More often than not, to be an Indiana Jones fan means embracing the ridiculous. That South American temple armed with a giant rolling ball as a security system in Raiders of the Lost Ark? Seems plausible! A man in a foreboding headdress rips some poor soul’s heart out before somehow burning him alive? When Temple of Doom came out, we went with it. Noted Scotsman (and former James Bond) Sean Connery as Harrison Ford’s dad in Last Crusade? Let’s fucking GO!
But not even the atomic refrigerator scene from Crystal Skull could have prepared me for what was to come with Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, a film that includes both time travel and a young CGI Indy. The film is a staggering collection of choices, right down to Indiana’s horseback ride through Manhattan’s subway tunnels.
The most absurd creative decision of all, however, might also be the most subtle: How the hell did Indiana Jones, a man with specific trauma around both cockroaches and rats, wind up living in New York City?
As diehards likely already know, Indy grew up in Moab, Utah, where he explored caves as a Boy Scout and nicknamed himself after his dog. He loves horseback riding, retrieving things with his whip, and plundering precious antiquities from their countries of origin. Sure, we’ve got a great museum scene here in the Big Apple (where I live and work). But is that really enough to make up for everything else he’s losing by being here?
In fairness to Dial of Destiny, this choice is actually canonical. The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles, which debuted in 1992 on ABC, actually opened on a scene at the Met. Indy also once met Gershwin during a visit to New York in the series—in an episode that finds him trying to date three women at once. (Some things never change.) Segments set in the future eventually revealed that Jones relocated to New York as an older man.
Dial of Destiny was under no obligation to stick with that idea, as their choice to nix Old Indy’s eyepatch from the show confirms. Frankly, they should have let poor Indiana live basically anywhere else.
From the moment Indiana wakes up to the sound of noisy neighbors in the new film, he seems out of place. Why is he stomping through an apartment building and not staring into the sun in a remote house somewhere in the desert, where the wind can sweep the hat off his head and sand onto his sweaty face? Does he rent or own? Does he leave his one shirt and his one pair of pants in the washing machine at the laundromat, or does he sit across from them in a bathrobe, waiting for them to be finished? These are questions that melt the mind, because we should never have to ask them.
Yes, the Manhattan setting does facilitate some big set pieces—including a chaotic chase through a parade. But at what cost to Indiana himself?
Let us not forget: Indiana Jones is a man who once almost got crushed to death in a secret prison filled with popcorn shrimp-sized bugs. He almost drowned in a sewer under the Chiesa di San Barnaba in Venice with half the cast of Ratatouille. Do you remember even the hissing in that scene?! Indy must be scribbling out eight letters per day to our newly appointed Rat Czar out of sheer terror.
If this man is living in Manhattan, city of pizza rats, then his therapist must be swimming in billable hours. (Wait—does Indiana even believe in therapy? Oh, no…)
At the end of the day, it doesn’t really matter where Indy lives; he probably won’t spend much time there anyway. But if we’re going to move Indiana somewhere new, it might as well be in a place where it’s easier to imagine him hanging his hat. Speaking of which—how’s the real estate market in Petra?
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