Indy 4 is almost here!! The early reviews are starting to trickle out already but I’ve been forcing myself not to read them - I gather it at least doesn’t suck though. Which at least says something given all the hype surrounding it.

To entertain myself (and you!) during the wait, I’ve been comparing what we know of Crystal Skull to the previous Indy movies. All pics of Crystal Skull here are from the trailer (and yes, the 130MB version ), so no danger of spoilers here!

Indy’s Sidekick

“Mutt” vs Short Round (Temple of Doom) vs Henry Jones, Sr. (Last Crusade).

What’s a hero without a trusty sidekick? Crystal Skull sees Shia LeBeouf (Transformers) in the role. Seriously though, what kind of name is “Mutt”? There’d better be an explanation.

I’d say most of us didn’t find Short Round as cute as we could have if we weren’t Asian ourselves. He does get a good one liner “You call him Dr. Jones!” and his own jingle that overlays with the main Raiders theme nicely though. I liked him and he’s a fan favourite, but I think that Sean Connery’s performance is just too hard to top :).

Femme Fatale

Irina Spalko vs Elsa Schneider (Last Crusade)

S: How dare you kiss me!
*kiss*
I: Leave me alone - I don’t like fast women.
*kiss*
S: And I hate arrogant men!
*kiss*

The love scenes in an Indy movie are always hilarious. It’s hard to top Alison Doody’s performance as the sexy Nazi from the Last Crusade, but if there’s anyone who can it’d be Cate Blanchett! As if to make the point, her bobbed ‘do is the total opposite of Schneider’s blonde bombshell look. Will Spalko pull a double with Mutt too I wonder…

Archeological thingamajig

Crystal Skulls vs The Ark of the Covenant (Raiders) vs Sankara Stones (Temple of Doom) vs The Holy Grail (Last Crusade)

(No pic of crystal skulls in the trailer :( )Ah what is Indiana Jones if not for treasure hunts? Unlike some other movies (*ahem*National Treasure*ahem*Tomb Raider), the story leading up to them is usually the right balance between an afterthought and being too convulted. I personally liked the Holy Grail’s plotline best.

Scary tribes

Scary tribe vs scary tribe from Raiders vs scary tribe from Temple of Doom

Many movies have Nazis, but savages never go out of vogue in Indiana Jones. Kali worshippers from ToD were the scariest hands down… they freaking tore out human hearts, roasted their victims as human sacrifices, poked a voodoo doll of you full of needles if you got too annoying, and converted you by forcing you to drink blood!

Life-threatening Trap

Revolving column vs Gigantic Boulder (Raiders) vs Crushing Ceiling (Temple of Doom) vs Tomb filled with burning petrol (Last Crusade)

Another Indiana Jones staple, served with copious amounts of creepy crawlies. I’d say the crushing ceiling from Tod was the most entertaining since it looked his closest to death.

And that’s it! I can’t wait! See you next week with a review!

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