, I'm not sure what else you do with characters like this at this stage of their lives and still have the story have stakes and an emotional journey for the character. And I'm not sure folks would be happy with NOT having an emotional journey for the character, and him (or rather CGI-ed stuntmen) just go through the motions one more time.

THIS. This right here.

One of my biggest concerns going into Crystal Skull was the fact that part of what makes the Indiana Jones character so fun is how much he gets beat up. Even when Crystal Skull was made, Harrison Ford was getting to an age where it just didn't seem as much fun watching him take the abuse. And I think the filmmakers were trying to make it the "upbeat fun romp" like the previous movies. Other than a throw-away "ain't as easy as it used to be" line, Indy is running, jumping, and fighting pretty much just like the prior films. Even if you take out the ridiculous fridge scene, the rest of the film rings false because Indy *isn't* the same as before, and I think on some level viewers recognize it as try-hard.

And Indy not being the same as he was is even more the case now.

Dial of Destiny found some clever ways around this. Having Indy ride a horse was a brilliant way to create a thrilling chase scene that ultimately didn't require Indiana to do more than just hold on. But ultimately, with a character (and actor) of that age, there really isn't much of an option but to make the story more about that than the action.

Also, something stories need is character development.

Raiders had Indy learn to value a person (Marion) over the treasure.

Temple had Indy give up fortune and glory to be more altruistic.

Crusade gives Indy a reconciliation with his father and to learn that it's ok to let the treasure go.

Crystal Skull had much less of an arc than the prior films, with the only real "change" Indy had to go through was coming to terms with having a son, which other than a joke about staying in school, really doesn't seem to come off as all that much of a challenge to his character. Along side of the film's other problems, this could be part of the reason it doesn't resonate with fans. It was an attempt to keep Indy the same, to give the same ol' adventure, which is what they thought the fans wanted... and so did the fans. Except it doesn't work.

Indiana Jones required a character arc for Dial of Destiny. And like you mentioned in your post, characters of a certain age who are known for action, have a pretty limited range of possible interesting story arcs. Beginning the film with Indy on top of the world as he was at the end of Crystal Skull would have given him nowhere to go -- unless all of his happiness was ripped away from him on screen (which I don't think fans would have appreciated).

Just because the "old embittered gunslinger comes out of retirement for one last adventure" is a trope, doesn't mean it can't be told well. Clint Eastwood's The Unforgiven is an excellent example (and it seems clear was an inspiration for Dial of Destiny). I don't think Dial of Destiny is the best retelling of this trope, but I don't think it's the worst, either. And I also don't know what other story you could tell with an 80-year old character that would be believable.

And Indy's character arc for the film is to learn to accept his failures and grief and not give up on life.

YES! Exactly! I mean, again, I can't speak to what's in the film in any detail. But I can say that if you're gonna stick an 80-something character into this situation, there's a core issue of "Where do they go? What are the stakes? What emotional journey do they take?"

One way or another, you're gonna bump up against the fact that for God's sake, he's 80 years old! There's just no way around it. And at that point...I think that's where you lose a bunch of fans.

And to be clear, that is totally understandable. I was very, very reluctant to see the Star Wars sequels when they were in development, mostly because I was (at least initially) uncomfortable with the idea of watching my childhood heroes die on screen, and I just friggin' KNEW they were gonna kill at least one of them (Surprise! They killed 3.). Like, it was just bound to happen. I ended up not being as bothered by it as I'd expected to be, but those films had other problems. Less said there the better.

I skipped Crystal Skull because I assumed it'd have Lucas' prequel style make it too ham fisted. I gather it's better than that, but still not great, and to this day I've just ignored it altogether. (It's the "free coaster" in my blu-ray set.) I skipped this film because initially I thought it was just pointless and would be incredibly hard to sell geriatric Ford as an ass-kicker, and then I was cautiously interested when Mangold came on board, and then I read enough negative reviews about issues I figured would bother me that I decided "Nah. I'm good with the original three."

All that said, I can accept why these stories keep playing out this way. There's only so much you can do in these kinds of franchises with these kinds of characters, and one of the main stories you do with someone who is approaching the end of their life is have them really come to grips with their own mortality, how to find meaning in their life, how to let go of the regrets they've accumulated over the years, you know the kind of stuff everyone does at the end of their life. While that can be done well, it's also just...not really something I'm interested in seeing with this character. Like, by the same token, I'm not really interested in seeing a Captain America movie about old Steve Rogers grappling with the loneliness of missing his wife Peggy. Hell, I'm not even really on board with some multiversaltimetravelmumbojumbo movie that somehow gives Chris Evans back the shield. He did his bit, and I'm fine with moving on.

