Retronauts - Retronauts Episode 362: Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade

Episode Date: March 8, 2021

The Retronauts East crew concludes their journey through the Indiana Jones films with a look back at the final entry in the saga: 1989's Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. Plus the games! (Except the LucasArt game, which deserves its own episode.)

Good news. You're listening to Retronauts, a part of the Greenlit Podcast Network. To check out the dozens of other great shows on the network or to join our growing podcast family, check out Greenlitpodcasts.com. This week in Retronauts, we suddenly remember our Charlemagne. Hi, everyone. Welcome to Retronauts. I am Jeremy Parrish, whose army is the rocks and the trees and the birds of the sky. And this week, we are finally wrapping up the Indiana Jones trilogy. It is another Retronauts East episode. And we're finishing what we started. There are no. No more Indiana Jones movies after that. No more Indiana Jones content. So it's going to be it. Actually, we might do another episode sometime on just like the sort of freestanding games,

stuff like, you know, the N64 game or whatever, the Emperor's Tomb. I don't know. Maybe someday. But for the moment, we're talking about Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, the film that came out in 1989 and the video games that came out shortly after. Although we are not talking about the Lucasfilm Games graphical adventure Indiana Jones in the Last Crusade because scum games are Bob Mackie's territory

and I would not dare to intrude on his work. So that's why it wasn't in the list. That's not in the list because Bob is going to be tackling it pretty soon. So I figured we should wrap up this conversation about the movie trilogy before he gets there so that people who are listening to the show and have somehow never seen this film. I don't know how this happened.

But anyway, yeah, so they will have the proper context for that episode. And also, so we can talk about the really bad games that were based on Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, as opposed to the good one. That's Retronauts East for you. We're mopping up the crap. Anyway, who is here doing podcast janitorial duties with me? Let's go backward in Greek.

So, last name, Sims. Yeah, it starts with the Sigma. Hi, I'm Chris Sims, and I'm very upset to, be finding out right now that we're not planning on doing the Young Indiana Jones Chronicles for this. Oh, we can do that some other time. That would be the mop-up episode. All right. Well, I'm Ben Elgin

and I never trust anybody. Actually, that's a lie. I trust everyone. Sorry. And also, I am Ben Elgin. I mean, I'm Ben Edwards. See, now even you get confused. I don't feel so bad anymore. Yeah, I didn't get a lot of sleep.

Sorry. Yeah, I'm Benj Edwards, and I'm here at home, and the children may bust in at any time demanding Indiana Jones content, so got to be careful. But again, this is, you know, this as I said before, the recording started, this is a film about fatherhood, about father-child relations, and learning to, you know, overcome those boundaries and distances and accept, you know, that you love, ultimately that you love your children more than you love the Holy Grail. It's not ignoring your children. It's teaching them self-reliance. Well, I'm still in that part of the movie where I'm ignoring my kids to do my work. Okay. So, like in the beginning.

Well, at some point, your kids are going to fall into a great crevasse in Hetay. And you're going to tell them to let it go. Let it go, Jr. So please look forward to that. That's an essential part of fatherhood. But for the moment, part of fatherhood is ignoring your children while you are in your study recording a podcast about the Holy rail. You're very, you're very Sean Connery today. What can I say? Yeah. So, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. We have talked about Raiders of the Lost Ark. It was great. We talked about Indiana

Jones and the Temple of Doom. It's extremely uneven. And now this movie, which I think is great. Where do you fellows stand on this film? It's pretty fantastic. I think I mentioned when we did Raiders that, like, Raiders is about as close to a perfect movie. as I can imagine. But having said that, like, Last Crusade's my favorite. I think this is one of the greatest films of all time. Wow, strong words. No, I also agree that this is, like, it's a great movie,

and I am, you know, whether or not I love this or Raiders of Lost Ark more is just a question for how I feel at any given moment. Some days I just want, like, a perfectly tuned. homage to serial action thrillers, lean, no fat, just, you know, perfect, or, and sometimes I want something that's a little lighter, a little funnier, and actually has character development. So when I want the character development, then I go for Last Crusade. So, yeah, I don't think it's quite as fat-free as Raiders of the Lost Ark, but, you know, it's a more, I think it's a movie with more of a point to it, as opposed to Raiders, which is just like

Gee, Willikers, I really loved watching these movies when I was eight years old and now I'm going to make my own, which, you know, Lucas, George Lucas and Stevens Spielberg pulled off with a plumb. But this is the kind of film you get from people who have grown up, you know, spent another decade of existence living their lives and gaining new experiences. And, you know, I think it reflects that. Yeah. I can't find any fault with this film whatsoever. I just can't. I mean, aside from the fact that, you know, you know, I think. You know, if you, it's not a serious, like, drama or something, you know, it's like a comic book, but it's awesome.

Like, it's just so well done. It's got humor, action, adventure, and it seems like it's so big because it takes place over so many different locations and time periods and things like that. So I love to have those dots on the map. Yeah. I love that in this film, the travel thing. Usually in a film that's not that great, but it does make you feel like there's an epic. scale here. I think you're definitely right about it being like the more experienced filmmakers, because

this is like, this is definitely a movie made by people who are 10 years older. Because much like the Last Crusade is the God of War 2018 of the Indiana Jones franchise, because it's the one about dads. Right. Does, does Sean Conner actually, or does Henry Jones, senior actually call indie boy? He usually just says junior. Junior. Junior.

Junior all the time. Remember in the end, I read something where they, one of the writers who tweaked the script and made it better, made him, like, say, son finally at the very end when he's trying to save his life. Yeah, I think it's what he tells him to let it go. He calls him Indiana in that scene for sure. Oh, maybe that's what it is. It's Indiana.

Sorry. Yeah. Don't listen to me. I don't know anything about this movie. Well, you know, it's funny because before I sat down to read up and prep for this episode, I really didn't know anything about this movie either. I've seen it so many times, but it never occurred to me to look into its history, whereas I think, you know, the history of Raiders of the Lost Ark is pretty well recounted as one of those like, wow, can you believe they made this movie?

It's two of the biggest filmmakers of all time working together. You know, the G-Wiz factor had kind of rubbed off, worn off. And I just assumed this movie sprang to life, fully formed from Spielberg's head. And yet that is actually not the case. Apparently, it was in development for like four. Basically, as soon as they finished Temple of Doom, they started developing a third movie. And it took many years, many script treatments in many hands to finally come up with the masterpiece that they ended up with. But it went some wild places.

Like initially, it was a treatment by Chris Columbus, not the horrible man who supposedly found America but didn't. But rather the guy who, you know, wrote all the teen movies and the 80s and then went on to direct Harry Potter. And he's probably done some other stuff. I don't know. The Christmas Chronicles 2 on Netflix. I missed that one. It's brand new in 2020. Oh, okay.

So he's out there making, I assume, direct-to-streaming movies with old stars. That's weird because I thought this whole time I thought it was written by the guy on the 1400s. Nope. You know, there were a lot of things that they found in the Dead Sea Scrolls, but Christopher Columbus's script treatment for Indiana Jones was not one of them. So I'm afraid, I'm afraid that's not correct. But Columbus's original treatment for this was based in China and had ties to mythical peaches and was heavily based around the Monkey King legend, which I guess that was just in the air at the time. Because, you know, you also had Dragon Ball showing up and a few other things based around the Monkey King legend was just, it was just percolating. I don't know.

I don't know what to tell you. But basically nothing of that existed. There were going to be Nazis in there. evidently, and the idea of like, you know, a woman who was tough and reliable and teamed up with Indy. But I mean, that's just kind of boilerplate for the franchise. But yeah, basically all of that stuff from the 1985 treatment was thrown out. It was rewritten by Jeffrey Baum, the screenwriter for Interspace, the movie. And then Tom Stoppard, who, oh, crap, I totally forgot what he did, but he's, he's famous.

Rosencrantz and Gildenstern are dead. Yes, okay. Yeah. And he's great. Yeah, I also just recently found out about the Tom Stopper rewrite so that apparently, like, most of the dialogue in this movie was touched by him in the end, which is probably why it's so good. Yeah, explains why it's so punchy, quippy, funny, witty. It's also warm-hearted and touching.

But I didn't know that before we started talking about it, but, I mean, it makes perfect sense with the dialogue. in this movie. Like, I'm a, I'm a big fan of Rosengrins and Golden Stern or Dead. It's one of my favorite, I mean, gosh, not to sound more pretentious than usual, but it's like one of my favorite pieces of literature. That's not that pretentious. Because, you know, I know so much about Hamlet that it's... Hamlet is a small ham.

But, yeah, like, the dialogue in this movie, like, the bickering between Indy and Henry Jones, Sr., Dr. Henry Jones, Sr., could have very easily gotten tiresome, and I don't think it ever does. Yeah, I don't think so either. Yeah, it kind of hits just the right note between, like, you know, exasperated interactions, but between people who still ultimately care about each other. Yeah. And also the bit with Marcus. Yes, I was just about to say, oh. The pen, Henry, the pen is mightier than the sword.

It's just, yeah, there's, yeah. Oh, I was going to say the scene transition. of indie talking about market, you know, he speaks a dozen languages. He has friends in every town. He'll blend in, disappear. You'll never see him again. I was just going to say like the minor characters have some, you know, kind of the side incidental characters have some of the best interactions because they don't really have to carry the story and you don't have to take them seriously. So they get to be a little goofy and kind of introduced this lighthearted comedic tone that, you know, Temple of Doom tried to do that, but it tried way too hard. Whereas here, it works because there is a light touch. And I think, you know, the actors, the quality of the actors is so good. You know, Dinhome Elliott and so forth. John Reis Davies. Like, they're just, they have great presence and great timing. And so, you know, giving them good dialogue, you're just going to get amazing things. So yeah, some of the, some of the most memorable parts of this aren't, aren't necessarily the big action scenes and the chases, but it's just the kind of goofy stuff that happens on the side. But, Apparently, Stoppard also rewrote the entire scene with the Seagulls, with the Charlemagne quote that you opened the episode from. That was also like Tom Stoppard stuff. That would make sense because he is, you know, literate. Yeah, but, you know, someone mentioned the exasperation.

