The Big Picture - ‘Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny’ and the Indy Movie Rankings

Episode Date: June 30, 2023

Sean and Amanda are joined by Ringer-verse host and Harrison Ford scholar Mallory Rubin to discuss the latest installment in the ‘Indiana Jones’ franchise and whether it functions as a worthwhile send-off to Ford’s iconic role as Indy (1:00). Then, they rank the franchise's five films (56:00). Hosts: Sean Fennessey and Amanda Dobbins Guest: Mallory Rubin Producer: Bobby Wagner Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hi, I'm Miso Kwonga. I'm Ian Wright. And I'm Ryan Hun. And collectively we are the Stadio Podcast and Wrighty's House on the Ring FC feed. Yes, we are. We come to you three times a week on the Ring FC feed. Bringing love. We're bringing love and football. So if you like zooming out and zooming in on football and all the stuff around it, make sure you follow Ring FC on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. How's that, Rye? I reckon I'll do. Yeah Superstore.ca to get started. I'm Sean Fennessy. I'm Amanda Dobbins. And this is The Big Picture, a conversation show about Indy. Joining us today, the mother of dragons, Mallory Rubin. Hi. It's the joy of my life to be here with you both to talk about Indiana Jones, something that is near and dear to my heart, and to talk about Harrison Ford, literally my favorite subject in the world.

Can I share, have you already shared publicly the circumstances in which you saw Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, the fifth film? Let's do it right now. Maybe. I was thrilled. I arrived to the screening and found a seat saved for me between our pal Chris Ryan and Sean was on the other side and then and Mallory Rubin. And then I was delighted to see your husband, Adam, also with you. And I said, Adam, hello.

I'm so glad to see you. And you said today is our wedding anniversary. That's correct. So this is how we've chosen to spend our time. Yes. There's slightly more to it, which is how we've chosen to spend our time. Yes. There's slightly more to it, which is that we actually had other plans, dinner plans, because it is our ninth wedding anniversary. And we thought, if not now, when?

In terms of leaving our home and going out to have a meal in the world. And then I got the invite to the Dial of Destiny screening. And I said, would you rather go to this? And he said yes. He loves Indiana Jones. He does. Of course Adam does. Well, we all saw it together,

which was a lovely experience. We're going to talk about the film in depth today on the podcast. We're also going to rank the Indiana Jones movie franchise. And we're probably going to get some notes from Mal about our Harrison Ford Hall of Fame too. I'm sure we are.

Are you okay with that? I'm ready. Although, we haven't done any kind of trading ahead of time or planning. So, I don't know where we're going to go on this. I have some notes on our experience of the Hall of Fame. You want to pod about the pod we just did? I wasn't planning to bring anything up today. I was going to send you all a very long memo.

Okay. That's literally what podcasting is, is you just do the memo here. I'll just preview hashtag DobMob. I aligned with Amanda frequently. I just want to say right now that Last Crusade and Working Girl and Mosquito Coast as yellows, I think you should be barred from podcasting, all of you, collectively. You should never be allowed to podcast again. Listen, I fought. I know. That's why I said no, mom. And I'm really glad that you're here and you're on that island as we go to the rankings because I was preparing again last night for the rankings.

I do my homework. And I'm like more pissed at you, Sean Fennessey, than ever. Everybody just relax. Your takes are bad and wrong. To be clear, Raiders is one of the most important movies ever made. That's not an anti-Raiders opinion. But last year's Raiders should one of the most important movies ever made. That's not an anti-Raiders opinion, but Last Crusader Raiders should have been

auto greens without question. I agree. Astonishing. Astonishing. Here's the thing. You guys. I stand with Amanda.

I'm really glad you're both here. Yeah. Your primary mode of understanding Harrison Ford is I would like to enter a bed with that man. It does not have to be a bed.

It doesn't have to be a bed. It can be a barn. A kitchen table. Ideally, it's a barn. A blimp restaurant. Ideally, it's a barn with straw where he is fixing a car and learning to stay on track. That's what I'm talking about.

Bill Simmons, right here, right now, let me and Mallory do a witness rewatchables. It would be the pot of my life. I feel sure. This is the big picture and not the rewatchables. And Bill is not listening to this, I can assure you. So your pleas will go unheard. For the sake of this conversation, let's talk about the new movie.

Okay, you can. I'm not ready to deal with you grousing about something you just did 18 hours ago to me on the pod right now. The new movie is, of course, unlike the previous four films, directed by James Mangold and not Steven Spielberg. It's written by Jez Butterworth, John Henry Butterworth, David Koepp, and Mangold. And it stars Harrison Ford. He returns as Indiana Jones. Thank fucking God he's here, because they probably wouldn't be making an Indiana Jones movie without him.

It also stars Phoebe Waller-Bridge, Antonio Banderas, Toby Jones, Boyd Holbrook, and Mads Mikkelsen. Get this. He's still an archaeologist. He's an aging archaeologist at this point. Harrison Ford, of course, we know is 80 years old now. I believe he filmed this movie when he was 78 and 79. He's about to be 81.

81 years old. Did you know that? He shares a birthday with someone in your life. Yes, my daughter. God bless her. In this film, when we meet Indy, well, there's a prologue. But when we meet him in the modern times of 1969, he is divorced, still teaching, it's about to retire. Yep.

And a new artifact and an old family member reenter his life, and that sets him off on a new course. So before we dig deeper into the details of the film, Mallory, I'll start with you. What did you think of Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny? I really, really enjoyed it. And I have to say, I'm confounded by the critical response to this, sincerely. Like there have been plenty of times

in my life where I like a movie more or less than the main response and that's fine. But I actually don't understand the response to this. I will say some of it maybe seems to be, you two would be the experts on this. The context of where it was released,

because while Rotten Tomatoes is certainly not a perfect metric, and in fact is a deeply flawed one, this movie is rising, rising, rising, rising, rising as more people see it. Now still only up to 67. You know why. Yeah. Because of where they premiered the film.

Yes. And also because I was not at Cannes. Right. Exactly. To contribute my... We've got standing ovations. We've got tears. We've got questions from the press about how he stays so fit.

And a wonderful reply from Harrison Ford about, thank you for noticing my body. Which, like, this is just a wonderful time to be alive witnessing the Fordissance. I'm a huge fan of his TV work as well in 1923 and shrinking recently. Obviously he's about to be in the MCU as Thaddeus Thunderbolt Ross. He is just giving us gift after gift. And so not only was it a delight to have another Indiana Jones movie and to have like what was I think truly a proper sendoff for like a late stage. This is what it looks like to get old and watch the world change around you in a way that I don't think Crystal Skull even approximated in this movie really nailed.

Like, I thought it was a fun adventure and I thought it was like shockingly touching. I was deeply moved multiple times in this movie, including twice to tears, which I am not ashamed to admit on this podcast. This is one of the most important characters and franchises in the history of cinema. And we have like a send off now that we can feel good about. Why is this not just like a celebration?

Is this a send off that you can feel good about, Amanda? Absolutely. My review is this is my kind of bullshit. You know, like this is this is my kind of bullshit. You know, like this is, this is it. I, a little bit more than Mallory, understand. Well, I have some notes that I will apply possibly in a science corner coming soon. I see. But yeah, it is. This is why I go to the movies, especially in the summer.

It is a delightful blockbuster. To Mallory's point, it has real affection for the series that came before it and feels like a culmination and a send-off and is a lot of fun. So I, you know, and I think French people can understand that too. I'm disappointed with the Cannes crowd as well.

I think there's some complexity with premiering franchise entertainments at Cannes. And there was a lot of talk about premiering this film and Elemental in front of the Cannes crowds. And both films getting negative responses, leading to a kind of a lowering of expectations and excitement about the release of these movies. And we've seen Elemental had a very bad opening box office weekend and actually had a better second weekend because maybe more people are liking it. And there's better word of mouth. This movie might have a somewhat similar situation where in terms of like,

there was huge audience anticipation, I think when it was announced and it has been lowered a bit. I felt pretty close to where you guys are. I wouldn't say I'm quite as positive as both of you about the movie. I will say though, through the first about hour and 20 minutes,

I was right there with you, Mallory. I was like, this movie rocks. Like I have no idea what people are talking about the film takes a couple of really bold choices near the end which we will discuss in a spoiler framed detail that i think shifted my feelings a little bit yeah but really for the first roughly hour hour and a half first two acts i was like this is just a good indiana j movie. And as we know from Crystal Skull, that's not a guarantee that we're going to get those all the time.