I guess in the last 20 years, I've become more sanguine with, if not necessarily moving on from every setting I love, at least moving on from every character I loved, OR just being happy with what I've got. I don't need more just for the sake of having more, especially if having more means that I have to also take the bitter with the sweet in a way that I'm not really interested in doing.

At the same time, I accept that IF we are going to keep trying to squeeze more content out of these properties, we have to expect that it will play out this way again and again, assuming people insist upon bringing back actors in their 70s and 80s to do live action versions of the roles they played 30+ years ago.

 

[Zuiun]

And to be clear, that is totally understandable. I was very, very reluctant to see the Star Wars sequels when they were in development, mostly because I was (at least initially) uncomfortable with the idea of watching my childhood heroes die on screen, and I just friggin' KNEW they were gonna kill at least one of them (Surprise! They killed 3.). Like, it was just bound to happen. I ended up not being as bothered by it as I'd expected to be, but those films had other problems. Less said there the better.

I've been thinking a lot about this and I think the real issue for a lot of people is the time gap.

From when the original films came out to now, we have all grown. But even so, the films remain rooted in our minds. We, the audience, may have matured, but our nostalgia has not. It really can't. That's kind of what nostalgia is.

Let's look at a different franchise... It involves a character who has aged. He has retired from saving the world. He went from setting aside everything else to protect the world to being perfectly fine with the way things are as long as he can remain happy and retired. He reluctantly joins the fight... and ultimately dies. And we are FINE with that. In point of fact, his sacrifice is the fist pumping celebratory climax of the movie.

I'm talking, of course, about Tony Stark in Avengers Endgame.

But here's the difference: As an audience, we got to watch and grow with the character. Tony started out as a selfish, brash, arrogant billionaire who decided to make it his personal mission to save the Earth, personal relationships be damned. He ended as a family man who wasn't willing to fight unless the safety of his family could be guaranteed. And we went on that journey with him. We matured with him.

I feel like if they had made the Iron Man trilogy in the 90's with RDJ, then had a 15 year gap and tried to come back with the older family man Tony Stark in Endgame, audiences might very well have been fighting their nostalgia just like they do with Luke Skywalker or Indiana Jones, and would have had a hard time reconciling their childhood hero not wanting to join in the fight, even though it's a totally realistic arc for an aging character.

 

[batguy]

At the same time, I accept that IF we are going to keep trying to squeeze more content out of these properties, we have to expect that it will play out this way again and again, assuming people insist upon bringing back actors in their 70s and 80s to do live action versions of the roles they played 30+ years ago.

As for the old heroes' disappointing physical declines for action roles? Yes, that is unavoidable.

The disappointing life outcomes that they keep having? No. That is not unavoidable. It's a creative path that the producers of these franchises are choosing for commercial reasons.


It's easy & tempting to go that route for two big reasons:

#1, it's Scriptwriting 101. Give your characters a struggle that demands character growth. Therefore, they need to start off in a bad place.
#2, it makes it easy to use the old characters to elevate the new ones the studios are trying to sell.

But the problem is, Scriptwriting 101 doesn't deal with how to continue existing franchises with beloved old characters. That's more like a 400-level issue and Hollywood has been a very slow learner lately. The audience has an additional set of demands when it comes to beloved past heroes. You can't just write them the same way you would write an old gray-haired former badass that the audience has never met before.

 

[Cephus]

The problem is, most writers in Hollywood are at the Scriptwriting 101 stage. We know that the vast majority of writers in the WGA are at the lowest rung of the ladder and I figure that's because a ton of people signed up for the WGA right around the pandemic, when it looked like tons of new streaming services were going to spring up and they'd need tons of writers. That didn't turn out to be the case. It's why half of the strike is about keeping their wealth of writers busy and well-paid, because the WGA benefits from having a ton of people paying dues.

The simple fact is, there is far more supply than demand and you can't legislate that away with a contract. A lot of these people need to go find something else to do, especially given the fact that what they have been writing has been so terrible to begin with. The people responsible for most of the shows on streaming are not the ones who have been around for years honing their craft. Instead, we have people who had unrealistic expectations and figured writing scripts for Hollywood would make them rich forever.