I think that was you, Ben, the exasperation in the dialogue. And I really, I really think one of the things that works so well in this movie is the fact that the two leads, Indiana Jones, and his father, Harrison Ford and Sean Connery, really, like the dialogue and the performances really nail the dynamic of a strained father-son relationship where, you know, these people know each other so well, and they have so much in common, they should, you know, they should be able to get along together, but they've just never made that connection because they're both a little broken, a little, you know, obsessive with their pursuits. and they just can't seem to connect.

And it really captures that where you kind of have this moments for each character where there's this obvious sort of longing for a deeper connection, but they just can't figure it out. And I don't necessarily mean the part where the father is like, all right, well, we're here, talk, talk to me. Like not that kind of thing, the force part, but, you know, more sincere moments where you're like, okay, they actually are not antagonistic to each other. They don't hate each other. They

just, they're just kind of bad at, you know, being human. And that even comes across in like unspoken bits, especially. Like, there's a lot of times when, like, you know, they were arguing or something happened. And then, like, the camera will just focus on one of their faces looking at the other one. And so even when they can't communicate something, you can get a sense of what they're feeling. Yeah. I feel like also that they, at their core, they both love the same. same things, but they approached them in different ways. Like Indiana Jones Jr. is a swashbuckling adventurer and stuff, and his dad is the academic, you know, but they both have this core love of archaeology and history.

And I don't know if they can see that that commonality they have with each other. They still view each other as different, I think. But at their core, they really should get along. And you can see that as a viewer of the film, I think. Yeah, Henry Jones, Sr. might actually be a good archaeologist. Yeah, like, well, because he actually, you know, writes stuff down and studies things as opposed to, like, well, I'm just going to, you know, hop in a cargo plane and punch some Nazis and hope everything turns out well. Yeah, for an archaeologist, Indiana destroys an awful lot of archaeological sites, but, I mean, it's not always his fault. That whole temple he smashes up in Raiders trying to escape from the snake pit. Like, how precious and irreplaceable was.

all of that. Well, and in this one, when he was in the tomb under the library, he's just like, you know, shoving skeletons off of shelves and stuff. And setting everything on fire. Yeah. Well, I guess that wasn't him who did that. But then he uses, like, a priceless relic as a, as a shield over the surface of the water. So, you know, it's, uh, yeah, he's different methodology, but same results. I can't, I can't imagine what his insurance premiums must be. But I think it's, I think it's really fitting that this was a co-production with George Lucas and Stephen Spielberg with Steven Spielberg directing because they kind of have the same dynamic, I think, not necessarily with each other, but just like their personalities kind of remind me of Henry Jones Sr.

And Indy, like Henry Jones Sr. is not good at people. He's good at, you know, like the focusing on the things he really loves and just pursuing those dogs. just like Lucas, when he directs, he's not good with actors. He's not good with dialogue. He's not good at like talking, you know, getting humans to interact as if they are actually human beings. He just, I mean, just watch the Star Wars prequels. He just can't do it. And he doesn't really care. He's like, yeah, I've got this big story to tell about, you know, trade federations. And, you know, it's really important that we get to the bongo and escape the boomer fish. Whereas Spielberg is very deeply. intimately concerned with people to the point that he's often modeling in his work. And I think you get those two kind of in balance and you end up with a movie like this where there is like the Spielberg touchy-feely, warm-hearted like father-son connecting like E.T. awe. And then you also have, you know, the kind of the big adventure, like the constant push forward, which, you know, Spielberg is good at action and adventure too. But I feel like Lucas is

is really kind of like the eyes on the bigger picture sort of guy who's like, okay, well, you know, we, we, we've spent enough time here in Venice. Let's go to Austria. Okay, cool. We're done here in Austria. Let's go to Hete. And so, yeah, I don't know. It's just a great dynamic between the two of them.

I don't know that they've really collaborated since this. Well, I guess there was Kingdom of the Crystal Skulls, but did I just make that up? I think I just invented something. That was a dream you had a bad dream. It was a bad dream. Bad dream. But yeah, so I don't know. Like, it's just all the parts lined up together.

And, you know, Indiana Jones, well, Harrison Ford and Sean Connery have great chemistry together. There is also, I think, you know, a little bit of the real world element of their father-son relationship here because Indiana Jones was so heavily inspired by James Bond. Even if that doesn't necessarily come out a lot in the movies. But, you know, the original treatments where he's kind of a lady killer, there was definitely a lot of Bond influence. there. And Sean Connery, of course, was kind of the definitive James Bond. And so, you know, it's kind of like, here is this action hero following the footsteps of this other guy. And I know Sean Connery was initially kind of reluctant to play this part because he's only, you know, like 10 or 12 years older than Harrison Ford. He was like, I'm not, I'm not old enough to be this guy's dad. But, you know,

I think the script was good enough. And he was allowed a lot of kind of feedback and input to push the dialogue and the character development that he, you know, agreed to it and was okay with it. I would like to give a shout out to the scenery and settings of this film. Like every single place they visit is incredible, and I just want to be there. I don't know why. It's like in the college in the beginning where he has this back room with all these artifacts in a tiny little desk, or the library slash church where they bust open the floor. Or, you know, even the German castle or something, you know, wherever that place is, it's incredible.

Yeah, you bring up his office on the campus. I'm like, that was an incredible amount of scene dressing for a shot that lasted all of, like, 30 seconds in the film. Yeah. Right. But his character development for him, it's, you know, it's showing who he is, which is a disorganized clutter agent of chaos. The bit in the catacombs where he says, that's the Ark of the Covenant. And Dr. Steider goes, are you sure? And he goes, pretty sure.

Wonderful. Yeah, I mean, there are lots of just great little beats in this. Benj mentioned the library and the part where he's smashing through the floor. Again, just destroying beautiful priceless relics in his determination to drive forward. But where that's just coincidentally timed up to the library and stamping things, it's stupid, but it's so funny. Like, as it happens, you know, it's great. Yeah. When I was a kid and I first saw this film, I thought that was hilarious.

I just thought that was the funniest thing I'd ever seen. It's pretty great. It's great. It's fantastic. As an adult, I think it's pretty hilarious. So when was the first time each of you saw this film? I saw it in the theater, I think, when it first came out. Yeah, I honestly don't remember who was in the theater, but I definitely saw it as a kid, you know, sometime soon after its release.

It might have been when it came to video. I'm not sure. I was eight, I guess. This is 1989, right? Yep. Yeah. Yeah, I was pretty young. But I'm pretty sure I saw this in the theater, almost 100%.

I saw this in the theater with my dad. Nice, cool. Who was a, like, both of my parents were, like, big Sean Connery fans. I was a big idiot at Jones guy. My dad was also, like, had really liked Raiders, not so much Temple. But, yeah, like, this was a, honestly, even more than Batman, probably that year. Like, this was the movie I was excited about going to see with my dad, specifically. Who are you?

And what did you do with the real Chris Sims? I know it's wild. But like, 1989 was a wild year for movies. It was. Like, at one time, you had, like, this was what May that Las Corset came out? Something like that, May or June, yeah. Yeah, it's, it's May 24th.

And then June 2nd, obviously, No Holds Bard, starring Hulk Hogan and Tiny Lister. Okay, that's what you're going with. All right. Got us busters, too. By the end of June. June, you had Ghostbusters 2, you had Batman, you had Honey I Shrunk the Kids, which was a big one, Karate Kid 3, which I had to describe to my wife, because we started watching Cobra Kai, and I had to explain that Karate Kid 3 is one of the wildest sequels of all

time. Just moving on, like, there was a new James Bond movie that year. There was U.HF, if you cared about that sort of thing, which I did. It was a big year. What was the Bond movie that year? License to Kill. Oh, okay. Licensed to kill.

Was that the one with Timothy Dalton? Yes. One of the second one with him? I don't remember. Yep. Okay. Never saw that one. But like it was, it's a big year for these like 80s action movies, right?

Like, Lethal Weapon 2 comes out. Bill and Ted's excellent adventure. Yeah. That's the greatest film. This is the greatest year of all time for movies, 1989. Roadhouse. But of all these movies, there's very few of them that I think feel timeless. in the way that I feel like Last Crusade feels like it could be made today.

Yeah, I think also it helps that Last Crusade isn't contemporary because it is, you know, it's set in the 1930s, and they do a really great job of capturing the look and kind of the dusty feel of those settings. It does kind of place it outside of time. You can definitely see, you know, comparing theatrical approaches, you know, technical elements, how it's definitely dated in some places. Like some of the special effects are not great, but...

Oh, they're better than the previous ones. Yeah. A lot of them. Like the exploding planes on the mountainside was definitely a lot more convincing than the Temple of Doom exploding plane on the mountain side. Yeah, but the guy screaming as he falls in the tank, that was bad then and it's worse now. Yeah.

And the giraffes are definitely fake. Donovan super aging is good. Well, yeah, the stuff they did, with practical effects or, you know, like in camera effects like that, I think, I think those hold up really well. I think it's all great. I love it. I feel like the closest point of comparison, and hey, it's me, the real Chris Sims, I'm back.

I feel like the closest point of comparison is Batman, because Batman is also, like, very much like retro-styled. Like, you know, everybody wears 40-style clothes and hats in Batman. It's very consciously trying to evoke the 40s. But I feel like, even so, I think Batman feels more dated than this. Oh, yeah, for sure. Even though it tries to divorce itself from realism by having that, you know, the Anton First Design City and the retro stylings, like, you know, the soundtrack still slaps.