That being said, I've revisited Crystal Skull and I've evolved some of my takes as well, which we'll get into. Sure. Okay, let's talk about some questions

before we start spoiling things specifically. There's a big prologue set up for this movie where we go back in time. We go back to the end of World War II to sort of introduce

this dial, this titular item, the Antithycara, which is a... Great pronunciation. Thank you. Made up word. It is a creation of Archimedes, and it's meant to control what?

What is this MacGuffin, Mallory? Is this spoiler territory, or this is the non-spoiler version of the answer? What's the understanding of the characters when they're searching the non-spoiler version of the answer? What's the understanding of the characters when they're searching for this thing? In the beginning of the movie, the Basil character, who is Helena's father, Helena is the Phoebe Waller-Bridge character, has been obsessed with this item, the dial of destiny, the titular dial of destiny, and believes that it has the ability to function,

in essence, as a time machine. That it can find fissures in time, that the moments of the calendar in which it is connected point to some sort of magical power. Now, you take away the particulars of that and it maps onto every other Indiana Jones movie where our central figure has some element of dissonance about whether he believes that magic is possible because he is, of course, a scientist and then, of course, has witnessed and we have witnessed with him over the years a number of irrefutably magical things. Now you could get into the Arthur C. Clarke magic and science connection of it all, right? And I think a lot of the fun of the mythology of the movies lives in that space. But like our guy was there when the Ark of the Covenant opened, you know? I don't know if you want to get into your Holy Grail takes again. People have heard them before. It's real to him. But he saw his father's abdominal wound heal before his very eyes. So he knows that great things, that inexplicable things are possible in the world. And yet part of his internal struggle is like, do you spend the time in the library? Do you go out into the field? We've heard him say both across these many movies. It's part of the

fun. In this prologue, it's 1944. So it's about six years since the events of Last Crusade. And did you find that this MacGuffin, that this object felt strongly in the lineage of previous objects? I would say Crystal Skull, notwithstanding. It's a huge outlier. I mean, because, as you mentioned, it is set in 1944, the opening segment is a flashback, which means two things. Number one, Harrison Ford is de-aged, which we can talk more about. And number two, it's towards the end of World War II and there are Nazis everywhere. And the Nazis also want the dial. So that's not what they're there for. They're there for the Lance, which is very grail adjacent in a way that I'm sure you have opinions about. Right. And so that's part of the fun of it too,

is it's this like this series of kind of accidental discoveries with the dial and rediscoveries of the dial across the course of the film. I'd love to talk about the de-aging. Is this the spot to do it or is that coming later? No, I think we should. I mean, but did you, you felt like it did fit it i mean it it is very clearly a powerful object that nazis want in order to win the war which is a direct you know line to the two best indiana jones movies so yeah i was fine with it it's less religious though than the other mcguffins it is really actually

much more scientific than what has come before. So, and as the MacGuffin evolves throughout the movie and we get into spoiler territory, it begins to, it takes a turn, as you said, and it works a little bit less for me. But that opening sequence, I was like, oh, great. We're like back in Indiana Jones. We're playing the hits. And I'll be honest, at this point in my life with Indiana Jones, I don't mind playing the hits. I will also say the de-aging looked slightly weird, but great because you know what? My man is really, was really handsome. I thought it was some of the best I've ever seen as far as de-aging technology goes. I'm holding like two truths inside of me

with this one, which is, I think that that's objectively the case. And it's been interesting to like read about just the vast volume of archival footage, of course, that they have, not only of his face, but of him playing this character in similar outfits and similar kind of, like, I'm running on a train or participating in some sort of chase sequence. Yeah, exactly. But

the slightly uncanny nature of it, like, bugged me more than maybe any de-aging I've ever seen. I think just because Harrison Ford has the most perfect and consequential face

in the history of the world. Whatever you just said. He's just the most handsome and magnetic person who has ever lived. More so than the Mona Lisa. Fuck the Mona Lisa. It doesn't move.

The Mona Lisa can eat shit. I'm with Mallory. Put Harrison Ford's face in the lube. Are you kidding me? God, remake Glass Onion, but with a portrait of Harrison Ford, a still shot of Harrison Ford. I don't even remember the plot. Okay. There we go.

Yes. Thank you. Yeah. Yeah. So I don't know. I don't remember the plot of Glass Onion, but yes. His face is so embedded in our minds that anything that isn't exactly right, I think kind of.

I would say it's and listen, just amen to everything that you're saying. I'm right here with you. It's probably more embedded in your mind than anyone else's, even mine. And it's like pretty embedded. So, you know, I agree. There are a few less creases and the creases and the Harrison Ford got hotter as he got older, which is a thing that many men can do. And congratulations to all of you. Maybe that's also one of the reasons that men are cool as they get older because they finally get hot but so the fact that the fact that he doesn't have like that sort of weathered texture in the de-aging it is slightly less Harrison Ford than Harrison Ford but I was also like wow it remember when yeah it was it was I had a weird like emotional moment about the passage of

time you know and and here we all are and remember when we used to be young. Well, that was how I felt when we saw him in the 69 timeline. But the other thing about the de-aging before we get to the present of the film is just how long

that opening stretch is. Now, I think one of the notes about a movie that I cherished and adored is that it is quite long. Yes. Quite long compared to a typical Indiana Jones movie.

And it is, while it has those emotional moments of poignancy throughout and a lot of character-driven delightful little exchanges, shout out Wombat, can't wait to talk more about Wombat, even by Indiana Jones standards, it is just a very long chase scene across two and a half hours. And the nature of the chase changes, but it's almost always a chase. And so for the opening stretch in the de-aged period to be that long running across a train, I was like slightly surprised by, but also thought it was magical. It is like you said, Amanda, it's like a time capsule. It just ports you back into what it was like to watch those earlier films. I will say I enjoyed this prologue. I think you can entirely cut the prologue out of the movie and just have a little bit of additional exposition.

And the movie probably works just as well. Maybe the reveal, perhaps, of Jürgen Wohler, who is the Mads Mikkelsen character, who is a Nazi and also a kind of artifact seeker in a similar mold to Indiana Jones, who we later see in present times. Isn't he also a scientist? He is a scientist, yes.

And he's working on... Isn't he sort of like an Oppenheimer, but... Ish. Well, so when we cut to the present day, we see Indy as this aging professor, and Helena, aka Wombat, aka Phoebe Waller-Bridge, reenters his life. He is, in fact, Toby Jones's character's daughter and Indy's goddaughter. That's right. And she appears in one of his classes. When you said member of his family and Indy's goddaughter. That's right. And she appears

in one of his classes. When you said member of his family, you're counting goddaughter. I think that's nice. Beautiful. I open my arms wide. As the Fast and Furious

franchise has taught us, family is expansive. I just wanted to be sure. I haven't seen any of those films. Are we just skipping the part where an 80-year-old or a 79-year-old

Harrison Ford has a shirtless scene? And that is how we begin. And a pantsless scene. I mean, I thought we were going to talk about that for 30 minutes. I turned to first my husband and then to Amanda and said the exact same thing to both of them and it was this. He still fucking got it. And he does. He definitely has the body of an 80-year-old man. A nice body for an 80-year-old man. He looks great.

There's some loose skin, I would say. He looks great. There's some loose skin, I would say. That's fine. Okay. It's the loose skin that makes you think of where all those tight-corded muscles used to be.

He's cute. He looks great. The barrel chest at a certain point, you know? I'm thinking also of Brad Pitt on the roof

in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. He's obviously much younger, but, you know. Shall we speak more about male anatomy? Is that something that you want to do here?

I would love to. Hello. Who are you podcasting with? This is a tricky one, right? Because on the one hand, you guys are just really horned up for, like, 70-year-olds.

That's, like, a fact about both of you. Sorry that we have open minds. We see beauty everywhere. A lot of love in our hearts. That's really nice. I don't want to spend too much time on

borderline nude Harrison Ford in the first 20 minutes of this movie because I find it to be an odd choice, candidly. Simply do not agree. Well, you said we can't do spoilers yet. So we're podcasting. Bobby, you're an expert in physical fitness. I suppose, yeah. Do you have thoughts on Harrison Ford still rocking it shirtless in movies at 80? Well, I haven't seen this movie, but I have seen Harrison Ford's body

in other circumstances, I suppose. Yeah. He looks great. I'm happy for him. He seems like he's out there walking a lot, you know, keeping fresh. Better to walk than fly. He's a cyclist as well at this point.