That is not how reality works. You actually have to earn the bigger paying jobs. Of course, nobody wants to have to earn anything these days, do they?

 

[batguy]

I blame the producers more than the actual writers.

A writer is not the one who decides to kill an old hero character or make the new one a Mary Sue. The writer will be taking orders from producers on broader issues like that.

Most of Hollywood's elders did their creative learning in the last century. Like, before everything was a reboot/sequel/prequel. They still see movies as more standalone pieces of work. They are way behind on understanding the implications of movies becoming extended series shows. You can't release a movie that frustrates fans without affecting sales of the next one a few years later. You can't get away with creative choices that serve the current movie if they screw up the larger series. Etc.

 

[Jaitea]

Fellow Ulsterman Despot of Antrim

J

 

[Joek3rr]

Agreed.

A good example of the "regrets and failures" angle is Kirk in Star Trek II; but that was handled appropriately, and Kirk showed vulnerability twice when appropriate. The first time was in front of Carol Marcus when they were alone in the Storage Area for the Genesis Cave inside the planetoid Regula. Kirk admitted how he was feeling to her: old. Worn out. Khan had escaped Ceti Alpha V, stolen a ship and marooned its' crew, murdered people close to Carol, all to get at the Genesis Project and trick Kirk into a trap he laid for him. His ship was heavily damaged, a fellow captain dead, a trusted crewmember (Chekov) compromised and injured badly, and a madman was waiting out there to finish the Enterprise off.

Only to find out his son David hated his guts. That alone would take the starch out of most folks.

The second time was when Spock sacrificed himself to save the ship from Khan's last-gasp effort to use the Genesis Device as an ad-hock doomsday weapon. Kirk got the call from McCoy in Engineering and saw Spock's empty chair, and you could tell his heart had sank. As he ran, he must have been hoping against hope it wasn't him. But his worst fears had been confirmed when he got there, and they literally had to hold him back from rushing into the Dilithium Reaction Room.

The way he sank down against the bulkhead after Spock died... he had just lost his best friend of many years.

That said: on the bridge of the Enterprise and in front of everyone , he was still Admiral Kirk and still in command; he didn't wallow in his mistakes, whine about Khan or his damaged ship, and he certainly didn't act like an entirely different person because of all that. He didn't become a reclusive drunk, coward, hermit or buffoon.

There are ways to handle this kind of thing, and there are ways not to. WoK is the first; DoD is the second.

Last year I went through all the Star Trek films again. And that was one of the things that really jumped out at me this time. How really amazingly those original films handled the aging of the heroes. Even The Final Frontier, has very powerful moments. And The Undiscovered Country is a near the perfect send off.

 

[Cephus]

Last year I went through all the Star Trek films again. And that was one of the things that really jumped out at me this time. How really amazingly those original films handled the aging of the heroes. Even The Final Frontier, has very powerful moments. And The Undiscovered Country is a near the perfect send off.

It's because they respected the characters and their legacy. Today, they don't. All of the Star Trek shows are garbage, making fun of everything that's come before.

 

[ZeroSum]

So anyway...

I liked it. It entertained me. It wasn't as good as the original trilogy (where it should've ended) but it wasn't as bad as KotCS. I suppose what little I saw of KotSC had already ruined the character for me and my expectations were very low for DoD. I didn't feel ripped off... I deliberately went on Cheap Tuesday

 

[HeartBlade]

I mean, yes, I agree, be more creative, but that also basically means "Stop trying to reinvigorate your 30+ year old franchises with new entries featuring the same actors." And...so far Hollywood seems kinda reluctant to do that.

If you go back to that well, though, this is pretty much what's gonna happen. It won't work otherwise. Ford was an incredibly fit 65-year-old when he filmed Crystal Skull. He could pull of Indy in his late 50s/early 60s and still kind of a badass, albeit one who is undoubtedly older.

He's 80 now. He was 79 when he filmed Dial. And again, he looks amazing for his age, but he's still his age. Patrick Stewart is 82. Mark Hamill is a spry 71. Carrie Fisher was 70 when she died.

If you want to tell stories about the characters these actors played, and use these actors in those same roles...yeah, pretty much this is the kind of story you're left with.

