Indiana Jones 5 officially announced

They need to let it die with Ford. No new actor taking over. Focus on something new…. A new hero and story line set in the Indiana Jones universe would be fine, just not Indy’s story anymore. Maybe the young adventures of Jock Lindsey, Indy’s pilot. Cast a young upcoming actor and write adventure stories around him. And with Disney already having the Jock Lindsey Hanger Bar restaurant in Disney Springs, they already have a head start on building his franchise and backstory.
 
They need to let it die with Ford. No new actor taking over. Focus on something new…. A new hero and story line set in the Indiana Jones universe would be fine, just not Indy’s story anymore. Maybe the young adventures of Jock Lindsey, Indy’s pilot. Cast a young upcoming actor and write adventure stories around him. And with Disney already having the Jock Lindsey Hanger Bar restaurant in Disney Springs, they already have a head start on building his franchise and backstory.
It doesn't even need to be the Indy universe, specifically.

Indy is, himself, an homage to Republic serial heroes of yesteryear. He was an original character created to provide a modern take on the vibe of the old stuff that Spielberg and Lucas loved. You could do the same with Indy. You could take it in different directions. You could go crazy with interconnected lore. You could set it during the 1900s-1950s and have it deal with Cthulhu or whatever. There's a gazillion possibilities that riff on the same theme of fragile, but heroic humans bravely navigating the physical threats of ancient cultures' temples/tombs/ruins, the menace of their fellow humans, and who are ultimately proven out of their depth in the face of the supernatural.

It's worth remembering that every encounter with the supernatural for Indy ends pretty much the same way: "Oh S***T, we really can't handle this. Better leave it alone." The Ark literally melts people's faces off (granted, Nazis, but still). The Sankara stones give you the power to rip people's hearts out and Indy just gives it back to the village and leaves. The Grail tests literally wither a man to dust, and Indy wisely leaves it in the temple. I'm told in a 4th film, aliens...uh...take their s**t and leave after Indy shows up.

But again, the consistent theme is that this stuff, the supernatural, is ultimately beyond Indy's capacity to deal with, and is beyond most of humanity's capacity to deal with except perhaps those who treat the artifacts with due reverence. You could work with those same themes.

Oooor you could do an entire series about "S Branch," the paranormal, supernatural, and occult branch of Allied military intelligence during WWII. Do, like, a series of movies about trying to stop the Nazis from nabbing occult items that would power their armies or whatever. I mean, the scripts basically write themselves for this stuff. If this were props, it's like building custom Star Wars blasters: we've got the basic blueprint and the core concept. All you need to do is add the greeblies.


To be clear, I love Indiana Jones films. Love 'em. (Well, the first three. I skipped 4.) I even dig the Young Indy chronicles. I just...don't see a need to keep telling Indiana Jones stories specifically at this point. It's not the kind of universe that can or should run indefinitely.
 
I can't get past Chris Pratt as the semi-homeless guy I knew on Maui, driving an old beat up VW Van, then working at Bubba Gumps.
 
I think a good movie can be made just with about anything given the story but...Jock? A whole "Indy" movie about Jock? That pilot we saw at the beginning of Raiders? Boy, I bet audiences are gonna love knowing how he got his snake. Aren't we grabbing at straws now? What's next, a prequel to Raiders about one of the diggers? Without Indy, who's there else that anyone really cares enough about to even bother making movies on? Sallah? Marion? Marcus? No. Indy does not lend to a "universe."

I love the Indy films but, let's face it, it really doesn't lend itself to continuation. I love ToD and LC, but even people have contentions with them. Hell, there were even moments in Crystal Skull I liked but everyone hated that. There's really no winning at this point with Indy. Anything in the vein of an Indy film would be considered "Indy-Lites" and have people pining for Ford again, but then a "real" Indy film gets made and it's just not the same.

In fact, it hasn't been the same nor will it ever be the same again. That time is done. It's okay to let it go.
 
I too think the Indy franchise should be put to rest.