Yeah, I've seen a lot of photos of him. He's a full spandex cyclist also, which I usually am against, but in this case i'll make an exception for harrison ford just like biking through the uk cool then it's just if the right the cool person is doing it that activity doesn't matter that is not about coolness i think that like full spandex cyclists are sort of like a menace to society but um sean when are you going to get in your cyclist era you don't even realize what I've been up to lately.

I'm in a full unitard these days when I go cycling. Helmet always though because you're responsible. Anyway. You're a father. Of course. Harrison Ford's allowed because he's a menace to society

and other forms of transportation. Let's circle back to the film if you don't mind. When Helena comes into his life, she identifies that she wants to get her hands on the dial of destiny. That she's questing for it

and that she seems like a treasure hunter in a way, in a way that we've seen Indiana Jones in previous films, and he's kind of toggling back and forth between this character who's a scholar who is trying to teach and learn about the history and also someone who sees the value in some of these artifacts. Then

Juergen Wohler returns as well as a, I guess, a NASA scientist. Operation Paperclip, right? And someone who is responsible for putting the men on the moon. And so we know that he,

you know, that's an unusual turn, I would say, for a former Nazi scientist to get involved in American governmental science. Except it isn't.

It's real world history. But it did happen. So, I guess, like, did the world of 1969 for you work in the context of an Indiana Jones movie, especially in New York City? I loved this.

This was one of my favorite things about the movie because especially like the moon day celebration in particular, the stretches where they're, you know, walking through the streets of the parade. But like the constant, you know, Indy having to of the parade. But, like, the constant, you know, Indy having to go and, like, knock on his neighbor's door and say, like, turn the music down. And they're celebrating. What are they celebrating? Progress, right? And these moments

where he's confronting, okay, here's a goodbye from people at the office. You're thinking about, like, the end of something, and everybody else is thinking about the beginning. And, like, definitionally, Indiana Jones as a character has always been connected to, like, history in the past. What is he? He's an archaeologist. He's digging up things that have been buried in the dirt. But the Moonday setting just brings that juxtaposition to the fore in a way that I love. Like, I think that James Mangold's films, like Logan is another one that I love. And it's a very, very, very different movie tonally. but they're both about these like massively iconic figures who are grappling with what it means for

something to change and end and to not be as relevant to the world around them as they used to be. And so like, what could be, what could be more appropriate than everybody celebrating going to space and Indies walking around? Like I used to dig up things in the sand and no one gives a shit anymore. Like what is my place in all of this? It's a really smart construction. I'll be honest. I spent a little bit of time doing math, you because i was like okay so it was the 40s and harrison ford was original indiana jones age and now he's this you know i just it because they're changing his age as well as the time periods i had to place myself in time a little bit. But no, I thought it was beautiful. And then to the point of the parade

and the saying the parade at some point also becomes like an anti-war protest that Harrison Ford, that Indiana Jones gets kind of lumped into, but joins, which sets up another,

I thought like pretty emotional beat of the story, though, Sean, you will have some math to do and some timeline questions to do about that one. Let's start with this before we start getting into true spoiler territory. Phoebe Waller-Bridge, of course, is critical to this movie. Yes. What did you think of her performance and her character? I thought she was sensational. I absolutely loved her. And I thought that this

was specifically the thing that Crystal Skull, which I'm looking forward to discussing later, and I've had a similar journey with it in recent weeks. This specifically is what Crystal Skull got wrong, right? Bringing Mutt into the mix, the frankly gall to have him pick up the fedora at the end and like toy for even a moment with the idea that he could inherit the mantle. I thought Helena was much more organically and deftly positioned as somebody who has that indie balance, right? Like, kind of an asshole, definitely a smart ass, sort of a fuckboy. Like, a lot of the romance of the movie and, like, the sexual, like, lust of the film is centered around her character this time

instead of Indy's, which I loved. But she actually is the smartest person in the room she can solve the puzzle and solve the riddle the the difference between the two of them is that Indy is still more of like the despite that rough edge like sanctimonious purist he's the this belongs in a museum guy and she's the I've lost my ability to like believe in anything like that i'm here for the cash pragmatist so i liked that even though they had so many aspects of the persona that were the same and you could feel that history from her childhood between them and she feels like the right person if there isn't a passing of the of the fedora to take it one day or a passing of the bullwhip to take it one day there's still a

tension in the way they see the world and the way that they conduct their affair so i thought she was just i thought she was great yeah i agree she also has amazing screwball chemistry with harrison ford and brings out yes like the comedic timing everything is just very light on its feet and and you need that willing to go along with like the silliness of these movies a little bit they are a throwback you know they were originally conceived as a throwback to to serial movies so i just also really like screwball comedy in my action movies um i thought a lot about the great no time to die scene between anna darmas and and daniel Craig. And there's another action film coming up which has a similar zaniness. I just, A plus.

Like, keep giving it to me. It's wonderful. I enjoyed her as well. I was wondering while watching it how much of her dialogue she actually wrote. And I suspect quite a bit. Yeah, of course. Which is part of the genius of casting someone like her

in a part like this. You know that she's not just going to repeat your mediocre franchise movie dialogue. I thought she was also a pretty adept physical performer. You know, the Indiana Jones movies are a real physical challenge. And she really, she hung in there with a lot of like stunt work. And as you said, Mel, like this movie is in some ways in not a good way, one big long chase. And there's a lot of just activity that she needs to be along for the ride on or even driving at times. And she was really great.

So I really dug her. I really also just really liked the chase sequence through the what became the anti-war march. And then ultimately Ford's hopping on a horse. Fantastic. I just thought it was awesome. Like as I was watching it, I was like, this is, if we're going to make movies like this, let's do it like this.

You know, this is how we stage. And I think a lot of that credit goes to James Mangold who's, of course, great at these set pieces and we saw in Ford vs. Ferrari, we saw in Logan,

we saw in movies like this. He's really, really good at this kind of stuff. And then, the movie starts to take some turns and it becomes a global adventure

in many ways. It's probably, now is probably the time, since that's roughly the first 30 to 40 minutes of the movie, where we can put some spoiler framing around the rest of our discussion, because there's the fate of one character that I'd like to discuss. So let's just say, if you don't want any more of this movie spoiled for you, maybe fast forward 30 minutes or so, and we'll get into some movie rankings, or you can come back after you've seen it. Spoiler warning.

But now, let's talk about Mutt. Yeah. So, Mutt as played by Shia LaBeouf is dead. Yep. He died in Vietnam. Yeah. He enlisted willingly according to the story. Hold on. Hold Yeah. He enlisted willingly, according to the story.

Hold on, hold on. I almost am like, I think that we should read these text messages aloud. Because you started this dialogue by asking us which war Mutt died in. Because the movie does not explicitly say it. It's obviously 1969.

Indeed, very clearly jordan's an anti-vietnam protest um and i think it seems clear that mutt's death and the ensuing it's like heavily implied crumbling of the marriage is quite recent yes right and and so between karen ellen's character and you're right that it just like it sort of has to be vietnam but they don't say it at any point I think because as you are about to point out

the math is a little confusing I think if you chart the math across Crystal Skull to the time that this film takes place

you could say Mudd is somewhere between 30 and 35 and so a 33 year old man enlisting in the army to fight in the Vietnam War circa 1967

is just a bizarre... I'm not sure if I've heard... Maybe there are examples of that, but it's a plot contrivance to do away with Shia, obviously. That is why that choice was made. But while I was watching the film and we heard this moment

explained later in the film, I was like, what the fuck? Like, it just took me right out of the movie. And obviously, they're obviously trying to correct for what you identified, Mallory, which is the lifting of the fedora at the end of Crystal Skull

and the kind of retcon what they were trying to insinuate to us. But it's not that big of a deal, but it's a strong choice that they made that they really verbalized in the script that I don't know if it made sense. I bumped on the math at first too. As Amanda noted,

we were all actively discussing this in the wake of seeing the film. I think revisiting Crystal Skull, which is set in 57, I had thought that Mutt was supposed to be maybe slightly older, like that when he was talking about dropping out of school, he was talking about college,

but I'm not so sure. He talks about prep school. So like maybe Mutt is younger than we think in Crystal Skull. So he's like 16. Also, we don't know. I just think we don't know how, like nothing in the film,

unless we are forgetting, and we should say, as a caveat for this entire pod, it's been a long time since we've seen this movie. Weeks have passed. I'm going to see it again tonight before doing Rigorverse tomorrow. I wish I got to see it again before doing this pod. But I don't think we learn

how long Mutt was in the service. So he could have enlisted well before he was killed. They leave it murky. What was it that he learned about what was happening in the Vietnam War that made him want to enlist?