Fans say "Be more creative" or "Do it differently," but in truth, what I think fans actually want is something impossible: they want the characters and the actors who play them to exist in stasis. They want MORE but they don't accept that they can't have more unless they also take the passage of time as part of the bargain. And I'll be honest, although lots of people here say "They could just do a more upbeat, fun romp with Indy like they did before," I don't think they'd actually be happy with it. Like I said previously, I think it would still ring false and feel inauthentic if they just did another romp that's no real different from the older stuff. And at the same time, a story that really grapples with the age of these characters is unsettling and unsatisfying.

My message is simple. First, Hollywood should move on from these franchises and instead focus on using them as settings within which to tell stories. The MCU isn't about The Avengers. It's a setting within which to tell stories with superpowered individuals. Star Wars isn't about the Skywalker family. It's a setting within which to tell stories. Indiana Jones...doesn't really work as a "setting," I'd say. You could have a new character exist in some world that is one where Dr. Henry Jones, Jr. also exists and maybe gets a quick reference in passing, but you can't really capitalize on it as a setting. So, either you re-cast Ford's character, or you move on.

Second, audiences need to move on. Hollywood gives audiences what it thinks they want. It doesn't always guess right, but it generally does pretty well, and the only way it gauges how well it did is ticket sales. I think Dial of Destiny is proving that maaaaaybe audiences are starting to move on from the franchises that dominated the 80s and 90s, and maaaaaaybe legacy sequels aren't actually all that easy to make successfully. But time will tell. Dial may just be its own thing, or it may be about a summer where lots of people are tightening their belts and feeling the pinch of other larger economic forces. I don't know, but I guess we'll see what Hollywood decides is "the real reason" in a few months.

The setting argument really doesnt work as an IP though since its more effective to just make a new one.

A Song of Ice and Fire was essentially inspired by the Middle Earth “setting” and Medieval England (war of the roses era) but has nothing to do with LotR.

Marvel’s setting is basically New York, the most dangeroud place in the world and I wonder why anyone would live there when there are far better cities to live in without fear of getting caught up in a superhero brawl. The Boys essentially gets inspiration from Marvel and DC heroes but is unrelated by IP.

Star Wars has been emphasized as a “family soap drama” by Lucas himself so removing the family aspect is a big deal. In terms of setting, many IPs have taken inspiration like Mass Effect but arnt Star Wars.

Settings can be used to inspire and make new IPs that dont need to be tied down by the “lore” of the original IP.

Also, sure people may not always know what they want but its different from basically going back to beat a dead horse. I love the Indy films but dont think any were necessary after last Crusade because the story ended perfectly there. There were no more stories to tell unless you wanted to “fill in” gaps with entries like between Temple and Raiders. Same with Star Wars and Lord of the Rings. Do we really want Lord of the Rings 4, the second ring that Sauron made in secret that must also be destroyed in Mt Doom? Or back to the Future 4?

I really felt this was an unnecessary movie that didnt need to be made, especially since Crystal Skull already showed that there wasnt a demand for movies like this the first time.

This is going to be unpopular but if anything, I think Disney should have taken a big risk and made the movie focus on Helen, marketing it as a new IP. Have her be the main character and start the film with her selling a fake artifact for cash on the black market, then escaping to show her competence. She gets caught by the US government who demand she obtain this artifact, the dial, or get life in prison for selling priceless artifacts so she agrees.

Helen solo adventure for a while learning about the artifact, sees the Nazi team trying to get it so they are in a race to find the dial. Unfortunately, both are pretty incompetent so after both coming to a dead end, Helen says she is going to an expert for advice. She stops by Marshall college and who do we see but Indy, now old but still giving a lecture to students (who are paying attention because this is college, not high school). She asks Indy for advice, he gets all excited and helps solve her problem and figure out the location. Maybe a fun scene where a bad guy attacks and while she fights them off and is about to get killed, Indy shoots him. He says he’ll handle it and Helen continues on her journey to get the dial.

Indy is there in a short scene to pay homage to the character and essentially tie Helen into the Indy universe while already working on making her her own character. With this, we can skip deconstructing Indy and giving him a miserable life (Im no fan of Mutt but killing him off and divorce with Marion isnt something I wanted to see). Helen is already a different character to Indy in her approach to artifact collecting so would be a new character for audiences to latch on to. The story beats can be similar to Indy but with a different protagonist with different reactions to the mystical events that occur.