Don't get me wrong. But Lester said, I think, feels very fresh. Like, the action especially, I think, has aged very, very well. speedboat, James? One of the things I was noticing as I was re-watching this right now is there's so much stuff in it just in terms

of shots and staging that like that is so fresh it actually still gets used today. Like there are scenes in here that were reminding me of stuff I just watched in the Mandalorian that seemed like it could have been drawing straight from here. I mean, I know they're both drawing from the same sort of pulpy action background, but

there's just scenes and shots. You know, there's a scene in, I mean, I don't want to do Mando spoilers. But there's a scene with punching people on top of a movie vehicle that, you know, you could draw a direct comparison to the tank sequences in Last Crusade. I'm not surprised. I'm sure everyone who worked on Mando probably loves this film. Oh, I'm sure. Anyone our age or whatever grew up with this. Yeah, so going back to the film itself, my perception of this has always been that it was meant to be a back to the basics approach after Temple of Doom. And maybe my opinion is colored by stuff my parents said back when the movie first came out and that's always just followed me.

But, I mean, look at it. It has, it revisits all the things. that worked about Raiders that you didn't see in Temple of Doom. It's got Nazis. It's got a mystical Christian relic. It's got Globetrotting, which was really pretty absent in Temple of Doom. Like once they got to India, that's where they stayed. There is the reemergence of a conflicted relationship from the past as opposed to, you know, Temple of Doom where it's just the friends you meet along the way. There is lighthearted action to it rather than more of the dark horror and oppressiveness that you saw in parts of Temple of Doom.

And finally, Indy has a formidable romantic opposite as opposed to Willie, who is not great. Allison Doody. Allison Doody as Dr. Elshah Schneider. Yeah, she's an interesting character because, well, she's... Spoil it. It's fine. Okay, fine. You think that she's Indy's ally, but in the end, she turns out to be a Nazi.

She turns out to be a good... How did you put it, Jeremy? Goose-stepping moron. Well, although she was more, I mean, kind of she allied herself with the Nazis because of her obsession. Like, I don't think, I don't know that she was really a Nazi at heart. In fact, there's some scenes that are definitely pushing you to think that she's not, but she's willing to do anything to get what she wants is the point. She has the bit where she's, you know, crying at the book burning.

She is still attending the book burning. She is still there. Yeah, she's absolutely complicit. If the past four years have taught us anything, it's the, that you may not be a Nazi at heart, but if you're like, eh, these guys are okay, I can, I can sidle up to them and be pals. You're, yeah, like, that's, that's not defensible. Yeah, no, she's, she's totally complicit, I mean, both her and Donovan.

You know, neither, neither of them are Nazi true believers, but they're both willing to throw in, and that's, that's why they're doomed as characters. Isn't that more dangerous than a Nazi, though, someone who's willing to do anything just to satisfy their own, you know, narcissism. Can we think of any examples of someone? Yeah, like someone who might run for political. Seems weird. Good thing that we don't have anyone like that in America.

Anyway, I don't want to get this too bog down in politics, although leftism is good. Sorry, listeners, tough luck. You know what, Jeremy? I'll take the heat for this one. I'll say it. Nazis are bad. Yes, I agree. Thank you.

Someone finally said it. Boy, everyone's been so shy about expressing that opinion. I'm glad. I'm glad you had the courage to step up. But yes, that's a big part of what makes this movie so fun is because it is about just punching the heck out of Nazis or shooting a whole bunch of them in one shot. I did not know Lugar's were so powerful, but there is that scene where Indy just, like, lines them up and pops a hole through him.

And he's like, whoa, did I do that? And, you know, on one hand, it's like, ha, ha, ha, murder. That's funny. But on the other hand, ha, it's murdering Nazis. So cool. Yeah, and it is, like you said, it is like, it's a throwback, right? Like, that is very much like the shooting the guy with the sword scene in Raiders of this movie. Like, it's such a cover version of Raiders in a lot of ways.

Like, Donovan is not the same character as Belloc, but he is, I think, he plays a similar role. Dr. Schneider, a very similar role, at least initially, to Marion. You know, the grail, the arc, very similar setups. But it's just enough twisted and not twisted like the Joker. You know, it's twisted just enough and it's like remix just enough and it's done so well that I don't think this movie ever feels like it's retreading ground. It just feels like, oh yeah, this is what Indiana Jones does. And it's weird that you can watch this movie. And I remember like being a kid, you know, not when I saw it.

when I was eight, but when I was watching it at like 13 on VHS and feeling like this was authentic because I remember I got the VHS tapes from McDonald's. Do you guys remember that? Not really, actually, no. There was a thing. I swear this is a thing. I hope someone else remembers it. Were they in Happy Meals? Yeah, you could go to McDonald's and like for, I don't know, 899 or whatever, you could buy the Indiana Jones movies on VHS and like I think they had one at a time like week one they had Raiders, week two, they had Temple of Doom and week three they had Lasker Sitesi you would keep coming back.

So I got those from McDonald's and so I remember watching them and feeling like this was what Indiana Jones does and Temple of Doom is not, which is weird because those were the only two previous films. It wasn't like there was a 60 year backlog of Indiana Jones stories. where we could synthesize what is authentic Indiana Jones. It's just like, no, Raiders is the one Temple of Doom is not. Let's do more of that. Yeah, to bring this back to video games, it kind of reminds me of the way people reacted to

Super Mario Brothers 3. Like when Super Mario Brothers 3 went back to kind of like the Super Mario Brothers 1 style without the weird stuff in Super Mario Bros. 2, everyone was just like, oh, yeah, yeah, that's how it's supposed to be. And then, you know, Mario 2, that's the weird one. What's going on? Oh, it's not a real Mario game? Well, that explains it.

It's definitely that sort of thing. where, you know, with a sequel, they try to do something that's different to strike out in a new direction. And it doesn't always work. And when that happens, if there's still value in continuing the series, the third one often is going back and saying, oh, well, you know, that was fun. But let's go back to what you actually like. Yeah, I was going to say, at least Mario didn't rip somebody's heart out in Super Margaret's too. I mean, when you kill enough enemies, a little heart does float up the screen. So. Oh, my God. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know, man. That's a dark game.

You can't spell Mola Rom without Mario. Actually, that's not true. But it's close. It's close. Actually, no, there's no eye. Okay. Never mind. Before we get off to, like, before we get off talking about the movie itself, I do just want to say, Donovan is such a great character.

I love Donovan in this movie, who is Julian Glover, who is like one of the best that guys in all of film, a guy that you might, you know, you don't know his name, but you're like, oh, that guy was fierce in Empire Strikes Back. Oh, that guy was in, that guy was in a James Bond movie. That guy was in Doctor Who. He was also the voice of Aragog, which I think is fun. But like, I love the way he's so, his sales pitch when he first. shows up. Now, that's a bedtime story I'd like to wake up too. Like, it's so, like, smooth. It doesn't have, like, the, the sliminess, but you know there's something up with him. And then he ends up delivering what I think is my favorite line in the entire movie, which I don't remember

if this was in the trailers, but it should have been the entire trailer, which is when he looks at the telegram, and he goes, Nazi Germany has just declared war on the Jones boys. And I'm I'm like, yes, that is a film. That is what I want to see. He's great. Honestly, I don't think there's anyone in this movie who isn't kind of like note perfect for their part. You know, like, Allison Dutie's really, really good. Donovan's good.

Marcus Brody's good. Yeah. Obviously, Indie and Henry Sala, who makes like more than a cameo, but less than the supporting role, he's good. John Ries Davies. Yeah, I love that. he's back in this one too and I mean think of all the ingredients

you have to get right to make a movie that's good includes the cast obviously you know everyone has to do everything right yeah and that's why follow-up films to this have been so absent

because you know the the question has been can we come up with something with a script that is as good as Temple of Do or sorry as Last Crusade can we come up with something that lives up to that legacy And apparently they looked at Kingdom of the Crystal Skulls and said, Ah, yes, this is it.

This is the one. I don't quite get that, but okay. I think that lived up to your Freudian slip. I think it was as good as Temple is doomed, maybe even a little better. Yeah, it's on par. I enjoyed it enough to really enjoy the nostalgia of revisiting Indiana Jones again, because after watching The Last Crusade, I just want more. Like, this is so good, I want more of this.

You know, why didn't they make more of these while they were young? And, you know, yeah, so, you know, there is going to be a fifth Indiana Jones movie directed by James Mangold, the director of Logan. So this is going to be indie dying, and it's going to be very emotional. So please look forward to that. But anyway. Going to be graphically violent, probably. Logan was insane. I did not like that.

It was pretty dark. Yeah. So at the other spectrum of Indiana Jones life, we do have the Indiana Jones in the Last Crusade, which begins kind of unexpectedly. Like if you don't know what you're in for going into this movie, I remember being a little. little confused at first when it's like, hey, it's 1912 and you're in Utah and there's these kids. But then you realize it's a little baby Indiana Jones being played by River Phoenix, RIP. River Phoenix. Yeah. So when I went back and watched this relatively recently for the first time in years and years and years, I realized like I barely remembered River

Phoenix, India. And like, he's good at it. He's not bad at all. But it just kind of slipped out in my mind, which apparently, apparently he also slipped out of a lot of, like, the game adaptation's minds because he's barely in any of them. Yes. So the prologue is like 8 to 10 minutes long or so, and basically is, it does that prologue thing where they're like, hey, everything that defines this character, it all happened in the span of 10 minutes. So, you know, basically this prologue accomplishes in 10 minutes what the movie Solo does with the same actor's character, Han Solo, in the space of like two and a half hours. So there's something to be said for efficiency.

I read somewhere recently, gosh, it might have been when we were talking about it. But I remember reading somewhere that, like, there are people who don't like this for that reason. And, like, I found that to be very surprising. Because, like, again, if you're going to do it, knock it out in 10 minutes. Uh, like, don't do an entire movie where, where someone explains why a dude in a world with people, or people have names like Cad Bain is named Hans Sola. Like, you don't need to do an entire movie about it. But I thought this was fun because, I mean, like, at heart, Indiana Jones is a fictional character. And I know that is obvious, but he's also like, are you, are you serious?