Well, Indy says he implies that Mutt did it to punish his father, to piss him off, to make him mad. That's part of the guilt that he's carrying. Is that something people were doing?

I don't... I wasn't there. It's just... It's a strong character choice. It's not that big of a deal, but it jumped out to me as I started pondering the film. I say that because his death is critical to the story.

The fact that, you know, he and Marion have split and then it's kind of searching for purpose in the aftermath. Like the death of a child is like a radical, massive story point to make. And even though we don't see Mutt or even really see a photo of Mutt in this movie, they went to great pains to set him up in the previous film. And obviously Shia has also had some personal struggles and has become a much more complicated figure in the public eye. And there was a part of me that was like, this kind of feels like they're

putting their thumb in his eye in a way, like by having this borderline illogical story point inserted into the movie and then used as the crux of Indy's emotional arc. Because as the film goes on and you see these, like the sacrifice that he thinks about making emotional arc because as the film goes on and you see these like this sacrifice that he thinks about making near the end of the film it feels very tied to this story point that they've made yeah I don't know if I agree with the thumb in the eye part just because I think like Mutt in Crystal Skull is presented to us as a character who's like lacking purpose and is like offended in a way that I do think is sort of winning and part of the one of the stronger parts of his introduction by people including his mother who are like get your

shit together why are you choosing to live your life this way and so I think like learning like that but decided to do something that he thought was meaningful for whatever reason it and that is a meaningful thing right is an interesting thing to learn about the character. I think also like to have a father like Henry Jones Jr. who is constantly gallivanting about the globe, having some sort of impact on history. Mutt trying to find his version of that, I think, tracks. But ultimately, at the end of the day, they had to explain why Mutt wasn't there.

And so I'm much less, I think we all thought it was a little bit of a speed bump, but I'm perfectly content with it because it gave us the easily one of the three best moments of the movie, which was, we've all watched like 25 to 30 Harrison Ford movies in the last couple weeks. One of our favorite actors, truly one of the great movie stars of the world. I thought this was some of his best acting in this sequence where Helena asked, like, what would you have told him? You know, what would you have done differently? And paraphrasing, but basically I would tell him he was going to die. Tell him that the grief would consume his mother and that I would not be able to console her.

And like to learn that their marriage had fallen apart because he couldn't figure out a way to comfort the person that he cared most about in the world, I thought was like so sad and very well delivered from Harrison Ford in one of the moments in the movie that I thought captured, this is a guy who has lived a full life and who is in like a genuinely different place than where we met him in Raiders. And there are other moments in the movie that are also delightful, like the elbow kiss callback at the end. Is there anywhere it doesn't hurt? That are just crackling and beautiful and really like honor our time with the character. But those are fun, right? Those are sexy. It's important, I think, to have a moment like this. It's like this guy has like matured and grown and lost and suffered and he's carrying something with him that's different from the thing he carried before. The thing he carried before was the pain of being the son who his father

didn't care about. And now he's on the other side of that. Yeah. I loved it. I mean, I also got to be honest. I don't take Indiana Jones movies that literally. You know? Like adding up the cause and effect. Yes, we know because of your misunderstanding of the historical nature of the grail.

I have more. When you want to do that, I have more thoughts on that. Like, I see what you're saying. Because I tried to engage with you when you brought this up the first time and you're right that the math doesn't add up but i don't i don't i agree with now i don't see it as like a you know a thumb in the eye or like a personal rebuke they just needed to set up the emotional stakes of them yeah and explain it in a believable way and aside from the age thing which we can just futz a little.

Yeah, no, I, and I think you're right. You can say maybe he was 16 in that movie and not actually 22 or whatever. I assumed him to be, it ultimately doesn't matter, but it matters to the telling of the story because of the consequence that

you're talking about, the fact that he is at the end of his life and he is reflecting on kind of like what he's leaving behind, which is kind of nothing, which is basically just the scholarly work that he did, which he's always had this complicated relationship to because it's a question of should he be out in the world and exploring the world and understanding it? Or should he be lecturing, literally lecturing people about the things that he knows that they do not, which as any podcaster can tell you is a fraud existence. You know, sometimes you just have too

much info and you don't feel great about how you're conveying it. The movie does kind of blur together in the middle for me as it becomes this globetrotting adventure. You know, we go from Tangier to the Mediterranean to Greece. It's very beautiful. It does seem like it was all shot on location, which is very important to you, of course. Did you enjoy the adventurous nature of the second act?

Yeah, of course. It was beautiful. Film outside, you know? That's kind of just one of my recommendations to all people just film in real places outside did you did you both feel like that it was a kind of just a big trolley car smash up for an hour in the middle there they're on a boat at some point with antonio banderas right yes that also is just another chase because the... Yeah. Mads and Boyd are there in pursuit.

There's the question of the tangled lines. We get eels instead of snakes. It's all... Everyone's pursuing the whole time. But it was beautiful. I liked the chase through Tangiers. That was... Yeah, that was cool.

Yeah. And Phoebe Waller-Bridge is driving a bit of that and I agree she was good. I don't remember what happened in Greece, but I love Greece. Would love to go back. So, if anyone's listening.

Well, a young boy is introduced into the story. Teddy was great, I thought. Wow. I straight up don't remember Teddy. Obviously an homage

to Short Round. Helena's sidekick, yeah. Right, exactly. Oh, yeah. Teddy, he was great. Okay, now I'm with you. Yeah.

I mean, it is one of those movies, right? Where you're like, oh, that guy. And then this other guy comes in here. What did you both think of Mads and Boyd Holbrook as the heaviest of this film? I really wish Chris Ryan were here. Because as mentioned, Chris Ryan was also with us. And as we walked out of the theater, Mallory and Adam, I hope, went to celebrate their anniversary solo.

Sean, Chris, and I walked out. And then Chris just started spitballing like an extensive backstory for Boyd Holbrook's character. And he's like, so are we supposed to think that he was like a Klan member? And then like this whole thing. And I was like, yes, Chris, that is what that is canon. That is what was written in the text. I know. He was like, so that's what we're supposed to think.

And I was like, yep. Every single person thought it was beautiful, beautiful stuff. You know, Boyd Holbrook, of course, in Logan. I don't want to get ahead of ourselves, but Boyd Holbrook has the best line reading in the whole movie. But it gives away the final reveal. So we're not there yet. We'll wait.

Boyd, who I absolutely adore, just cherish. His villain in Logan is one of my favorites in recent movie memory. I would say better in that than in this, personally. That's what I was going to say. This is actually one of my notes on the movie is I think he was kind of wasted. It's an underwritten character. Yeah, he doesn't have a ton to do. He's more of a henchman and a stooge than the

the primary threat and i also love mads mickelson so him being the primary threat is uh wonderful it's not like i would necessarily make the trade but boyd felt underutilized despite being in the excellent subway horse motorcycle oh god yeah which was wonderful wonderful. I think maybe they needed to call Chris. Like, I don't even mean that as a joke. Like, they kind of needed to flesh that character. Give us, like, two lines of exposition so we understand why he's so loyal to this cause that the Juergen character is pursuing.

I did think, I mean, Mads is always awesome. I mean, he's just great. It's a little bit of karaoke for him to be playing yet another German demon in an American franchise movie. Like he just does this in on autopilot, but the creation of that character as a kind of dueling scientist is, was cool, was a good note. And I think when we see them kind of side by side in the final act of the movie and them kind of measuring their wits in the final moments is, is a lot of fun.

Uh, should we, should we talk about the big conclusive third act yeah oh boy are you ready for this bobby based on what you know what do you think happens i well i haven't even been following the plot of the movie at all other than just that they're running around chasing each other so i don't know who's who and who's trying to get what they're basically chasing each other for the dial the dial is in pieces so they need to get the different pieces collect them solve the mystery of where the pieces are so so they need to get the different pieces collect them solve the mystery of where the pieces are so that they can find them

put it back together and reforge the dial anew. But they obviously want it for different reasons. And what is the like stated reason that they want the dial?