Also think Helen/Indy should never have gone back in time in this movie. I think one aspect of Indy is while Indy finds the artifacts and sees the results of their power, he never experiences them first hand. He never sees whats in the ark in Raiders, really use the stones to ward evil, get healed rapidly from drinking from the grail, or gain knowledge from the alien skull. Indy is a third party witness to the artifacts but doesnt experience or use their full power directly. Dial changes this by having him go back in time when I feel it would be more Indy to let the Nazis go back. Maybe they go back and get stuck in time or actually get back to WW2 but get shot by fellow Nazis before being able to inform Hitler and actually change things (or actually get killed by younger Indy in a scene from Crusade or Raiders as a background casualty).

It seemed clear that Disney wanted to make a spinoff series with Helen as the lead. Instead of pussyfooting and bringing back Indy, why not just make the Helen movie and see if there is demand for a “female archeologist adventurer”?

 

[Solo4114]

Last year I went through all the Star Trek films again. And that was one of the things that really jumped out at me this time. How really amazingly those original films handled the aging of the heroes. Even The Final Frontier, has very powerful moments. And The Undiscovered Country is a near the perfect send off.

You know, I used to really kinda dislike Generations. But the more I think about it, the better and more important of a story I think it really is. There are some strong parallels applicable to some of these discussions.

The setting argument really doesnt work as an IP though since its more effective to just make a new one.

A Song of Ice and Fire was essentially inspired by the Middle Earth “setting” and Medieval England (war of the roses era) but has nothing to do with LotR.

Marvel’s setting is basically New York, the most dangeroud place in the world and I wonder why anyone would live there when there are far better cities to live in without fear of getting caught up in a superhero brawl. The Boys essentially gets inspiration from Marvel and DC heroes but is unrelated by IP.

Star Wars has been emphasized as a “family soap drama” by Lucas himself so removing the family aspect is a big deal. In terms of setting, many IPs have taken inspiration like Mass Effect but arnt Star Wars.

Well, what I'm saying is that if what you want is "more Star Wars," the way to do that is to move it away from the Skywalker family drama and shift towards the universe being a backdrop. I'm a big fan of West End Games' development of Star Wars as a setting in that regard. It's a fantastic universe within which to tell all kinds of stories. It's rich in lore and ideas and such, but there's a lot of blank spots on the map you can fill in, so to speak, if you want. In that sense, if what you want is an IP where you can have ongoing connective tissue between otherwise unrelated stories, it's great!

The flipside is, if what you want is more Skywalker stories, then, no. That story is done. It was done with the PT and OT. The PT began the story, the OT ended it. Period. "What happened afterwards, though?" They lived happily ever after. They grew old and died. Nothing. The story's over and now it's bedtime. Go to sleep.

So, if your perspective is "Star Wars is and only should be Skywalker stories," then yeah, I agree with you that it's time to move on to creating new IPs. I'm just of the opinion that Star Wars is and should be more than just Skywalker stories. I don't really care what Lucas said. It's a great backdrop, and there's no reason not to tell other stories in that setting if you want to.

Also, sure people may not always know what they want but its different from basically going back to beat a dead horse. I love the Indy films but dont think any were necessary after last Crusade because the story ended perfectly there. There were no more stories to tell unless you wanted to “fill in” gaps with entries like between Temple and Raiders. Same with Star Wars and Lord of the Rings. Do we really want Lord of the Rings 4, the second ring that Sauron made in secret that must also be destroyed in Mt Doom? Or back to the Future 4?

I really felt this was an unnecessary movie that didnt need to be made, especially since Crystal Skull already showed that there wasnt a demand for movies like this the first time.

Ah, here we absolutely agree. Kinda. I totally agree that Indy's story ended with Last Crusade. They literally ride off into the sunset. There's no reason to tell more stories there unless, I dunno, you wanna do a computer game series or animated series about Indy's time working for the OSS during WWII or somesuch, or his life in the years after WWI and what we saw on screen. But the point after Last Crusade? Nah. Story's done. IF you are going to tell stories after that, well...they're gonna look a lot like what we've gotten so far. Which I think only highlights the argument for "Yeah, maybe just let this one lie."

I felt the same with respect to the OT characters in Star Wars. When Disney announced the sequel trilogy, I thought "This is a bad idea. These actors are too old to do this anymore, and they're gonna have to undo what they accomplished to have any story to tell. And I'm worried they're just gonna recycle the old one." And sure enough, they basically did. There's a lot of aspects I like about the ST. The young cast is great, I like a bunch of the messages in TLJ. The action sequences are undeniably entertaining, in most cases. And while I think he's not a great storyteller, JJ is absolutely an amazing roller coaster engineer. But yeah, I think the smarter move would've been to tell stories much farther in the future, with characters who aren't biologically related to any of the old ones, and reference old characters in holocron or video recordings or whatever.