This is not how World War II went down with the Nazis? Well, he's a very obviously fictional character. Like, even, you know, we're not, we're not even really suspending our disbelief when we watch this movie as much as we're, like, watching an adventure. And we kind of get that, right? Like, because it's, because it's a throwback. Like, there's never a moment where you, you buy into the realism of it, I think. You might, like, buy into the danger. The speedboat chase sure freaked me out when I was a kid, because the chopping, the blades.

But, yeah, I agree. It's like a kind of like cartoon action in some places and how perfectly everything goes that it's impossible. But it's still great. Like the Germans are very cartoony every time they show up and are fighting him. Yeah, like I feel like you can get away with doing the, hey, here's why he has a hat and a whip and that scar and is really into artifacts and has a bad relationship with his dad. And where's that jacket? Like, I feel like you can get away with that. when you have a character where the kind of heightened reality of the fiction is acknowledged and put front and center, if that makes sense.

Yes. Also, I was just going to say, I love the flashback thing in the beginning. It's so well done, in my opinion. I think it's the best one of those things I've ever seen because it's not, like, sentimental and cloying and, like, it's not, like, cheesy or, like, Here's cute Indiana Jones, like running around or something. I mean, River Phoenix really sells the fact that he's a young Indiana Jones. He does it so incredibly well. It's great.

It's a great characterization. You can tell he's imitating some mannerisms of Harrison Ford. And also, it's just, I think it's so cool that he was on adventure that far back. That just blew my mind. And it made me want more of those. You know, I know that did the young Indiana Jones Chronicles and stuff. but if they had River Phoenix in there, it would have been so much better. But obviously, I don't know, he died in like 93.

I don't know when they did the Indiana Jones Chronicles, but. I think it was around that time. Yeah. He's probably also too old at that point. I think he was too expensive, honestly. Too expensive, yeah. For a TV series, yeah. Yeah.

And I think this kind of works both ways in that, like, you know, he has this adventure when he's this age. But, you know, it's not something, it was kind of an accidental adventure. And at the same time he's doing it, it's clear that he's in way over his head that, like, he really, you know, he's a kid. He has no power in this situation. You know, as soon as more adults come into the picture, there's nothing he can do about the outcome because he's just a kid. He's not like some super powered character. Yeah, it feels like something that's in there for kids. Because, like, obviously, at this point, they knew kids were in Indiana Jones. I totally disagree. I don't think that's why I like this. It's not, I don't think it's there for kids. I agree. I mean, they... They didn't make Indiana Jones toys until many years after this film because they always said, like, this is, you know, it's meant to be, you know, kind of an all-ages franchise, but it's not really for kids. It's not the kind of thing you merchandise to kids. It's not really targeted toward kids. If kids enjoy it, you know, we want to make it, you know, sanitary enough that they can watch it and not be freaked out. but it wasn't really aimed at children in the way Star Wars was. Also, if they had put Indy in like a six-year-old Indiana Jones with a whip and a fedora,

that would be aimed at kids, and now I'd hate that. I mean, but they didn't do that. He's in a Boy Scout outfit, you know, or whatever he is in the beginning. And it's just, it's cool. It's dramatic. Yeah, he's old enough to kind of hold his own and get by, but young enough to be, you know, to not know like this is a really bad idea. But then, you know, the whole point of that prolog, I think, is kind of that he never grows into realizing, oh, this is a bad idea because he's always in over his head. He always goes out thinking, I've got good intentions, you know, this belongs in a museum and ends up in these life or death experiences, you know, having his basically, you know, hanging off the side of a tank as someone tries to scrape him across the side of a mountain or, you know, escaping a zeppelin in a biplane while Nazi gun.

or he's trying to shoot him down. You know, it's just a, it's a series of getting in over his head and briefly surviving until the next time he gets in over his head. And that all kind of starts with the prolog. And, you know, it is contrived. And it doesn't really bother me that much. I like some of the subtle elements, like the fact that the guy with a Panama hat, who's sort of the villain behind the scenes here in the prolog, you know, he's very,

reminiscent of Beloc from the first movie. So you kind of see these two types. There's like the rugged sort of freelance adventurer that Indy aspires to become. And then there's the suave sort of cunning, wealthy, industrialist type who is, you know, just in it for himself. The field work versus the backer. Yeah, exactly. And, you know, the transition between the prolog in the present day is brilliant, where the freelancer, the bounty hunter type guy, whatever you want to call him,

the B-tier version of Indiana Jones, puts the hat on Young Indy's head, and then the film stays on his hat, but then cuts to 26 years later, and he's on a boat, and he's fighting back for, you know, fighting to get back that same cross, that same artifact.

He lost to Panama hat in the prolog. So it, you know, it's a self-contained story that also happens to tie the prologue into the present day and segue into the main adventure. So it's very well crafted. It kind of reminds me of, you know, the first half hour or so of Return of the Jedi is that whole sidebar in Jabba's Palace, which really doesn't have any bearing on the main story. It's just like wrapping up a loose end from the previous movie and, you know, something that had been referenced a few times. And it takes a really long time to play out

this feels like it's kind of trying to do the same thing to give you like you know like kind of set your expectations for the adventure ahead while giving you sort of this lead end to show you what this character is about and it does it much more quickly so I keep comparing this to Star Wars and saying this is better so there you go

yeah I think Return of the Jedi is a good comparison it takes place over several different locales and I think it's I was just thinking that earlier where we were talking about this It feels like Star Wars somehow, but I didn't know which one, but maybe it's that one because of what you just mentioned. Maybe I'm just, maybe it's just like that I was really drawn to this sequence when I was a kid.

And like, I enjoyed seeing a young indie. But I also really like that the opening is serial storytelling in miniature. Like, it's, it's so short, but it's got, you know, there's a cave, there's a chase. They figured out how to make him fight a lion. Like, it has multiple set pieces that are very rapid fire that I think kind of set the pace of, hey, in case you've forgotten, this is what an Indiana Jones movie is. It's been a minute since Simple Doom. He's going to be going to a lot of different sets and having a lot of different kinds of action in it. I think it's a really strong opening.

Well, it also introduces Indy's father, who is, of course, a key figure throughout the movie. but it doesn't really introduce him. It's more like it introduces the idea of his father. And, you know, when you go back and watch this, if you didn't know the movie, didn't know how it was going to come out, didn't know Sean Connery was the co-star who plays his father, you could be forgiven for thinking that the whole movie

is going to be the pursuit of this elusive, shadowy father figure. Because, you know, in the prologue, he's just like a man who has his back turned indie, sitting, you know, kind of wreathed in shadows and never really focused on by the camera. And then the movie immediately jumps into the main story, which is, you know, kind of set into motion by Indy needing, being told like your father has gone missing while searching for the Holy Grail and you need to go find him. And so, you know, this sets off the big adventure.

Will Indy save his father? But then, of course, you know, like half an hour later, he finds his father. and then the second half of the movie is the two of them together trying to figure out the bigger mystery of the Holy Grail. Hey, Lassie, what are you doing here? Timmy's in a well. Sequelcast 2 and Friends is a podcast looking at movies in a franchise, one film at a time, like Harry Potter, Hellraiser, and The Hobbit. And sometimes the host talk about video games and TV as well.

And now it's part of the Greenlit Podcast Network. Oh, Lassie, we don't need to rescue Timmy. He likes the well. Well enough, I guess. Darth Vader is Luke's father. Lassie, I told you to play off the spoilers. Take a time machine back to before the world went to hell. Around the year 2000.

The 80s and 90s were so rad. The movies, the music, the TV, the games? That's what I want to talk about. If you're cool enough. Join us and listen to less than 2000. Because that's all we talk about. Adam and Chad live less than 2000. Oh, hi.

I was just shoveling where red-hot takes into the old hardcore gaming 101 opinion furnace. ShaqFu has some redeeming qualities. There's a lot of biggie game podcasts out there, but only HG 101 has the Co-Jones to objectively, definitively, scientifically rank the top games of all time. No, it's definitely pronounced Co-Jones. H.G. 101's top games. Twice a week, every week, right here on Greenlit. Oh boy, I can't wait for future history 101 today.

I hear Prof. Timesworth is going to teach us about World War Six. Gather around, students. It is time to learn. Podford University, where history and future are the same class. Available on iTunes, Spotify, and everywhere you get podcasts. So actually, I guess we should talk about the movie itself. I mean, we've been talking about the movie, but like go through the plot beats just to kind of set things up to explain how the video games work. Not that the video games are necessarily worth talking about that much, but, you know, we've got another 40 minutes here.

So let's make it good. Basically, the movie takes place across three main locations. international locations past the prologue. I mean, you have the kind of brief sidebar to set things up in New York at Barnett College where Indy teaches occasionally when he's not, you know, risking life or death. But then you basically go to Venice, Austria, or the Austria-Germany border, and Hete, which I think is interesting because Hete is a place that I didn't realize this. I just figured it was like a country that, you know, had been merged into another one. But I didn't realize that it actually only existed for about nine months. So, you know, I did some reading on Hete, and it's a part of Turkey now. But, you know, it was like this independent territory for a very, very brief period of time. And then Turkey was like, yeah, just come on join us. So now it's like this little dongle that sticks out from the bottom of Turkey. But just the fact that they, you know.

I thought that was amazing, too. They did enough research to actually put some historical. context in there like like that well yeah that's that's something this these films are good at is like here's here's an interesting little weird bit of history that is vanished now but you know like the with with um

Temple of Doom taking place kind of in right before the end of World War I you know before World War two and sort of the the partitioning of India and that sort of thing like it's a very brief period of Indian history where it's set

whereas this is a very brief period of, I guess, Turkish history or Middle Eastern history. And, yeah, I don't know. It's kind of cool just to like the fact that there's all these little quirks that say, hey, this is really anchored to a specific period of time and you kind of have to go deep to know about it. Although the temple they use for the backdrop there, I believe it's actually in Jordan. Like, that's a real place, but that's not where it is. But it's such a striking visual. It's no surprise that they used it.