Like what does it give them? Mads wants to Mads wants the dial because he's been pursuing it for 30 years and he's evil. Are we in full spoiler, full everything? He believes that the theory that the time fissures allow for time travel is true. But not only that, he believes that he can thus use it to go to 1939 and kill Hitler.

Not as a baby, though. Not as a baby. Just kill him. Not Bobby to stop him from the atrocities he committed. To do a better job. To as a baby though. Not as a baby. Just kill him. Not Bobby to stop him from the atrocities he committed. To do a better job. To do a better job.

He was like, the problem was that Hitler lost the war for us. Yeah, I mean, it's a real like Valkyrie reboot where it's like, we're not only

going to kill Hitler, but we're going to do his job better than him. And Helena wants it in theory to sell it to cash in, but her father, Basil, this was like his great obsession. And that was the other thing in terms of how, to get back to your earlier question, Sean,

how a MacGuffin is deployed in indie movies that I really liked about this one is like that idea of obsession and how it shapes somebody. And the fact that indie has a connection connection to Basil to Helena knows the way that that obsession with the dial like consumed him we'll talk about Last Crusade soon but what is like one of the central elements of that plot is that Henry senior was obsessed with the grail consumed by the grail to the point where his own child and his family and his life around him ceased to carry that he had read one book he would know it was invented in the 11th century but that's okay sure you've moved back from the

16th century yeah okay so i like those parallels we can't do more grail chat just we can do we can do whatever we need to we're going to okay uh continue your point yeah but so like those those parallels you know and george lucas is not the actual writer of the movie unlike prior indie installments in terms of scripting the story though he has an ep um but that's a very george lucas it's poetry it rhymes right right recurring beats across time and across character sets so i enjoyed that so they're all questing for this item which eventually jurgen acquires and they use to pursue a journey through a portal in time yes and in fact a portal in time opens yes and he believes based on his calculations his character's calculations and when he's doing this he for some

inexplicable reason decides to just bring indiana jones with him basically just to prove him wrong rather than shoot him in the head as he probably should have an hour earlier in the film. That would be a great movie. He does in fact enter a portal in time but he does not go back to 1939. He goes back

to 210 ancient Greece. He goes to Syracuse, Sicily where he encounters the creator of the dial during the siege of Syracuse, Sicily, where he encounters the creator of the dial during the siege of Syracuse, Archimedes. Archimedes, of course,

mathematician, inventor, astronomer, one of the great minds in the history of civilization. Inspiration for Amanda on Science Corner. Yeah. Absolutely.

Listen, it's coming. And they enter a war sequence during the siege of Syracuse by plane and so they travel back in time they travel back they factor in continental drift

is the explanation for the different point of time that they exit which I thought was which I loved that was Indy's conclusion that worked that part was fun

I will say though when they made the shift and we enter Syracuse yeah I was like no no, I can't. You've lost me here. I loved this. So here's where I had two phases of no.

The first no was like, oh, no, they're doing a multiverse, which, you know, is a little bit PTSD from the last three months to six years of movie going. But I'm out on multiverses. And then part two, I just have to be honest, I don't know if I literally needed to talk with Archimedes. You know what I'm saying? And I do run Science Corner, but when Archimedes just shows up, and I understand the emotional beat that it sets up sort of. And, you know, it's that Indy has been wanting to be, you know, toggling between like, am I a scholar or I'm a person in the world? And Harrison Ford gives like an emotional speech about like, I've been studying this all my life. Like, I'm here. I'm finally here.

You know, let me stay here. But like, then there's also a man in a toga being like hello good sir what is your spinning machine you know and you're like oh okay he's speaking latin i believe but he's not speaking like fucking greek you idiot it's greece the hell see i one of my favorite ways to spend time is to listen to you two scream and I'm other and belittle each other in my car. They're in Sicily. He's not in Greece. He's Greek. I understand that he's Greek. But how are they communicating?

Indy knows how to speak Greek? Yeah. He knows like the eight codes. He was translating in Mayan in Crystal Skull. My guy is a linguist. He'll have to run it through Mayan. Just so you know, when you're a classist, maybe we have to learn both. Or a classist. He'll have to run it through my end. Just so you know, when you're a classism major, you have to learn both. Or a classism major. And New Greek is an ancient Greek, you know, like modern Greek.

So Indy speaks ancient Greek. I'm sure that he does. What the hell else is he going to be Indiana Jones? All of my professors read ancient Greek and kind of spoke it. I mean, the speaking of it all is hard but that's a whole other podcast so you don't want to have anyway mal i get it he's been studying presents as though she speaks ancient greek when she talks about these things remarkable to get to witness should we start doing this podcast in latin

well i think sean should do it in latin you gotta do it in ancient Greek. You gotta do it in Mayan. And I'll be here barely speaking English, you know? I get it, but it's like, it was also like, you know, ancient Greece Renaissance fair. Okay. Here, if you will allow me to put on my ringer verse hat for a moment, is where I will say,

Indiana Jones movies, and again, this is incorporated into the text. It's something with the central characters constantly grappling with, are genre movies, right? And so actually having a part of the story go into time travel, bootstrap paradox, I thought was like exciting and cool. I certainly don't think it felt out of place inside of a franchise where the Ark of the Covenant has opened and melted off people's faces or the Holy Grail has healed Henry Sr.'s abdominal wound or where we've watched hearts pulled out of human chest cavities and that person continues to live until they are melted in a lava pit like what about this doesn't feel like it belongs in the franchise uh it's it's it's not

that i i have thought about that a lot i do think it is in keeping obviously with the um the outsized almost science fiction nature of the conclusion of every ind Jones movie. I don't have a problem with that specifically. I think there were two things. One, there was a lot of, in the run-up to this film, criticism of the CGI, how the CGI looked in the trailer, which I didn't really notice as I was watching this movie at all until we got into this sequence.

And we saw a plane having arrows fired at it during the siege of Syracuse, and I was like, this just kind of looks like shit to me. They all think it's a dragon I get I mean but even as a storytelling convention

that would have been fine but it just kind of turns into a third act CGI fest which I really thought did not work and it does not work in a lot of these movies

and in addition to that I thought I agree with Amanda that there was a kind of like your fourth grade teacher dresses up as an historical figure and starts to talk to you in class feeling where I was like did you ever have

to do that did I have to yeah like yeah I didn't teach fourth grade no as a student I did but I had to do I was Chrissy Everett who I really can't who's commentary I don't know what you're talking about I I did that who were you Henry Ford oh that's cool wow that's that's a tough class it's a really good semi nobody told me at the time

that's why I love Ford versus Ferrari so much that's a good point so I struggled with it a little more I did think ultimately that the conversation between Indy and Archimedes

whatever language they spoke was there was something touching in Harrison Ford's performance that I liked. And I thought that the way that they concluded that segment by not allowing him to stay was ultimately the right choice. Because it gave us the final five minutes of the movie, which I thought really worked well. That sequence, though, I just I didn't it just didn't work for me the other thing i liked about it have either of you watched the outstanding television program dark no i haven't seen it so when i was watching this and i have to talk to chris about this because he's obviously a fellow dark head it felt clear to me that the people who made this movie not only have seen but

cherish dark this was real like the end is the beginning and the beginning is the end stuff in a way that i again is like i think a sci-fi nerd just enjoyed but it also felt thematically apt because not only of the as you guys have both noted that like struggle that indy has maybe i just i don't belong in that world anymore this is where i belong in the past i'm a relic too, was very compelling to watch. I think that actual concretizing of the impact he has had, right? They see in the tomb when they get the final piece, the wristwatch on the skeleton. He's clocking that, we're clocking that. They are presenting the completed Dial of Destiny before Archimedes in his time

has finished actually constructing this. So he knows that he can do it because he already has. It's a bootstrap paradox and Indy is a part of that. So even though Helena says he can't stay because he didn't stay and that would have a ripple,

which we should save to parse on a whole separate bootstrap Paradox pod, he has had a bearing on events that then shaped the rest of not only history, but the lives of the people who were closest to him. I thought that that was really great. Also, the water displacement of the plane is what inspires Archimedes to discover his principle about water and volume. That's right. Here's the thing I don't understand. Archimedes died during the siege of Syracuse, in historical fact. Okay.

So when did he complete the dial? Like, during the siege? After Indy left? No, Indy gave it to him. No, they say Helena says he's got to finish it. Which, again, not sure. We're, like, in the heat of battle there. Maybe his sidekick finishes it. It looks battle there. Maybe his sidekick finishes it.