The only viable plots that I enjoy are the supernatural and they already tackled the good ones that are Biblical in nature. The whole Inter-dimentional Being thing just didn't work for me. Interesting concept but a hard one to swallow.

I don't want to watch "Indiana Jones and The X-Files" or an "Indiana Jones Bond Film".

I've tried reading some of the IJ novels over the years and their plots always fall short. It's the same reason I never got into the Young Indiana Jones series. Blah.
 
Here's the way I think it could go, and be successful.

You have a college professor, who goes on adventures. He took Mutt with him once; maybe this time another student goes along (or several for a "big" adventure) and unfortunately Indy buys it. Then the student(s) moves the franchise forward.

Sort of how we all thought that Mutt was going to carry the torch; but thank whomever he didn't. (I'm not a fan of him or his acting)

Cue the music-
 
Considering how jaded and cynical modern audiences have become I think it's difficult for any movie to recapture that sense of wonder and fun the Indy films used to. Especially when you consider how this franchise was a love letter to the past and far too often people consider history to be offensive, to the point where they rewrite it to help themselves sleep at night rather than having the intelligence to understand context.

Last Crusade was the perfect end and literally had Indy ride off into the sunset. Some movies are best left alone so as to save their dignity.
 
There are more than enough people on this planet that there should be enough money and room for different views and different movies for different groups, but unfortunately there aren't many movie studios left as they keep merging. Besides, between greed for BILLION dollar blockbusters (that must magically please almost everyone) and responses to every single imagined slight across the entire planet that has little or nothing to do with the rest of the world but somehow magically sets off riots/protests everywhere and leads to changes that please literally no one, it seems we can't have movies like Raiders of the Lost Ark anymore.

Raiders has been deemed to promote grave robbing and theft of countries' treasure, even when its been missing for thousands of years in a shipwreck on the ocean floor. It seems that finders keepers doesn't count, only genetics or political borders. The coins are from Italy, so give them back to Italy! Sorry Indy. You can't keep that fertility idol! It belongs to the Hovitos, even if they didn't make it, put it there or know how to retrieve it (e.g. Incan treasure despite the lack of Incas or their empire today. Some politician in a suit said so!

As if the dead need their material goods.... The Egyptians dig up mummies all the time and put them on display in museums (Yeah that really honors the dead and their wishes), but if you find a pot buried on your property, you should find the descendents of that tribe and give them their pot back or leave it in the ground!

THAT is why we can't have proper movies and why Indiana Jones should be in prison for stealing (not "finding" or "obtaining") rare antiquities! That's where that evil ******* should be in the film and what he and his children unto seven generations deserve! Thief! Der dieb!


As for Chris Pratt, nah. Let Indiana retire. The political fallout would be endless unless the movies were PC (i.e. Boring as hell).

Create new characters already. How about Nevada Smith? Oregon Brady? Florida Gator? Arizona Ice-T? California Whine? Canada Dryer?

Nah. Bring Bogart back! He wouldn't put up with these Hollywood phonies!
 
There are more than enough people on this planet that there should be enough money and room for different views and different movies for different groups, but unfortunately there aren't many movie studios left as they keep merging. Besides, between greed for BILLION dollar blockbusters (that must magically please almost everyone) and responses to every single imagined slight across the entire planet that has little or nothing to do with the rest of the world but somehow magically sets off riots/protests everywhere and leads to changes that please literally no one, it seems we can't have movies like Raiders of the Lost Ark anymore.

Raiders has been deemed to promote grave robbing and theft of countries' treasure, even when its been missing for thousands of years in a shipwreck on the ocean floor. It seems that finders keepers doesn't count, only genetics or political borders. The coins are from Italy, so give them back to Italy! Sorry Indy. You can't keep that fertility idol! It belongs to the Hovitos, even if they didn't make it, put it there or know how to retrieve it (e.g. Incan treasure despite the lack of Incas or their empire today. Some politician in a suit said so!

