Possible Indiana Jones reboot coming

[Havok]

Why? What's the worst that could happen?

The new movies, good or ill are going to be what new generations come to know as Indiana Jones. Even those that do run into the originals are going to end up looking at them through the lens of the new ones. So for a reboot to suck would mean that the public image of Indiana Jones would be forever tied to something that completely sucks.

So?

[Channel72]

Why? What's the worst that could happen?

The new movies, good or ill are going to be what new generations come to know as Indiana Jones. Even those that do run into the originals are going to end up looking at them through the lens of the new ones. So for a reboot to suck would mean that the public image of Indiana Jones would be forever tied to something that completely sucks.

You might be right... but it's hard to say.

For whatever reason, I still associate James Bond with Sean Connery and the classic pre-License to Kill movies. I don't know why exactly - I wasn't even born when those movies came out. But, somehow, the older James Bond flicks (especially the ones with Connery) have had more of a permeating effect throughout pop-culture than the newer ones like Golden Eye/Quantum of Solace or whatever. Austin Powers was basically a parody of the older James Bond flicks - even if you've never seen them, they're so omnipresent throughout pop culture that you basically get the gist (evil villain petting a cat, secret base, countdown to secret base exploding, sexual puns, henchman attacks Bond in the final scene... etc.)

I wonder if the same would hold for "classic" Indiana Jones and Harrison Ford.

[Batman]

'This completely sucks' is pretty subjective anyway. I know somebody who loves the Adam West TV show version of Batman, and I think we can all agree that I do not.
To me James Bond will always be Roger Moore. Sean Connery was that old guy who 'used' to be James Bond, Lazenby was a one-movie oddity, Dalton was the guy who should have never gotten the job, Brosnan was the one who should on account on being a better Bond as Remington Steel than Dalton was as Bond but was apparently unavailable at the time, and Craig is the one one who got the job after I stopped caring.
And a lot of people will disagree with that. That's where the 'subjective' comes in.

[Eternal_Freedom]

For whatever reason, I still associate James Bond with Sean Connery and the classic pre-License to Kill movies. I don't know why exactly - I wasn't even born when those movies came out. But, somehow, the older James Bond flicks (especially the ones with Connery) have had more of a permeating effect throughout pop-culture than the newer ones like Golden Eye/Quantum of Solace or whatever. Austin Powers was basically a parody of the older James Bond flicks - even if you've never seen them, they're so omnipresent throughout pop culture that you basically get the gist (evil villain petting a cat, secret base, countdown to secret base exploding, sexual puns, henchman attacks Bond in the final scene... etc.)

I wonder if the same would hold for "classic" Indiana Jones and Harrison Ford.

I think that's probably because they've been around longer, and you get the effect of parents watching them with their kids and saying "these are the best ones" because they were the ones that came out when the parents were kids.

[Simon_Jester]

Yeah, aliens and flying saucers is TOO CRAZY, but Jesus and God being real and a box melting Nazis with... magic Jesus laser dust? is totally reasonable and not out there at all.

Put this way; it's the difference between using myths that already exist, and using myths that you just made up.

This is the same reason that people keep cycling back to the mythology of the real Greeks, Norse, and so forth. A pantheon of gods and legendary beings that you just made up isn't going to carry with it the same kind of archetypal associations that a pantheon that someone else made up and created a large canon of myth about.

We all know what "Zeus" means and can rapidly imagine lots of things associated with the character of Zeus: immense power, promiscuity, power over lightning and the sky, rulership over a group of beings who are gods in their own right. "Hercules" just plain has more resonance than a comparable fictional character of modern vintage- more longevity and more ability to persist and be viable outside his own specific milieu.

Compare and contrast the two Indy movies which reference real Judeo-Christian myth, versus the one that gratuitously makes up an Indian death cult.

Unless one is such an obsessive-compulsive cartoon-version atheist that one can't even think about Judeo-Christian legends without wanting to spit on them... the use of the Ark of the Covenant and the Holy Grail adds weight and compelling character to the story. Because it invokes the idea of an inherently supernatural and mysterious divine will, an idea which pervades large parts of both movies. Because it helps the audience perceive the supernatural awe experienced by the characters. Because it adds a bit of depth to what Indy is doing and why- he's not just a treasure hunter, he's on an actual, morally righteous crusade to preserve these artifacts from the evil of the Nazis.

When you replace these things with alien beings, you have the problem of making your fictional aliens as compelling a driver of the plot as, well, Jehovah. Not an easy task.

[Channel72]

Compare and contrast the two Indy movies which reference real Judeo-Christian myth, versus the one that gratuitously makes up an Indian death cult.

The Thuggees were a real "cult" (more like a tribe or botherhood, I guess) - they were just exaggerated and granted actual supernatural powers for Spielbergian reasons.

[Irbis]

So, looks like Indy V is happening after all:

http://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/201 ... -confirmed

Though they still can't decide who to cast...