It looks pretty tame. Maybe his sidekick finishes it. The battle seems tame. They're storming the walls. Well, but it's just like some CGI ships, you know?

We're doing a little bit of writing stuff off. I realize you have to do that in an Indiana Jones movie, but there's some rickety-ness to this plotting, I will say. The siege lasted

a year and a half, so you had some time. Oh, okay. Yeah, here's my other thing. Ohness to this plotting, I will say. The siege lasted a year and a half. So you had some time. Oh, okay. Yeah, here's my other thing. Oh, good Googling, Bobby. Thank you. He's like, I know I did it. The sequence that we see, it appears to be the culminating event, I will say.

We're like, it's all hands on deck. The arrows are fucking flying through the sky. I've been told that Googling talent is what sets Ringer producers apart from other podcast producers. Here's my one other thing about Archimedes. That Googling talent is what sets Ringer producers apart from other podcast producers. Here's my one other thing about Archimedes. Of all of the historical figures that Indy gets to meet in his life, you can pick anyone. You're going with Archimedes. No.

Right. So I was just kind of like, respectfully, it's important to know what water does and doesn't do, and all the other things. I don't know. I only learned about Archimedes' principle. Can you put Science Corner in at some point? Welcome to Amanda Dobbins' Science Corner. I do think, strangely, Mallory and I have an awareness of the Antipokira's history because of something, a project we worked on here a long time ago. And so because of that, and knowing what I know about it,

you could say that it is a really great artifact for Indiana Jones. And so it's less about Archimedes and it is more about a 2,000-year-old artifact that has been longed, like like people have been trying to understand the ancient computer for a long time but the movies um like other emotional core is set up for indy to be pleading like in 231 bce to get to stay and talk to this guy because it's what his whole life has been leading to and his whole life is leading to like archimedes but i think it's less about archimedes and more than he thinks no one's left to talk to him in 69.

Archimedes is talking to him. You know what I'm saying? It's less about him than it is like an evocation of his obsession with history. Yeah. And he just is a stand-in. What do you want to be? Cleopatra? I was going to say, give me Caesar.

Give me something. No, because those people are not, they're not scholars. They're leaders. But Archimedes isn't. But they're not though. They're leaders, but Archimedes isn't, but they're not though. He's much more representative of what Indy is interested in. So I don't,

I thought it was appropriate. I didn't think it was a weird choice. It's just the actual execution of the scene is just not great in my opinion. And so it held me back from being like, this is one of the, this is, is this in the conversation

for third best Indy movie? I'm not going to make that case. You may though, it sounds like. We'll'll see okay interesting okay uh it's good though i thought it was good it was really fun it's great were you surprised that it was good wait can we talk about the final like the very final scene of course which i just i was also i teared up it was incredibly moving yeah the reunion reunion of him talking about Marion earlier and then the actual

reunion with Marion just flawless. I thought, Sean, we've made fun of you a lot today, so to credit you, I thought that your point on The Last Crusade

rewatchables about how Marion is like the secret ingredient of the franchise and the movies that don't have her just simply like missing that element

is correct. Yeah, that was good job. When you're right, you're right. It's the only good point you've made on a podcast this year. Holy shit.

Unbelievable. I have no idea what I've done You're the best. You're the best. There's only one Sean Fantasy. That's why to me it's Raiders

and then everything else in a lot of ways. But that reunion and the final moments of the film was great. Lovely. Beautiful. Let me ask you this.

You blanched at the idea of the ongoing adventures of Mutt in 2008. Would you watch the ongoing adventures of Wombat in a new movie that is just Phoebe Waller-Bridge? I would. I'm like a franchise glutton, so I'm sure that doesn't surprise either of you to hear. Though I personally would like to just sit on it and wait. I think this feels like a very nice place to stop for a minute. And while I don't think that only one performer can embody one character, I'd say that if you were going to make that case, the best example you could ever cite would be Harrison Ford as Indiana Jones.

They're just like, it's indelible and he is inextricable, right? The person and the character. So I don't want to think about like a world where Harrison Ford's not here anymore. But as long as he is, it's hard for me to watch an indie movie where he's not the lead. But can you do-

But one day, sure. Helena Shaw and the podcast about a Holy Grail. So often when we're talking about maybe not other franchise movies, but yeah, like other action movies or a thing that we'll say as a compliment. It was like, oh, they're kind of like doing Indiana Jones, right? Because it has a certain vibe and throwback fun to it. If Phoebe Waller-Bridge were in a snappy action movie that's like doing Indiana Jones, which I think they really get to with her character in this film, it would be great. If she has to literally be the franchise standard bearer for Helena Shaw in Indiana Jones and, you know, the second to last whatever, like, no. Because there's just, there's too much machinery and nonsense. You won't get that like lightness that I think I think she brings to this franchise and that this franchise has with Harrison Ford.

I also think like it's not a one to one. But if we look at Solo, a Star Wars story, a movie that I actually like think is slightly underrated. We just have proof. It's like the hardest thing to do to step into Harrison Ford's shoes. People will just always say this isn't Harrison Ford, even if, I think Phoebe, I think Phoebe would be amazing

as the lead of a franchise, but, it's just hard. Yeah. I mean, the other thing, it's like, I think it would be fun

to see her doing franchise entertainment and maybe even some action-y stuff, but like, is that how, do I want Phoebe Waller-Bridge spending the next 10 years

of her life you know rolling what if fleabag and hot priest found the dial of destiny and went back to the yeah okay and then there's uh instead of a plane that people think is a dragon there's a fox this is something that chris ryan and i discussed uh actually after we left you we you went up to the fourth floor and we went to the third floor of the parking structure after the film and he and I were talking and we were like

what's she been up to for the last five years like Fleabag ended she made this so when you say this is what she's doing for the next ten years what else has she done

what else is she doing no that's that's one of the things to celebrate like the return of Phoebe Baller to our lives I mean she is just

a sensation she's terrific love her shall we rank Indiana Jones movies? Should we take a break so I can lick my wounds after getting pummeled by arrows during the siege of Sean? There are five movies in this franchise.

I'm going to list those five films and the years they were released before we really get into this. Raiders of the Lost Ark from 1981, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom from 1984, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, 1989, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, 2008, and Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, 2023.

Is it safe to assume it probably isn't is it safe to assume that raiders of lost ark is number one where are you if you're mallory is nodding her head so okay yes i'm not gonna i'm not gonna fight with you guys i last crusade is my favorite but i understand its historical significance you know if you want to do it by like number of memorable set pieces, et cetera, like I get it. You know, it's Raiders.

I just think there's a love thing that is not. And Marion, you're right. Marion is not there. That's true. And Alice in Duty, no disrespect.

Yeah, shout out Elsa. Yeah. Just to be clear, I think that Last Crusade is a sublime movie. It's one of my favorites ever. And I think, I often feel that way too.

The question of like, which is actually my favorite? It might be Last Crusade. But I think if the exercise is like best, most consequential, most important. I agree. I'm with you. Raiders is just, I think the case is like close to unimpeachable. I think also just the pure filmmaking is the best in that movie too. I agree with that. Last Crusade obviously is a wonderful moviepeachable. I think also just the pure filmmaking is the best in that movie too. I agree with that.

Last Crusade obviously is a wonderful movie. Absolutely fantastic. Lots of controversy in the aftermath of our Hall of Fame. It is what it is. That's you.

I do think that you should be ashamed that it wasn't an instance. What would you have traded? Thanks for weighing in again on that. No, no. Ashamed. What would you have traded?

You wouldn't have done the American graffiti thing? No, I wouldn't. Yeah, of course not. I mean, it's, I understand. His rules are too small. Yeah. Yeah. I get it.

It's all right. Harrison Ford. Maybe next time you guys can create a podcast. And then when you do, you can put that movie in there. Sound good? Okay. Amanda and I are going to do Rewatchables Cole and Harrison Ford. And oh my God.

That would be so good. No one else is invited. We're going to have a blast. As a series. Yeahables Cole and Harrison Ford. Oh my God. That would be so good. No one else is invited. We're going to have a blast. As a series? Yeah. As a sponsored series? Oh my God. Yeah.

Is it going to be publishable? Is the internet going to accept it? Or is it going to be too explicit? Yeah. It's Red Band always. Yeah. I can't believe you didn't get this one involved

in your only 78-year-old men cool guys power rankings with with juliette well we just it kind of came up organically on jam session do you want to be on the cool men committee you're welcome anytime i have a lot of strong fervent feelings about older men i don't know if i'm really like a arbiter of cool to be honest know that's good self-knowledge. Thank you. Okay.