Yeah, I mean. carved out of the rock in the canyon. That's kind of a given. You know, like, they actually didn't film Star Wars on Tatooine. It was actually in, uh, in, uh, in Tunisia. So, you know, you kind of have to find your locations and just sort of wing it. Um, that was Petra, I think. Yes.

The famous temple. It's awesome. But yeah, first they go to Venice, which is actually, now that I think about it, I'm, I'm just having this, this kind of moment of realization here. Um, that was actually, I don't think that's incident. because, you know, there's a, one of the bad James Bond movies has a big scene in Venice where, you know, they're, they're on the canals and there's like a pigeon that does a double take. It was a, it was a Roger Moore one, so I've totally forgotten everything about it. Maybe

like, I have a T-shirt of the pigeon double-take. Yeah, you know, the double-take pigeon. Yeah, it's, it's one of those scenes you just can't shake from your mind. But it does, like, I think that is a fun little reference. Like, you're, you're searching for the guy who played James Bond. So you're kind of retracing his, his, you know, most famous adventures. I don't know if that was deliberate, but it feels like, it feels like it was. I mean, of course, James Bond has been so many places, but that was kind of one of the iconic, for better or for worse, scenes of kind of the classic vintage James Bond. So it feels, it feels deliberate to me.

I think you, you may be correct. Because the speedboat chase does feel very James Bond. Yeah, yeah. As does the, I mean, Dr. Schneider is about, like, way closer to a Bond Girl than a Mary and Ravenwood. That's true. She's not as Bond Girl as Willie, thankfully. Willie's more of a Merry Goodnight, I think. I would say that Elsa Schneider is more of like a modern Bond woman, you know, Bond heroine, kind of from the 90s onward.

The women in James Bond movies tend, not always, but they tend to be less passive, less like, here is an object for James Bond to romance. And more like, here is someone who takes an active part of the adventure, who is skilled, who is knowledgeable, who has, you know, bona fides and credentials and can actually make a positive contribution to the adventure. And she has, she has her own agenda, like honestly, independent of all the other parties. You know, she hooks up with the different parties as it suits her. Literally sometimes. Sometimes quite literally, yes. Yeah, so, yeah, I think that's probably the defining trade right there. You just nailed it, Ben.

A Ben, damn it. Ben, you ruined everything by getting your own name wrong. But, yeah, like, you really, you really kind of got it in one right there, is that she is, you know, self-motivated. She has an agenda, and that's something that you, really didn't see so much in the first two movies. I mean, Marion kind of had an agenda, but mostly she just wanted to pay for the bar that got burned down. And then, you know, romance blossomed out of that. But here, Elsa is very much doing her own thing,

playing all sides against the other. She wants to get the grail. And if that means she has to team up with Nazis or, gosh darn it, sleep with Harrison Ford and Sean Connery, it's tough work, but someone's got to do it. Such sacrifice. Yeah, so the Venice scene is, you know, the big chase is kind of through the sewers and then that tumbles out to the speedboats through the canals between these two big ships. Very great and tense. But one of the things that's interesting to me about the Venice sequence is that it introduces

one of the other factions, the non-Nazi factions, which is called the Brotherhood of the Cruciform Sword. And to me, they're interesting because if you look at it. at their ethnicity. They seem to be, you know, of some sort of Middle Eastern descent, maybe Egyptian or something. You look at their ethnicity. You look at the setting. You look at the time and place. And you look at when this movie was made. You assume, oh, this is going to be like, you know, some sort of Islamic terrorist or something because that was really getting big. And Hollywood at the time was like, hey, brown people, they're terrorists like the Libyans. It's so bad. But that's not what these guys are. They are Christians. And that's something you really don't see represented very often in Hollywood is like, here is, you know, you're looking at this part of the world. And these guys are ostensibly, you know, the same religion that's dominant in the U.S. But they have their own agenda, their own methodology. And then they turn out to be, you know, like once they realize that Indy's not out to just get the grail for himself and consume its power, he just wants his dad. They're like, oh, that's cool.

We're just here to keep, you know, this powerful relic from falling into the wrong hands. So you go your own way. By the way, somehow we know where your dad is. So it's just kind of an interesting sidebar. Yeah, they're a sect. I'm sure they have spies everywhere. So they're keeping tabs on, you know, what the Nazis are doing to. I was going to say, I just think it's cool that you think that they're going to be the enemy of the film or something, I think, at the point they're revealed.

And it turns out not to be the case. Which is another thing that gets lost in a lot of the game adaptations because they're like, oh, you know, some guys with swords that we're trying to kill India at one point. And so they just become generic mooks. Yeah, with video games of this era, you tend to lose a lot of subtlety and a lot of nuance. I do you. You too. First I've heard of it. Yes, they have to take some liberties to say, here is an image from the movie.

Let's just kind of ignore what the substance of this was and go for. or patting out the levels with some bad guys. So, yeah, video games of this era tend to turn a lot of characters who are not actually bad guys into bad guys. I agree. Any more thoughts on the Venice scene? Or do we go on to Australia? Australia.

Whoa, Indy took a wrong turn. Back at Albuquerque. Good I, Mike. So Austria is where Indy finally catches up with his father. And, you know, I think the reveal that as Sean Connery is very effective if you don't know it's coming. Like, if you are familiar with movies and at the same time, have not seen this one, you're going to be like, oh, it's James Bond, but older, wearing a dumpy hat. You know, he's got his own look. It's a very different look than Indy. Indy is, you know, leather jacket and

fedora, whereas Henry Jones is tweed jackets and fishing hats and spectacles. But, you know, there's still... He's very stereotypical, eccentric academic look, too. Yes, yes, definitely. Like, you know, I feel like they kind of recycled his general vibe for John Hammond in Jurassic Park. That was Spielberg doing that. He was like, yeah, we'll just kind of recycle this to be like the, you know, a little more contemporary. And you get John Hammond. But you immediately get the buyplay between the two Joneses.

There's friction. And both of them kind of think the other as being an idiot, like, well, this is so obvious. Why didn't you do that? But they both are making, like, stupid obvious mistakes at the same time. They have their blind spots. And it's just fun to watch them interact, get captured, you know, escape from a burning room by themselves and accidentally stumble into a, like, a secret Nazi lair, escape from the castle on a motorcycle by jousting.

It's just, you know, like one set piece after another. And it's a lot of fun. It's incredible. Also, one of the most striking scenes is the book burning scene where it, it's looks, I mean, today they'd probably do that with a bunch of CGI characters in the background or something, but it looks like there's an actual gigantic parade of people with torches marching around in the background while there's Harrison Ford and Allison Dutie are talking in the foreground. And the epic scale of that is incredible. I mean, there's, you know, bonfires burning behind him.

And, of course, he runs into Hitler, which is really funny, as you think that he's going to, oh, Hitler has the Grail diary, you know, but Hitler just autographs it. Probably the funniest possible Hitler cameo, I think. Yeah, because he's kind of the mastermind of everything, sort of. But he's also, Hitler wasn't the brightest guy, and he was just very self-involved. So he just assumes, like, oh, this guy wants me to sign something for him because I'm famous, I'm Hitler. So, yes, it is a funny anti-climax because you really expect, like, wow, the jig is up. There's no way Indy is going to escape from a Nazi racking.

valley where Hitler is after him. Yeah, and Hitler gets his hands on the grail diary, and you're like, holy crap. And then he just autographs it, which is totally unexpected. And that's another thing that was hilarious to me when I first saw it. Yeah, I still remember the tension of that scene watching that. I was just like, I don't know how this is going to work out. And it's such an anti-climax that it's great. It lets you kind of focus on the other adventure scenes, you know, like the escape from the Zeppelin

and so forth. And even that has an anti-climax. There's also like the Justice League episode where the Heroes and Villain Switchbodies and Lex Luthor takes off the Flash's mask to learn a secret entity and he has no idea who he is. Indy has caused trouble for Adolf Hitler, I think, is a mild way of putting it. But there's no reason that he should know him on site. Right. Yeah, there's no reason. Yeah, exactly.

Like, who would have shown Hitler? Like, here's a photo of the guy who blew up the Ten Commandments. Like, no, like, of course not. So, yeah, it is a, it is a good scene. It feels a little on the nose, but it's, it's very effective, like, just because there's so much tension that deflates in a sort of unexpected way and then leads into the next sequence. But, you know, I have to, I feel like it must be really weird and difficult to be an actor, like an extra, filling out these Nazi rally scenes. and, you know, shouting and burning books and so forth. Like, that's, I feel like that's, that's really kind of intense labor.

I don't know. It's not something I'd want to do. Like, even if it's just acting, it's still, like, kind of icky. That's my word for it, icky. I, yeah, well, I'd like to say there's a generational difference here. Like, my parents, both of my grandparents were in World War II, and we still lived with the Nazi, you know, the horror of Nazism. I don't know how you pronounce it. In our families, I know people who lost family members in the Holocaust, you know, or who barely escaped and stuff

like that. And it's so visceral. I don't know where I'm going with this. Just forget. But I feel like there's another side to that worry, you know, in the 80s and 90s. I wouldn't want to wear a Nazi costume, even walk around. That's what I'm trying to say. Yeah. That's all I'm trying to say. Absolutely. But I think there was a side to it in the 80s and 90s where like, you know, the current threat was maybe Russia or something. And Nazism had kind of been relegating to just to like a symbol of evil and sometimes even like used as cartoonish evil. And so even though there's people's in, you know, in Benjus family position where it's still a very real thing. I think in a lot of the zeitgeist it was just this is just a placeholder for like cartoonish evil. And it's just it's more. more a concept than a real thing in that time period in history. Also, I think, I don't know if Indiana Jones works without Nazis as the enemies because they were perfectly cartoonishly evil. It was okay to shoot as many as he wanted and blow them up without any kind of moral reserve.

