Having now seen Indiana Jones 4 I am finally free from looking forward to anything by George Lucas, hooray!
Indy 4 was terrible and at least as bad as The Phantom Menace. I’m not sure how it’s managed a score of 78% on Rotten Tomatoes as I write this, but I have to assume that will be lowered by time and careful reflection.
Here’s my ranty spoiler-filled list of things I can remember disliking:
- Indy being a bumbly moron
- Indy following around Dudey McMumbles for the whole movie going “what? what are you doing? what’s going on?”
- Whipping out the Crystal Skull every other minute.
- Indy surviving a nuclear event in a refrigerator?
- The plot made no sense.
- Indy throwing a big ridiculous sissy-fit over the snake in the quicksand. “Say grab the rope”?
- No sense of urgency or danger. None of the characters took the danger very seriously so I didn’t.
- Endless, tiresome exposition. Please, TELL ME MORE.
- The one-liners were so weak. “I like Ike”?
- Shia Tarzan
- Indy dramatically picking up his hat like eight million times.
- Why do the commies act exactly like Nazis?
- Commie chick is psychic I guess? But she can’t read Indy’s mind? And also not Huxley’s? And also not Marion’s? And also can’t make a connection with the crystal skull? And also does nothing with her power throughout the entire movie?
- Why did the evil commies break into a US government top secret storage facility to get an alien body? They just poked at it and went “oh we have several other of these”.
- Triple agent Mack, tricking Indy any ol’ time he feels like it.
- Indy trying to save Mack after he gets betrayed again?
- Why did Indy get promoted to Dean?
- Why did Indy and Marion get married?
- Why are there karate ninjas hiding in every long-deserted ruin?
- “[Their] word for gold translates as treasure. But their treasure wasn’t gold, it was knowledge. Knowledge was their treasure.” THANKS FOR CLEARING THAT UP. TWICE.
I guess it might be easier to list the stuff I liked:
- Intro stuff with Indy was nice to see. Him teaching, reference to Marcus & his dad. :(..
- Shia as Mutt was good actually and managed to have an occasional bit of chemistry with Indy.
- I liked the big UFO ending, but it was set up so poorly and at the end of a really bad movie.
3/10
I think they might have just put them in because they were “funny”.