The real work begins here. Thank you for accepting Raiders. To me, Raiders is unbelievable. You don't deserve it. I'm doing it for Mallory and not for you. It's 1A and 1B though. I think we should say

it's 1A and 1B. Out of the chute. They can be 1 and 2 but they're close. It is a tier. They're a top at a tier. I think Raiders is ahead of Last Crusade

for the purpose of the ranking but that's a separate tier from the rest of the list. So then, we usually do these in reverse order, but in this case... Let me ask you this. Why will you accept the Ark but not the Grail? That's a fantastic question. What do you mean? Yeah, you're just like, the Grail is

bullshit, but the Ark is also a Jesus-related... The Ark of the Covenant appears in the Bible. The Holy Grail does not appear in the Bible. But I guess it's not Jesus-related. It's Moses-related. It appears in the Old Testament appears in the Bible. The Holy Grail does not appear in the Bible. But I guess it's not Jesus-related. It's Moses-related. It appears in the Old Testament. Yeah, it's an Arthurian legend.

Okay. Because the Grail is an invention and the Ark is not. So, to me, it's more interesting. That's part of why the dial, I think,

is interesting. So, what you're saying is that the Bible is factual. And especially the Old Testament. No. I'm saying that

it's not a retconned object, which is what the Holy Grail is. I'm not mad. You are wrong. It's a simple fact. You didn't know this until I told you this yesterday. You were surprised to learn that the Holy Grail is not in the Bible. No, it wasn't. I know the Bible.

I had to go to four fucking years of Bible school in high school. I know what is in the four Gospels. No, no, no. Let's go to the tenets of Christianity school in high school. I know what it is. Let's go even further. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. Let's go to the tenets of Christianity. Oh boy. If you believe in the teachings of the gospel, God and his son, Jesus, you will have eternal life in the kingdom of heaven.

You don't need to drink from a magical cup that grants you quote unquote eternal life. In fact, that is blasphemy to imagine that there is an object in the world that christ would consecrate that would allow you to live on this earth forever so the whole idea of the grail is bullshit which is what indiana jones learns at the end of last crusade no He doesn't learn that there is eternal life inside of the seal, though. Yeah, and he values real life there.

And presumably it is granted by Jesus, is it not? What I can tell from... They don't say Jesus. It is by the power of God. That's the understanding in the story. Sean has not spent enough time in Camelot, and that's okay. Yeah, that's okay. It's also...

I was thinking a lot about this and I think what appeals to me and Grace about it, it's like You thought it was one thing that it was not. You were like, you like the sword and the stone, but you don't like the Holy Grail. I like the sword and the stone because it's a great story of Arthurian legacy.

So you think that I get up every day and I'm like, today's the day that I'm going to find a magic cup that Jesus drank out of and then Arthur was looking for? No, you don't have the will or ingenuity to find it. So I don't think you will do that. No, I like this type of mythology that is like allegedly somehow connected to real world instead of like totally made up like science fiction mystical. That's the type of storytelling that I like that's the point that I'm making that part of why

the Ark is such a great artifact and part of the reason why Archimedes' creation is such a great artifact it is rooted in a sense of history

because the Old Testament is fact no because it is it was created contemporaneously it wasn't retconned into the history of something previous to it

can I just observe there was a cup that this argument there was a cup at a table yeah so that's the same thing there were some tablets like what are you talking about the whole idea of of something previous to it. Can I just observe? There was a cup. That this argument. There was a cup at a table. Yeah. So that's the same thing. There were some tablets. Like, what are you talking about?

The whole idea of eternal youth and catching the blood of Christ. But none of that stuff is in the Bible. None of that stuff is part of the history of Christ. So it's in the Bible that all of the segments of Moses' like two tablets give you the power to defeat all armies forever? I honestly don't know the details of that.

It's not in the Bible. Maybe you can weigh in on that in the Old Testament. Let me just tell you, that's not. I do not feel prepared to speak on the Bible, but what I will say is that part of what

is genuinely great about this argument, this now recurring argument that you two are having, and this is one of the arguments for Last Crusade, is that this is like incorporated into the text

of the movie. Yeah. It's a leap of faith. Right? Like that whole sequence hinges on whether you can believe. Yeah, you guys are in

taking that step. Two great movies. It's a great argument. Raiders and Last Crusade. Raiders is number one. Last Crusade is number two. I think that your philosophy is inconsistent,

but that's fine. I'm still giving you Raiders at number one. People are listening to this pod and they're like, Amanda sucks. Just get her out of here. She just got dunked on. And you're like, I'm right. You're literally like, I believe in one made up biblical artifact, but not the other. I'm not saying I believe in it. I'm not saying I believe it. I'm just saying

it appears in the text. I don't, of course, I'm not a practicing Christian, so I'm not saying I believe in anything, honestly. Can you insert the clip from four and a half minutes ago of Sean shouting, that is blasphemy! Right after he says that he's not a Christian. When you are raised in the church, you are taught to communicate in that way. You know, there is a fire and a brimstone. There's three more movies. There's Temple of Doom, which has been catching strays left and right

on the Ringer podcast network of late. There's Kingdom of the Crystal Skull and Dial of Destiny. Now, have we gone too far in rejecting Temple of Doom of late? I think so. And it's not my favorite by any stretch of the imagination, but it is still practical filmmaking by Steven Spielberg. Okay. So I think some of it, like on a pure just action set piece level, exceeds anything in the other two movies. That's in the more recent movies.

Because of, you know, and I am biased against all CGI stuff, but I just, you can really see it in both Dial of Destiny, but particularly Crystal Skull skull what do you think i am torn on three four between temple of doom and dial of destiny and what the right order is i think that when i when i've really interesting yeah because like i agree with what amanda just said i think that there's a lot to recommend Temple of Doom

when you revisit it and to think about when it was made. It's a sexy movie. The set pieces are, like, riveting. But also, like, we just broke down whether it makes sense for arrows to hit airplanes. Like, does it make sense when the trolleys are going through the mountain and the water and the pace of it and where people exit the,

no, none of it does. And it's actually kind of like disorienting to revisit it. And obviously there are other parts of the movie that are just like genuinely problematic and don't hold up. And in terms of just the characters and how compelling they are together at short round and India are lovely. Right.

But Willie is, I mean, you, you talked about Elsa earlier, like Willie is one of the weakest characters in the history of Indiana Jones. And the fact that it's a prequel

and takes place before Raiders but comes out after, part of what makes Last Crusade so memorable and fulfilling is, like, the real feeling that, like, the character is making progress and moving forward

and we're learning something new and meaningful about his relationships and who he is. Temple of Doom not only doesn't give you that, it, like, reverts and undermines some of what's what really like is like perfectly calibrated about in the in raiders in a way that i like it's a more immature version of him yeah and so like it's it's just not it's just like not as great of a movie as people remember that said

I watched it a second time after that was my feeling revisiting it a couple weeks ago and then I rewatched it again this week and I was like this is still fucking great

because it's an original trilogy Indiana Jones movie so that's kind of that's kind of where I am I mean it just seems like all of those guys

were in a really ugly place and it's just as we've said it's bad vibes throughout but it's still torn sleeve indie with his chest showing on the bridge though yes sensational i think generally i agree with both of you guys i think that the movie has a lot of flaws i find it to be a little slow honestly yeah and it kind of it kind of drags i haven't watched rewatched it twice in the last few weeks. You're an absolute maniac, even by my standards. I think, obviously, it's pretty culturally insensitive,

and there are serious demerits for that. The villains are the least memorable. The MacGuffin is the least memorable. Molaram is really memorable in my mind. As a performance, sure. As a character, too. Really? Whether or not that's the right kind of character

for this franchise to be portraying, I think is up for discussion. To me, as a kid, Molaram was very memorable. Almost iconic, candidly. I think if you're going through the movies and saying, what are these people fighting for?

What are they trying to achieve? What does anybody actually want? There's the least established in the text of the story. Now, that's not why everyone watches Indiana Jones movies, and that's fine like it's an action adventure movie it is it has more horror elements in a fun way than some of the other movies i think dial of destiny and it maybe this is recency bias is a more fulfilling indiana jones

story and that would be my case for considering it at three i think ultimately i would put temple of doom at three because of its like historic significance and weight and Dial of Destiny at four. But I do think there's, I came out of Dial of Destiny, I was like, this is three. This is the third best indie movie.