And without that kind of enemy, I don't know if Indiana Jones works because he's so swashbuckling and devil may care about that kind of stuff. You know, like, if he mowed down as many other people as he did Nazis, he'd just be a monster, you know. Yeah, no, I think that's definitely true that they were an acceptable target. Yeah, I feel like we, you know, we kind of talked about this with some of the previous episodes. Like, these movies did kind of, they did a lot to contribute to the idea of just, you know, mowing down hordes of human beings in action sequences, something you didn't see that. much of, not on this level on the scale in movies, but, you know, that really kind of took off

in the 80s. And obviously, I would say this did not have as nearly as much of that as like Rambo for Splod Part 2 or something. But, but, you know, there is this element of dehumanization. Like, you know, what's the difference between, you know, just slaughtering robots and slaughtering Nazis? I mean, Nazis are more satisfying. Yeah. So I guess there is a conversation to be had there about whether or not it's appropriate that there's just want and slaughter of the bad guys here. But on the other hand, they are the bad guys. But on the other hand, did, like on the other hand, did that desensitize people to think of Nazis as cartoonish and not take them seriously when they started to gain traction in the U.S. again decades later? I don't know. that's something for media critics to write about and I guess that's what we are but we're not writing so we're off the hook

That's where I think the generational gap comes in There's enough distance now between World War II A lot of those veterans are dead now And it's not a living memory as much as it used to be Like when we were kids So I think that It's such a difficult subject And it's terrifying that we have to worry about that now

Whereas it was obvious for so long that Nazis were bad. It's just so obvious and universally accepted supposedly in our culture. But I guess after a while, you take things for granted. So anyway, that's definitely a sidebar. But in any case, Hitler just signing his name to the Girl Diary is still very funny. Yes, it is. We can agree.

So for the finale of the film, kind of the climax takes place in his hay or hatay, I actually don't know how you pronounce it. But I don't think they say it in the movie. do they? Alex Andreva. It's written. It's like a caption. It says Republic of Hete. Yeah. I'm wondering if they said it in the scene where Donovan is bribing the ruler, but I don't remember for sure.

Anyway, basically everything takes place there. There's a great tank sequence, one of the great literal cliffhangers as the tank goes over the edge and you think Indy's dead with the Nazis, but he's not. And then, of course, the action. climax of the film, the, the real finale is not an action sequence. It's much, it, it, it really kind of downplays as opposed to, you know, the first two movies, there's a lot of kind of like smash boom, crash action. Whereas this is not that, you know, there's a little bit of gunplay, but it's really a trial of Indy's perseverance, his, his, you know, what he's actually taken

from his father in terms of his academic prowess. And of course, you know, you know, you have, you know, all these things kind of come together and as he faces these grail challenges and has to basically outthink these ancient traps that, you know, based on his father's research through the years. It's like Indy just went from an action adventure to a puzzle adventure for this last scene, which And that is why I'm sure Bob's episode on the LucasArts game, which allows you to play as an action game or a puzzle game. or, you know, adventure game will be great. But I haven't ever actually played all the way through it.

So I can't speak to it. And an interesting thing is I think the sequence was so great that we think of this stuff as an integral part of indie too now. You know, he has these action adventures, but we also think of him like as kind of a puzzle solver, explorer in terms of getting through, you know, these ancient traps and that kind of thing. And there's some of that in the previous movies, too. But this, but the closing of this movie really amps it up to having to use everything

he's learned to figure stuff out rather than just punching it. Right, including how the letter J is written in the Latin alphabet. But yeah, this view of Indiana Jones kind of reminds me of Captain Kirk, where, you know, people always think of Captain Kirk as this Lothario, but you go back and watch Star Trek the TV series, and he's not just like this wandering id traveling through the galaxy, planting a space seed. He is actually like really, really, really,

cunning. He uses people. He manipulates people, like, especially in the first couple of seasons. He has these kind of like flings with space ladies, but generally when he gets involved, it's for some ulterior motive. Like he's like, you know, trying to find some strategic upper hand by doing that. He's not just like, all the ladies love me and I'm going to, you know, space bonk him. I don't know where I'm going with this. I mean, it's not like Indiana Jones is exactly like that. He's much more open-hearted, I would say, but less, less calculated. But, you know, there is- You're saying that Kirk was caricatured over time in our popular culture to be a certain way, but it's not actually that way. Yes, thank you. That's why I need an editor sometimes.

I mean, that's the case with like everything people do, because our brains just can't comprehend the complexity of nuances and details. and we boil everything down to simple caricatures all the time. And it's just, I think it's a limitation of our human brains that we do that. And it's also a limitation of 8-bit video game design. That's right. We're talking about the video games now. Like, we can, you know, do a recap at the end here. But I do think that is a good segue into the games because they do simplify Indiana Jones.

They do take this kind of complex movie that works on a bunch of different levels. I mean, it's not a complex. movie but you know there's more going on here than just dumb action but that's all the video games are it's at least you know the non-Lucas arts games they are just dumb action and uh yeah it's really dumb like they they simplify things there's basically two really there were a lot of a lot of Indiana Jones games based on the Last Crusade you know released a lot across a lot of platforms but all but one or two of them are built around the same uh the same basis, which was a concept developed by Tier Techs, the extremely cool European developer who gave

us Strider Journey Into Darkness and other classic masterpieces, and published by U.S. Gold, a company whose title, whose name is a lie. It's more like U.S. bronze. Exactly. U.S. participation medal. Sorry for everyone who worked there. Anyway, most of these games appeared on computer systems, so a lot of them are kind of inaccessible for Americans these days, but they're all kind of the same thing. Like you have an MSX game and ZetsX Spectrum game that are basically exactly the same, like single color sprites, very kind of simplistic.

Then there were more elaborate versions like Atari ST and Game Gear and Master System. And then probably the most elaborate version is the one people probably played, are most likely to have played if they're listening to this, which was the Sega Genesis version. And it's basically, you know, that same 8-bit microcomputer game, but embellished with 16-bit graphics. But, you know, not necessarily livened up in terms of gameplay. If you watch long plays with each of these games, most of them can be completed within 8 to 20 minutes. so there's not a lot of substance here and it's all just like variants on the same thing. Have you guys played any

of these? It's okay to say no because why would you want to? I have not played them but I have watched some of them and like yeah it does not look like a fun game. I mean, well you say you can complete it and like you can complete this game in like 15 minutes but the thing is most of the levels are these

huge aimless labyrinths so in reality you're probably going to spend like several hours wandering around completely lost because that's just the kind of game it is. Right. And the controls are like, I played the Genesis version for this. And it does not control well. It is not the smooth, buttery, you know, Mega Man style, Mario style, Sonic style experience that you would want. I mean, obviously, it's a different kind of game than that, but it's not like Contra. It's not, it's just, everything feels clunky and stiff.

Enemies show up in, in unintuitive places and hit you out of nowhere. There's lots of gimmicks that will hit you really hard. So, yeah, while you're, while you're wandering around these extremely European-looking platform stages, you know, the sort of eight and 16-bit style where it's just, here's an immense space. I think on another podcast, Dave Rudden, referred to these as airplane hanger games. And that's kind of what it is. It's just like, here's a big box and we've put a bunch of platforms in here. Like, you know, this was exactly the same as some of the Star Wars games, you know, Empire Strikes Back and so forth. It's just like these wandering, rambling, not really thoughtfully designed spaces and the

challenge is one to find your way through and two, to find your way through without dying because the controls suck and the enemies are cheap. And the really inexplicable thing is they barely let you use the whip in these games. Like the whip is, for some reason, the whip has ammo that you pick up. It doesn't really make any sense. But, and it's, and it's, and it's even worse than that because you need the whip for traversal, too, in a lot of places. You run out of leather every time you use it. You run out of leather, yeah, I don't know.

Yeah, it's, it's a really strange choice. I will say, you know, to the game's credit, it did the use the whip to swing from, you know, whip points two years before a year and a half before Castlevania four. So, yeah, there is that innovation for it, but it's, it's even, like, it's even clunkier and stiffer here. than in Castlevania 4. Yeah, it's cool that they did that, but then the fact that they do that means that you, like, never want to use your whip on enemies, lest you, like, have not enough whip when you need to swing somewhere. Yeah, it's, it's really weird. Like, I get the desire to make use of Indiana Jones in his fisticuffs and Indiana Jones and his whip, but there has to be a more graceful way to do it than by saying, like, you can only use your whip five times and then you're out of whip. Like, that, there's no ammunition to a whip.

Come on. It's a piece of leather. It's braided cowhive. Guys. Has any one of you actually used a bull whip before? I have not. I, my uncle, you know, my... I mean, you can wear down the tip.

I know that. I have swung one a few times. My mom's from Texas, and they had whips in their barns and stuff. And my uncle gave me one when I was a kid, and it was a huge whip. And those things, they're really terrifying. Oh, they are. Yeah. You can crack the hell out of them, but they're big and long.

Anyway. Yeah, I mean, the same way River Phoenix cut himself with it the first time he used to. You can definitely do that if you don't know what you're doing for sure. Yeah, you can do some serious damage with those. And I just remember, like, I wanted to be Indiana Jones, so I tried to, you know, like, do it around a beam, you know, so I could, like, you know, in a barn. Like, so I could swing or something. It doesn't work that way. I'm glad you were still alive.

That's great. Yeah, I never tried to do the Indiana Jones whip thing. It just seems like something I would cause serious damage to myself with. So I just went for the hat. I was like, that's fine. I'll just wear a hat. But yeah, when you hear the crack of a whip, isn't that because the tip of it is actually breaking the speed of sound?

Yep. Yep. That is it. Yeah. So maybe don't get that near my eyeball. Yeah. Anyway, so, yeah, let's give you kind of a basic rundown of the action game format. We kind of talked about the general design, but basically all the, all the games here follow the same beats.