As if the dead need their material goods.... The Egyptians dig up mummies all the time and put them on display in museums (Yeah that really honors the dead and their wishes), but if you find a pot buried on your property, you should find the descendents of that tribe and give them their pot back or leave it in the ground!

THAT is why we can't have proper movies and why Indiana Jones should be in prison for stealing (not "finding" or "obtaining") rare antiquities! That's where that evil ******* should be in the film and what he and his children unto seven generations deserve! Thief! Der dieb!


As for Chris Pratt, nah. Let Indiana retire. The political fallout would be endless unless the movies were PC (i.e. Boring as hell).

Create new characters already. How about Nevada Smith? Oregon Brady? Florida Gator? Arizona Ice-T? California Whine? Canada Dryer?

Nah. Bring Bogart back! He wouldn't put up with these Hollywood phonies!
That's not greed, it's called business. You forget, and I've said dozens of times previously in other threads, Hollywood (outside of indie studios) is not in the business of making movies, they're in the business of making money and movies just happen to be how they make they make their money. So, whatever kind of movie they think is going to make them the most money is the kind of movie they're going to make.

To add to that, there are 2 main factors contributing to the current trend of reboots, remakes, sequels, and prequels (which has been going on for a lot longer than people seem to think). One factor is risk, your Summer blockbuster/tentpole movies (a concept that really didn't exist prior to the release of Jaws or the original Star Wars) have gotten really expensive to produce. They often feature a well known director, at least 1 or 2 big named actors which all drive up the cost of production. As a result, Hollywood has become risk averse because there's a lot of money on the line, too much to risk on a potential flop. So what do they do? They go back to what's worked before, if audiences liked X, then surely they want to see more of X and that's why they make all of these sequels and prequels. That or they want to capitalize on nostalgia and so they do a remake of an older, often, but not always, well known/beloved film or TV show.

The other factor that comes into play is the foreign box office, particularly China, Because of the foreign box office, a movie no longer has to do well in the US to make its money. It can actually not quite make a profit in the US but do extremely well overseas and it's considered a success, enough to warrant a sequel. So Hollywood makes movies that work well overseas, movies with simplified plots but lots of action because action is universal and crosses any and all language barriers. This is also why they like the remake/reboots, for foreign audiences, once again, particularly China, it's new to them. They don't see a remake of some old movie or TV show as ruining a piece of their childhood because it was never a part of their childhood, to begin with. It's just another Hollywood blockbuster to them and that's all that matters to them and to Hollywood.
 
That's not greed, it's called business. You forget, and I've said dozens of times previously in other threads, Hollywood (outside of indie studios) is not in the business of making movies, they're in the business of making money and movies just happen to be how they make they make their money. So, whatever kind of movie they think is going to make them the most money is the kind of movie they're going to make.

To add to that, there are 2 main factors contributing to the current trend of reboots, remakes, sequels, and prequels (which has been going on for a lot longer than people seem to think). One factor is risk, your Summer blockbuster/tentpole movies (a concept that really didn't exist prior to the release of Jaws or the original Star Wars) have gotten really expensive to produce. They often feature a well known director, at least 1 or 2 big named actors which all drive up the cost of production. As a result, Hollywood has become risk averse because there's a lot of money on the line, too much to risk on a potential flop. So what do they do? They go back to what's worked before, if audiences liked X, then surely they want to see more of X and that's why they make all of these sequels and prequels. That or they want to capitalize on nostalgia and so they do a remake of an older, often, but not always, well known/beloved film or TV show.