And now I'm kind of like. You feel firmly there or have you been convinced at all? I agree with Mallory on Temple of Doom at three, but Dial of Destiny, like higher in my heart while being at four. It is more,

I think it's more enjoyable, but. And yeah, fulfilling. There's something very fulfilling about it. You know, I thought the Barcamini's stuff was like pretty silly

and it is bloated and you can see it trying to be the throwback. You know, it just has like the weight of all the other movies on it. So I think it probably is Temple of Doom 3, Dial of Destiny 4. It's interesting that we're arriving at that conclusion, which I'm aligned with you guys. And that would mean the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull would come in at five. Because I, like so many other people, frankly, in America these days, are revisiting Kingdom of the Crystal Skull would come in at five. Because I, like so many other people, frankly, in America these days,

are revisiting Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. And once again, not unlike Dial of Destiny, through about an hour of the movie, I was like, good, great movie. Really enjoying this film starring Harrison Ford as Indiana Jones. Sure. It does take some unfortunate turns. And I would say specifically the last 15 minutes of the movie, I'm like, what the fuck is going on here?

It is a huge misfire, in my opinion, at last 15 minutes of the movie I'm like what the fuck is going on here it is a huge misfire at the very in my opinion at the very conclusion of the movie but even some of the stuff I didn't like so much the chase through the jungle

the swinging on the vines with the monkeys the ants attacking the ants are bad so so bad it's funny I was kind of comfortable with it

the ants I don't mind the monkeys no no no it's horrible the way that I rewatched this was that I wanted to revisit some of it before we saw Dial of Destiny. But I only got through.

I watched until Marion shows back up. Okay. Which is like a lovely moment. And so I rolled into Dial of Destiny and I think said to you, I was like, you know what? Pretty good, honestly. We were misremembering. But then I felt that I needed to finish the rewatch before this podcast. So I got only like that last 45 minutes.

That on its own is a tough ride. What happened? It is really not good. Why is that movie like that? I don't understand. I don't know. I think we've all had the same experience revisiting it. I said to you, Sean, the morning after I rewatched it a couple weeks ago,

Crystal Skull, not as bad as we all remember and think and I enjoyed it a lot more certainly than I did in 2008 and and then I anticipated that I would but it just has way more flaws than even if it has more to recommend it than I think we recall which it does it just has way more like devastating flaws than it and again the Mutt stuff is I think what most people would cite more so even than the like actual alien high mind reveal and all of that but like also like the sci-fi chats i mean that's a terrible indiana jones villain i mean it's so cape planchette but i don't know i don't know what's motivating you as an enthusiast say that this is up there with like tom hanks and elvis is like some of the most baffling accent work we've ever gotten in movies. It's not great.

Yeah. The Mac character. Is Mac Ray Winstone? Yeah. Like of all of the different people who were. It's a lot of double, triple, quadruple crosses there. Yeah. Like, okay, this is somebody who is either a foe or a friend and has history with Indy that they're alluding to constantly.

But we have no affection for that character or interest in that character. So it just doesn't work anywhere near as well as some of the other figures who are in that kind of role. They don't let John Hurt talk for like an hour and a half. He is there though. But he gets to draw

which is great. Sure, but they don't let him speak. It's still really fun though. I also like, what do the aliens want? I rewatched this and I just, what? Well, that's part of it too, right?

It's like the whole let's find, you know, the golden city of El Dorado and then the bad guys want the skull to basically like exert mind control over the planet. That's what the Russians want. And the good guys, right? Ox, Indy, actually experience this telepathic connection

staring into the eyes of the crystal skull of the alien being. There's all the stuff about, you know, crystal's not magnetized, neither is gold. And so there's this like, okay, well, what is the power and how will it be used? But I don't know, in a Spielberg movie, it's of course like seems totally appropriate that there would be some sort of alien presence. And I think Indy confronting something alien instead of just historic or religious and thinking about history through the lens of maybe a force we didn't understand is like all of that theoretically I find kind of paper it's kind of compelling yeah it's just an execution problem

yeah so then this is basically chalk this is what people would imagine probably if they thought the dial of destiny was not going to be a fiasco. Which all the way up until the first trailer people were like Dial of Destiny! Exciting! What I wonder is if we did this in like 15 years

if we'll have Dial of Destiny at three. I might change my mind when I see it again tomorrow. It's possible that I see more flaws or that I'm even more moved by it.

I don't really know. I'm quite curious. So then our rankings will be in order. Number five, Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. Number four, Dial of will be in order. Number five, Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. Number four, Dial of Destiny by a Hare. Number three, Temple of Doom.

Number two, which is really one B, is The Last Crusade. And one A is, of course, Raiders of the Lost Ark, one of the greatest movies ever made. And I don't understand why people in this pod keep dismissing it. I'm not dismissing it. I love Raiders. No, don't say that I'm dismissing Raiders of the Lost Ark. I love that movie. I won't allow it. You nag dismissing Raiders of the Lost Ark. I love that movie.

I won't allow it. You nagged it a little bit so you could get last crusade points. That's all I'm saying. The thing about you just trying to psych people out. I have never nagged Raiders of the Lost Ark, nor will I on a podcast. Because you get psyched out. No, is that all of your previous statements are recorded. So we can just rewind the tape.

I stand by everything. Okay. I stand by it all. I think that Raiders of the Lost Ark is a sacred text. Do not imply otherwise, or I will ask you about the Mets. We're not talking about that here. Speaking of blasphemy. You're going to make me collateral damage to that?

Come on. Mal, any closing thoughts? Any other Harrison Ford floating emotions that you need to put out into the universe right now? I just think he's an incredibly special presence in our shared history. You're the most important face in the history of civilization. Yeah, I feel that way. She said replace it with the Mona Lisa. I understand like sex and desire

to the extent that I do, which is a matter for another podcast because of Harrison Ford, sincerely. He's just a seminal presence in my life from the very beginning. My dad taking me to see the original Star Wars movies. My mom sitting me down to watch Working Girl. Very different experiences with my divorced parents,

but they all centered around Harrison Ford. The first time you see Working Girl. It's memorable. It's really, really special. You just like looked deeply into my eyes when you said that. And I honestly don't know why. I don't either. I'm out of here.

Harrison Ford is a treasure. I just, just absolutely never tire of revisiting his movies. When you guys were starting the Hall of Fame and you all had you all indicated a similar experience it's just like the most fun you can have is booting up a Harrison Ford movie and spending two hours watching him

be magical. It's great. I think the only other thing I would say is that Joe and I had the pleasure of chatting with James Bangle for Ringiverse. So check that out this weekend. How did you find James? Fantastic. Really wonderful. He's articulate

and says many words. Does he say many words to you? Yes, he had very thoughtful answers for our questions. It was really wonderful. It was great. Where else can we find you? You have a Baltimore Orioles podcast going right every day. Bobby and I are going to be starting a daily

dispatch that it's just our slacks but Mallory asked me to carve out between 15 minutes and 15 hours at some point over the next week

to talk to her about Yeah, I did say like I need to know the moment that you're leaving LA so I can make sure we have enough time to talk about Adley Rutschman

Jordan Westberg and Gunnar Henderson together before you go. Come with me to LAX. Yeah, happy to. If it means we can talk about Felix Batista. Amanda, do you have any closing thoughts? I was just going to ask her the Orioles doing well or not well?

Incredibly well. Oh, that's exciting. It's great. It's June though. Wow. This is what it's like. This is what I'm talking about. It's completely unnecessary.

I want you to protect your heart. I've shared an office with you through multiple Orioles seasons. I know what's going on. It's happening. We're going back to the playoffs. I saw these guys last year, okay? You know? And that was ugly.

That is true. Here's a true story. I'll leave you with this. We are planning a 70th birthday trip for my dad this fall. And we were supposed to do it in October. And he recently said to me, we cannot do it in October and he recently said to me we cannot do it in October because we cannot risk missing the Orioles playoff game.

And I said I'm like very nauseous. You're right. You guys, that's not dangerous. You're too close to it. You're too high on your own supply right now. Your soul is pure. We always appreciate you. Thank you for being here Mallory. Thanks to our producer Bobby Wagner for his work on this episode next week on the big picture what

are we doing we're having all our friends back yeah Mal will be back Bobby will be back some other all-stars an epic all-star episode best movies of the year so far we'll see you then you