This.
Let's be even more frank since we're on the topic: Indy cannot exist past his three films. It just can't happen. He's so of a particular time and place; his very character reflects that! I love the character because of this. Raiders was a celebration of a bygone film tradition of a bygone age, even for the 80's, and his movies were made in the vein of them by people that remembered watching them as kids. We are now 40 years removed from something that was already 40 years removed by the time Raiders was released, and there is no one in modernity that remembers the old Republic serials with fondness. There's too much of a separation between filmmakers/audiences and what those films are paying homage to. I mean, see how much was lost in just making Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. Neither antagonist or McGuffin were any of real threat or interest past The Last Crusade (and arguably since Raiders) and placing Indy outside of "classic," pulpy, romantic adventure flounders. So he is stuck either repeating the past in diminishing returns, or he is made to do more outlandish, unbelievable things which undermines his humanism. It cannot work out in the long run.
Indy is not like James Bond and I think the comparison is flawed. Bond can exist in any time because there will always be a need for clandestine operations carried out by nations with their own respective agencies and operatives, and that loose premise is enough to keep Bond alive no matter the political climate. He can be reinterpreted to suit whatever age he needs to work in. Indy cannot. Indy exhausted his premise after Raiders. An archeologist is recruited by the government to find a paranormal relic before the Nazis do. Done. What and when does he need to do anything remotely as interesting after that? The original sequels, as much as I love them, even struggled with their answer. In Temple of Doom, he's a roguish mercenary/tomb-raider that inadvertently gets caught up looking for rocks (that do much of nothing in retrospect), and Last Crusade essentially repeats Raiders but on a smaller scale. Because of these things, Indy is forever locked in a specific amber of early 20th century cultural pastiche.
Finally, Harrison Ford is Indiana Jones! There was no one more perfectly cast to play him other than Ford at the time, in which he was at his utmost peak. He exudes a confident, natural machismo, animal charisma that so evokes the attitude of classic male leads these movies were paying homage to. Backed by acting chops honed in years of working as a minor contract studio player, and sculpted from the ideology of 'naturalism' that existed in the 60's and 70's, Ford has all the training for a character actor but possesses the traits of the strong leading man, and that powered his career until he aged out. It's a rare thing for actors to have and even rarer in today's climate. It's not a tall order for someone to fill Ford's boots as Indy (nevermind the vacuous, charmless Chris Pratt) because no one else can be Indy. Indy works not as an idea, like Bond does, Indy is a fully-formed and very specific character. It is the very thing that hinders him and makes him great.
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