There are some variances. But for the most part, the first stage is, you. usually of these games is usually the cross of Coronado stage. The prolog, sometimes the prolog is broken into two parts. Like in the Genesis game, the prolog is actually two of the five stages. So the first like 10 minutes of the movie, the two hour movie, is, uh, you know, two-fits of the overall game, which is a little lopsided. There were some pretty cool action sequences throughout Indiana Jones in the last crusades. So why focus on just the baby indie part? But the thing is it's not even baby indie here yeah and but indy was in a mind for like all of three minutes so

clearly we need to have a huge sprawling mind stage with like carts and ladders and a million enemies yeah yeah so the the train sequence is actually kind of refreshing because it's like the only stage that isn't an airplane hanger it's uh it's actually just kind of a linear run across the train top and that's uh that's a lot more tolerable than um wandering aimlessly through a cave trying to avoid falling into spikes and, you know, the other nonsense that happens. But it also gets kind of repetitive because I don't know how many giraffes were on this train, but there were a lot. And every time you have to avoid them. I will give them the giraffe heads in the game look just as fake as the giraffe heads in the movie did.

But giraffes are like the gent. They're like horses with really, no, they're not even horses. They're like cows with really long necks. They're so passive and meek. but they're extremely dangerous if, you know, they're shackled in a train and you run past them. It's a bit of a strain. So usually the third stage is the Venetian catacombs where you have a lot of times you have this fire effect that like blasts across the screen. There was one of the games trying to remember which one.

It was the Super Nintendo one that had the fire sweep across the whole screen. and you had to duck under it. But the Genesis one looked at nauseous. Oh, yeah, yeah, it's like falling fire. That's right. Man, these are all blurring together in my head. Yeah, the Genesis one had fire dripping from the ceilings, like, looked like pretty much at random, which looked incredibly aggravating. Yeah.

There was one game that we'll talk about for NES that's very different than all of these. But for the most part, yeah, it's just another, like, rambling stage with a lot of fire traps. The fourth stage is Castle Brunwald, on the awesome. Germany border, and that pretty much consists of making jumps on ledges outside of the castle while Nazis pop out of doors to attack you. It kind of reminds me of the next to last stage of Wizards and Warriors for NES, where it's just, you know, basically they've built all these platforms just randomly sticking out of the wall of a castle, which to me kind of defeats the purpose of a castle being like this, you know, defensive space when you've given your,

your enemy footholds, but what do I know? Yeah, there's a lot of easily scalable castle walls in video games for some reason. You never even get to see the tipstries. Chris, if you are a Scottish lord, then I am Mickey Mouse. How dare you? Anyway, the fake indignity there, that is one of my favorite parts of the movie. How dare he? especially when you've got Indiana Jones like, you know, doing the Scottish accent when that's what his father talks like, sort of, except with an actual Scots accent.

Yeah, we should probably just talk about the movie and some of the games. But anyway, usually you go from the castle immediately to the Holy Grail. There's all this, like, the tank that gets skipped over. Sometimes, some of the games have the tank. We do have the Zeppelin. When the Zeppelin again is like this massive thing

that you're jumping around through, even though Zeppelins are... Yeah, okay, anyway, it's all just kind of the same. It's all bad. It's a lead, Zeppelin. A zeppelin that's been led. And where has it been led? Led to the Holy Grail, because that's where we're going next.

Yeah, so anyway, that's basically the summary of these PC games. Like I said, I wasn't able to play most of them, but they, you know, watching them, they all basically look the same as the Genesis version, except with just different levels of downgraded graphics. Well, you skip the last stage, which is the Grail trials. That depends on the game. Some games, you just get to the end, and it's like, congratulations, you save Dad. But the Genesis one has the Grail trials. And so you do some, like, dodging of the Breath of God, metal spinning disks of doom. And that's all good. And then I actually like how some of these eight bit games did the Jehovah sequences. Like, they'll have you walk over tiles because there's like no, you know, health. or dialogue in the games. It just has you forced to walk over tiles that spell out Yehovah the

first time. And then the tiles come up again with a choice of which ones to step on. And so, you know, which ones to step on because you just did it. So that's, it's kind of a clever way to do it without actually having like help dialogues and stuff. Right. And then, yeah, okay, honest confession here, I did not beat the Genesis version. I got to like the second stage and said, I'm done. Yeah, so it does have that at the end. And then most of these at the very end have a section where you have to walk across an empty space to simulate the last trial, you know, the leap of faith. And I actually thought, I was watching just a long play of this, and I thought it was kind of cool how in the Genesis version, there's actually a grapple point next to the final

gap there. And if you use the grapple point, you die, because what you have to do is just walk on the empty space to show your faith. No, that's BS. If you make it all the way to the end of this punishing, unenjoyable game, and you follow the rules of game design that have been laid down to this point and are punished for it? That sucks. Okay, game-wise, it's terrible, but as a tie-in to the movie, it's kind of clever. Only the Genesis Man will pass. I guess. Man, that's as bad as the X-Men game where you have to reset. So one of the weird things about some of these 8-bit games, the computer games, not all of them are this way, but some of them change. And, you know, the game perspective, the gameplay perspective and controls for the final stage where they're

always, you know, 2D side-scrolling platformers. Some of them, you get to the last stage and it becomes more of like a double dragon sort of thing where you can move into and out of the screen so that you can dodge the, you know, the razor traps and things like that and you have to walk across specific platforms. And it's interesting. I don't know if it's good, but it does show that like there are little differences between each and every one of these games. There are none that are exactly the same. Like, some of them have the Zeppelin stage that is missing from the Genesis. Some of them have an actual grail trial.

Like Genesis has a grill trial where you actually have to pick the cup of the carpenter. But then a lot of them, you just reach the grail and he's like, what up? You made it. Good job. So, yeah, I don't know. Like, you get the feeling everyone was working within the constraints of their platform and still trying. and I don't know that those efforts really panned out, but you have to respect the fact that they did make the effort.

Did any of them make a puzzle out of choosing the right Grail Cup? So that brings us to the 1991 NES game, which is the most distinct of all of these. You know, all these games were Tier Tech's U.S. Gold, and that one was actually adapted to NES in 1993 toward the end of the system's life by Ubisoft. But there were actually two Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade games for NES. And before the Ubisoft adaptation of the U.S. Gold game, there was a game developed by Taito, which is nothing like any of the others. I mean, yeah, it's got some of the same like beats and stage concepts in the sense that they're based on the same source material of the movie. But it plays totally different. And yes, this one does have a grail element to it, like a puzzle, where you have to actually complete a sketch in Venice and then use that sketch that you've created.

from the rubbing to actually compare against the shapes of the different grails because it's not like you have a tall golden grail and a little short wooden grail and one made out of bronze. You have all the grills look pretty much the same, but the details of their embellishments and like the actual shapes of their handles are slightly different. So you have to compare your rubbing from Venice to that. You're playing spot the difference on incredibly subtle pixel graphics. Yeah. Yeah, it's not like major differences. It's like, well, this one has like three little bumps on the handles, whereas the other one only has two bumps. So it's got to be the one with three bumps. And to get that sketch, the entire Venice stage is actually just a sliding, your traditional sliding tile puzzle. It's like a five by five sliding tile grid that you have to slide all the tiles around until you get the correct sketch of the grail. But there, as a tie into the movie, you're not just sliding blocks around. You have to solve. this puzzle before the rats arrive and the stage timer is like a visual indication where you have

like this conduit like a pipe or something and there is just this uh this flow of rats moving through it i thought it was the fire like the other end had been lit lit on fire by the guys and you had to outrace the fire that was coming down the pipe uh i don't know like it's eight bits it's kind of it looked like rats to me but but i guess it could be either one or both i don't know but yeah it's a time pressure slider slider puzzle which actually seems pretty annoying but at least it's something different. Right. But a lot of the stages in the Taito game, one,

Indies like a really tiny sprite. It's kind of weird. But a lot of them, you don't have an objective besides just like kill a bunch of guys. You're just like fighting enemies. You have to kill X amount of enemies and then you can move on to the next stage. It's a, it feels like they didn't quite finish this game. It feels very primitive for a 1991 NES release. I mean, this was the same year as like,

Mega Man 4, Battle Toads, you know, there were a lot of Powerblade, I think, or Power Blade 2. I don't know. There were a lot of like really good, refined, interesting NES games, action games, happening in 1991. And then you had this, which feels like something from, you know, 1987 or so. Yeah, it definitely feels like more of an early NES game when you still have more echoes of like the way things looked on Atari's and stuff. I would say the most ambitious stage in the NES game by Taito is the, uh, the most. castle Brunvald, where it changes the side-scrolling perspective and does the three-quarters maze thing. But instead of being linear, like the grill stages and the other, like the PC games,

it's actually a maze. And you are moving into and out of corridors and passages in the castle trying to find your father. And you, you know, you eventually find your way to the fireplace at the end. And that's when you know you've beaten the stage. That was giving me a real Goonies vibe in the layout. Kind of, except to you know, with that double dragon perspective, it's, it's very strange. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Actually, um, also you have to put together a diary in Castle Burnwald.