The other factor that comes into play is the foreign box office, particularly China, Because of the foreign box office, a movie no longer has to do well in the US to make its money. It can actually not quite make a profit in the US but do extremely well overseas and it's considered a success, enough to warrant a sequel. So Hollywood makes movies that work well overseas, movies with simplified plots but lots of action because action is universal and crosses any and all language barriers. This is also why they like the remake/reboots, for foreign audiences, once again, particularly China, it's new to them. They don't see a remake of some old movie or TV show as ruining a piece of their childhood because it was never a part of their childhood, to begin with. It's just another Hollywood blockbuster to them and that's all that matters to them and to Hollywood.
Also, those of us who were kids in the 1970s and 1980s when "blockbusters" became a thing, have these rose-colored memories of the experience. And now, we are the middle-aged generation with the disposable income, trying the relive our youth and catch that magical feeling once more...
 
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That's not greed, it's called business. You forget, and I've said dozens of times previously in other threads, Hollywood (outside of indie studios) is not in the business of making movies, they're in the business of making money and movies just happen to be how they make they make their money.

So how is that not greed? Greed is all about making money. The difference is the summer blockbuster and overpaid actors, etc. that you talk about. They don't want to make a profit. They want to make insane profits and they don't want to take any risk doing it. Yes, that's precisely why we are getting endless sequels and reboots.

While you can blame the studios for this, the quality elements and the high costs for not giving new actors a chance, etc. are on the director and casting director. How is it Jaws was made for a fraction of the cost? How is fake looking and massive costing CGI better than practical effects in most movies?

If movies weren't so ridiculously overpriced, they could take more chances. Other than ever present inflation, what's the reason Hollywood could manage up until the year 2000 or so, but now are stuck in two decades of reboot/sequel GARBAGE while studios still go out of business or merge anyway?

The Maltese Falcon was the blockbuster of it's era yet in today's dollars it cost like $27 million to make if I recall correctly.

Good movies don't have to be all action and special effects and if they are, WTF do you need overpriced actors for? Running and jumping in front of green screens?
 
Keith Coogan just spoke about this in a recent interview. If the studios don't use a given property within 30 years then the rights revert back to the original creators/ writers. This is why so many movies are rebooted and rushed into production and often can't hold a candle to the original.

Which was a revelation to me, and while it's still doesn't totally excuse terrible rehashing, it does make fiscal sense.
 
Keith Coogan just spoke about this in a recent interview. If the studios don't use a given property within 30 years then the rights revert back to the original creators/ writers. This is why so many movies are rebooted and rushed into production and often can't hold a candle to the original.

Which was a revelation to me, and while it's still doesn't totally excuse terrible rehashing, it does make fiscal sense.

Yeah, it screws over the original creators/writers. Dimension keeps putting out GARBAGE sequels to Hellraiser so Clive Barker can't get his rights back. He's been waiting to do a proper movie for many years. But it'll never happen because they don't want to pay to do a proper one and they don't want to lose the rights either. So the consumer gets screwed, as usual.

Absolute obsession over money ruins so many things in this world.
 
It certainly doesn't excuse making terrible reboots, but I can certainly understand why they would do it. From a business perspective it's cheaper to retain the rights to their own property than to acquire the rights to a new one. It would certainly explain the push for the foreign market becoming such a viable cashcow because they can reinvent an old idea to cater to a global market rather than having to worry about pleasing American sensibilities so it's not as big a deal if it tanks here in the States.

For better or worse, even the films we cherish like Indy or Star Wars are still a business. There's a fine balance that those properties struck at their peak in the late 1970's and 1980's when they were box office gold, and yet retained a certain artistic integrity. In all honesty the only way we'll see something that rides that line will be a totally new property that changes the game, not a behemoth like Indy because you can only reinvent something so many times before it gets tired and old.

My father and I talked about this today actually and there really comes a point where an idea gets so popular and so big that it generates it's own industry to self perpetuate. I mean Lucas sold Star Wars in part because he knew he had thousands of employees to provide for, and with no new Star Wars films planned after 2005, he knew he had to do something to keep his companies afloat. I'm sure there were other reasons for it too, but even world famous music artists have to charge insane ticket prices and fill stadiums to keep their techs, producers, record labels, roadies, and assistants (and their families) fed.

You can argue to whether these things are good are bad, but this is just the reality we live in when it comes to movies.
 

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