This is going to be unpopular but if anything, I think Disney should have taken a big risk and made the movie focus on Helen, marketing it as a new IP. Have her be the main character and start the film with her selling a fake artifact for cash on the black market, then escaping to show her competence. She gets caught by the US government who demand she obtain this artifact, the dial, or get life in prison for selling priceless artifacts so she agrees.

Helen solo adventure for a while learning about the artifact, sees the Nazi team trying to get it so they are in a race to find the dial. Unfortunately, both are pretty incompetent so after both coming to a dead end, Helen says she is going to an expert for advice. She stops by Marshall college and who do we see but Indy, now old but still giving a lecture to students (who are paying attention because this is college, not high school). She asks Indy for advice, he gets all excited and helps solve her problem and figure out the location. Maybe a fun scene where a bad guy attacks and while she fights them off and is about to get killed, Indy shoots him. He says he’ll handle it and Helen continues on her journey to get the dial.

Indy is there in a short scene to pay homage to the character and essentially tie Helen into the Indy universe while already working on making her her own character. With this, we can skip deconstructing Indy and giving him a miserable life (Im no fan of Mutt but killing him off and divorce with Marion isnt something I wanted to see). Helen is already a different character to Indy in her approach to artifact collecting so would be a new character for audiences to latch on to. The story beats can be similar to Indy but with a different protagonist with different reactions to the mystical events that occur.

Also think Helen/Indy should never have gone back in time in this movie. I think one aspect of Indy is while Indy finds the artifacts and sees the results of their power, he never experiences them first hand. He never sees whats in the ark in Raiders, really use the stones to ward evil, get healed rapidly from drinking from the grail, or gain knowledge from the alien skull. Indy is a third party witness to the artifacts but doesnt experience or use their full power directly. Dial changes this by having him go back in time when I feel it would be more Indy to let the Nazis go back. Maybe they go back and get stuck in time or actually get back to WW2 but get shot by fellow Nazis before being able to inform Hitler and actually change things (or actually get killed by younger Indy in a scene from Crusade or Raiders as a background casualty).

It seemed clear that Disney wanted to make a spinoff series with Helen as the lead. Instead of pussyfooting and bringing back Indy, why not just make the Helen movie and see if there is demand for a “female archeologist adventurer”?

That's basically the "Setting" thing, though. That's what I'm talking about when I say "setting." It's the same world/universe, but it's focused on different characters and different situations. To the extent that there's connective tissue between the old stories and the new, it's either a limited interaction like what you describe above with the characters, or it's literally just "We exist in the same world, so events that happened here can have an impact there." You can say "it's a new IP," but the way I see it, it isn't. It's a new focus on a new character, but they exist within the same shared universe as the old character. We just aren't really dealing with the old character much.

 

[The Terminator]

Except, under Kathleen Kennedy, it absolutely is. Here's the reality. Most fans of these franchises don't give a crap about gender. We never have. We loved watching Tomb Raider and playing the games every bit as much as we loved watching Indy. I've never gone into a Tomb Raider game and said "damn, I wish I could play a male character!" I don't care! I love Ripley and Sarah Connor and all of the female action stars that have been out there. Atomic Blonde, even Milla Jovovich in the Resident Alien movies, she was good. Never once have I ever watched a movie and said "I wish I didn't have to watch women!"

The problem are the people who are saying "damn, I hate men!" It's the people who are insisting that the only thing that makes a movie good is the gender (or race or whatever) of the person in the lead. That's the problem. We don't need more representation, we need people to grow up and stop giving a crap.

Yeah, if a person's issue is the gender of a character, then that is very sexist. As is a simple gender swap.
For me personally, when I started playing the original Mass Effect game back in 2007(right after my 3rd 360 died, and had to wait two weeks for a replacement FU M$), I started the game with a default male Shepard. Two or three hours into the game I couldn't stand the voice actor any longer. Played the rest of the games with the same "FemShep", fantastic voice actor Jennifer Hale.

Scratch this: "We don't need more representation", instead we need quality representation! Less forced representation. Better writing, new quality characters and not just gender/race swaps. Too shallow, too racist.