Indiana Jones and the Indefinite Culture War

Forget Star Wars, forget Hulkamania and the Ninja Turtles—for me, growing up in the early ’90s, it was always Indiana Jones. More specifically, Raiders and The Last Crusade on fuzzy VHS, plus a few tattered old comic books.

I was truly enthused for Kingdom of the Crystal Skull back in those naive days of 2008, expecting another classic adventure, before it ended up being the worst movie I’d ever seen. It felt like a cheap rip-off of Tomb Raider, the kind of comprehensive embarrassment that nearly discredited the entire franchise.

So when Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny was announced a few years ago, I was reflexively against it. Hadn’t Lucasfilm and Spielberg trashed their legacies and our childhoods enough? Disney had already ruined Star Wars et al with gratuitous wokery, why rub salt into the wounds?

All my jaded presumptions were continually confirmed by frequent clickbait during production. The wicked Kathleen Kennedy was reputedly grooming a shrill Mary Sue to educate and ultimately replace Indy, even inheriting his iconic hat once they finally managed to kill off the irrelevant old white man—further desecration of reliable intellectual property, as had become standard. Still, I couldn’t help but notice that the bad buzz was piling up before anyone had seen much more than a few publicity photos.

Despite all, I remained residually curious about the presumably final chapter—but paying to see such a certain abomination felt like crossing a picket line. It was only after The Dial of Destiny became one of the biggest bombs in cinematic history, and while on vacation I’d spotted the last local discount matinee, that I could finally justify purchasing a ticket (alongside five senior citizens).

Following two and a half hours of nostalgic old-school capers, I mostly liked it! As someone who typically hates summer tentpoles, this particular would-be cash-in had a surprisingly thoughtful and self-aware script reflecting wistfully on the passage of time, and Harrison Ford was loveable as ever. The new female sidekick was way less irritating than Shia LaBeouf and Cate Blanchett had been in the last one, and the handful of obligatory concessions to 2020s wokeness were quickly brushed past.

Of course the film can’t hold a candle to the original trilogy—in particular, the last act is pretty silly—but overall it turned out smarter and more heartfelt than can reasonably be expected from a global popcorn flick in this day and age. It was absolutely decent, and provided far more dignified closure than the preceding disaster.

Yet, as rather OK as the movie actually was, it’s probably good that it’s failed so spectacularly. Regardless of the droves of talented people on its payroll, Disney has long since become an evil megacorporation with contempt, or at best indifference, for its customers. All that its corporate leadership understands anymore is money and ESG scores, and exacting financial pain is the last, best hope of beginning to change their incentives.

That means not only skipping unnecessary franchise sequels, but rejecting all the merchandise and staying away from the theme parks and cruises—and thinking larger, like boycotting ABC, ABC News, Freeform, Disney+, and the rest of the company’s slimy tendrils. The hydra must be slain.

Perhaps the organic backlash against contemporary Hollywood (and Bud Light) could prove an inflection point: the mass audience finally rejecting the shameless cooptation of their values and icons, and demanding something different. Helping determine what might come next represents the adventure of a lifetime.

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Next: A Letter From Back Home

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