I forgot about this. Uh, and using that will show you the safe route over the stones at the end because you have, um, like just, it's a top down view and you have just this massive array of stones with Roman letters on them. And you have to follow a course that is laid out in the grail diary that you get in the castle. So if you don't have... Okay, the thing about this one that really got me, though, in this NES game, they spell freaking Jehovah with a J. You're stepping on the J tiles. But what about in the Latin? Yeah. Didn't you watch the film? Like, what are you doing? This was two years after the film. They should have enough time to get it right. Man. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Anyway, so it's

very strange that there were two Last Crusade games released for the NES. One, two years after the movie and won four years after the movie. I feel like that ship had sailed, and yet Ubisoft was like, there are some mediocre European platforming stages here that we need to bring to this platform. The world must see it. So there it is. That version was also adapted to Game Boy, and it has an added element where you have to

find documents that are scattered around each level in order to complete the level. So there's like, when you're in the Venice Library, have to find four pieces of the Roman X. When you're in, uh, when you're in, uh, when you're in the castle, you have to find, I think, four pieces of the grail diary and so on and so forth. And this does have the pick a grail at the end. Pick a grail. Any grail. Any rail. It doesn't matter. You've played this far. You hate your life. You probably want to die. Yeah. And of course, a lot of those also, you know, there was the one that relied on the sketch, but most of the other ones that would make you pick a

grail just rely on you having seen the movie and know what the right one looks like. Because there's not really anything else in the game to tell you. Yep. So it's, you know, blind luck unless you've seen the movie. Of course, why would you want to play this game unless you'd seen the movie? I don't know. But why play this game if you have seen the movie, because the movie's

so much better. Yeah. Why would you want to play it at all? I don't know. The graphic adventure game is, those are great. The graphic I mean, that one is great and all the ports of it are good. These action ones are not good. I'm sorry, I'm not allowing you to talk about it. But

Maybe, you know, if you love the game, maybe reach out to Bob and say, hey, put me on that episode. Yes. I'll be as giddy as a schoolboy. And so finally, there is one other adaptation of Indiana Jones in The Last Crusade, and that is the final third, actually, like final quarter of Super NES's Indiana Jones Greatest Adventures, which I guess was also on Genesis, wasn't it? I can't remember at this point. I don't think so. I think it's just on the Super NES, right? I feel like we've talked about this, but my mind has actually purged this from my memory for my own protection.

We played it at your house before that other podcast. But you have to get through all the other stages from Temple of Doom and Raiders of the Lost Ark in order to get to this part. So we never played that part. This game gives me kind of a Super Star Wars vibe. I don't know if any of the same people worked on it or not. Yeah, it was a factor five game. Yeah. So it's definitely the same kind of vibe. We, again, we talked about this in a previous episode. And like I said, it's been a couple of years and my brain has purged all that information. But yeah, go back and listen to that episode where you can hear more informed people or more informed versions of ourselves talk about it. But yeah, it basically just gives you like three or four stages. You've got Venice. And this is the one where you have just sheets of fire flying across the screen. And also you're killing a lot of brown people, even though they are. not your enemy because it's video games.

You have to do the Brunvald Castle thing. You have to do the Led Zeppelin empty hangar stage where the Zeppelin's rigging is much more elaborate than it could actually physically possibly be. The one thing this game does add is, of course, a Mode 7 biplane sequence where you have to shoot down the Nazis, even though canonically you shoot down yourself. But then the weird thing about this one is the ending where I guess they decided that this was too much of an action game to end on puzzles. So, like, they skip most of the puzzles.

There's no Jehovah Tiles sequence at all. And then they decide they need a boss fight, even though there isn't one at the end of the movie. So, like, Skeletal Donovan comes to life and attacks you and, like, throws his head at you. And there's this whole boss fight against half-dead Donovan. And that's the end of the game. I miss that part. You games. Anyway, that is Indiana Jones in the last crusade.

The games are not good, except the one that Lucas film games made, because it's a scum game, and therefore it's a scum game, and therefore it is good. And that can be, that's something you can all look forward to in a future episode of Retronauts. Bob will handle that. So final thoughts on the film. Let's, let's have a little sorbet here at the end and go back to the good times. That's funny because I'm literally eating a sorbet right now. Are you? You're not supposed to eat on the podcast. I'm going to destroy you. Final thought, it's good. All right. I'm glad we can all agree. I think It's hard. I don't know if we, the film is just so good.

It's got everything. It's got action, adventure, humor, settings, scenes, history, whatever, you know, like, people. It does, in fact, have settings. It was filmed. It was filmed. Real film. There's dialogue. It's spoken words.

It's great. It's hard to, I don't, I don't know if we didn't cover anything. I mean, we covered pretty much everything, right? Yeah, I think so. I mean, do you think it's possible? Here's, here's a better question instead of, what do you think? Do you think it's possible for Lucas and Spielberg and Harrison Ford or, you know, whoever is putting together this next movie along with James Mangold? Do you think it's possible for them to capture the spirit of this movie? Do you think like fun, lighthearted, meaningful, substantial Indiana Jones could happen again? Probably not. Tough. There's so much baggage. Also, is Tom Stop. Oppard's still alive? I don't know. He's so old. Like, I, when I saw episode seven of Star Wars, you know, where Harrison Ford is Han Solo again, he's just basically an old Indiana Jones to me in that film. He's just so old.

He's not the same, like, you know, I love Harrison Ford and everything, but it's something changes in your body as you age. Yes, your soul start to die. Yeah. And it's not the same. I mean, it's like, I don't know, Paul McCartney just released a new album, and he's my favorite artist of all time, and I love him. But he's 78 years old, and so he doesn't sing very, you know, like he doesn't have the flexibility of his voice as he used to. And I love it, but I don't know how many more years he can keep doing that and not just not be able to sing whatsoever. And I think it's the same with Harrison Ford.

I mean, just how many years can you keep being old Indiana Jones? and have some verve and some action to it. You know, maybe they'll just have him sitting around as an old guy and it'll be really reserved and nice. I don't know. It's going to be a challenge. You can play the Jones Sr. part, you know. Yeah, he's going to be the cranky old dad sitting at the desk,

ignoring his son. I mean, which he kind of already did in the last one. Yeah, I mean, his son is Shia La Booth, so I would also ignore him. I liked him as the son, honestly. I don't know why people. don't like Shia LaBouf, but I thought it was, I thought it was cool. Well, I like the part where he was going to hand off the hat, but then he didn't. He was like, tough luck, kid, you can't be, you can't take up the mantle.

Get your own schick, yeah. I think if they make Harrison Ford try to be an action star again, it will be a serious mistake at his age. I think it'll be like, you know, really jumping around and whipping things and stuff. So it has to be a different angle on it. And I don't know how they're going to do it. I think it needs to adjust. Yeah. Like, you could have, like, maybe one climactic moment where he whips out something slightly actiony for a moment, but you can't have him doing that all the time.

It's not going to work. I would like it if there was a, like, if not an India Jones movie strictly, like a movie like this. It wasn't too long ago where, I think on movie fighters right here on the Queenlit podcast network, Matt Wilson and I were having a conversation about what are the, you know, the adventure movies. that we have today. And it's like the closest thing we have over the past decade is like the Pirates of the Caribbean movies, which are not good. Well, there's National Treasure. I mean, the National Treasure is better than Pirates of the Caribbean. The librarian with Noah Wiley.

I actually liked the librarian and the TV series that followed it. I thought it was pretty good. It was quite good. And Tomb Raider. Tomb Raider was kind of a play off of Indiana Jones, right? also not good, though. Yeah, the one with the Alicia Vikander wasn't so bad. I didn't see that.

I feel like maybe some of it's going to TV. Like, I know I just mentioned this, but the Mandalorian, I mean, obviously that's harkening back to Star Wars' Western and samurai roots. But I feel like it's got a lot of this adventure spirit in it also. They should make Illinois Jones. Hmm. Ohio Jones? No one would name a dog, Illinois. Kentucky Jones.

Okay. So I think that wraps it up for this episode. we've gotten to the binge making bad puns part of the show for the program. Michigan Jones. That's our alarm clock. That's how we know it's time to go. That's right. Okay.

Well, also, there is the time element. So we all need to bounce really quickly. So that wraps the Indiana Jones trilogy. And we might, you know, like I said, Bob will inevitably put together an episode on the Scum game. And then we might visit the other Indiana Jones games, although I don't know if they're, they can really hold an episode on their own. but we'll find out. I don't know. Stay tuned. You never know what's going to happen with Retronauts, except that I'm going to say that I am Jeremy Parrish. And Retronauts

is a podcast that you can find on the internet. You can find it on the Greenlit podcast network at Retronauts.com on your favorite podcatcher. And you can support the show if you want to hear people like us rambling about movies and games and complaining about European platformers and celebrating leftism. That's right. You can go to the Patreon account, we have Patreon.com slash Retronauts. And for three bucks a month, you can download each of these episodes a week early before they go to the public feed at a higher bitrate quality with no advertisements or cross promotions. And for a few bucks a month extra, you can get bonus episodes on Fridays, alternating Fridays, sorry. And also

weekly columns by Diamond Fight and maybe some other stuff by the time this makes it out. We shall see. But in the meantime, that's the retronauts schtick. So how about you guys? Chris? You can find me by going to T-H-E-I-S-B.com. There's links there to everything that I do, including a bunch of other podcasts like Apocoprapells and Waruckety Jax that would be very fun for you to listen to if you

enjoyed their subjects. Very good. Ben. I'm Ben. You can find me theoretically on Twitter at Kieran, K-I-R-I-R-E-A. i n kind of fell off social networking over the holidays and january seemed like a bad time to get back on but i'm sure i'll get back there at some point it's better now yeah yeah also i am minnesota jones you you aka ben jedwards and you can find me online at uh ben jedwards dot com and on twitter

at ben jedwards and i'm considering doing a season two of the culture of tech you heard it here first podcast. Yeah, you should do that. Stay tuned. It was a good show. Awesome. Yeah. Make it happen, binge. I will. And it's been fun talking about Indiana Jones. I really appreciate the opportunity because I love this film. Yeah, and I appreciate you guys being on the show. And then finally, for those who are interested in learning more about me, you can find me on Twitter as GameSpite.

And you can check out my YouTube channel where I'm doing video game stuff, kind of like retronauts. And also at Limited Run Games, where I'm doing other video game stuff, kind of like Retronauts. It's kind of, it's like a thing I do, basically. This is my schick. So thanks for listening. We'll be back in, when will we be back? Will we be back in a day? No, not in a day. 72 hours. We will be back in a week. Yes, next week with an episode on the Game Boy Advances 40th anniversary. I'm pretty sure it's it. Yep, we're all old now. So look forward to that. And in the meantime, if you ever see a goose-stepping moron, just Give him a good punch to the chin, like Indies. You know,