Rank The Indiana Jones Films

Surely there's Indy fans here, being the other major Lucas property. One of my all-time favorite film series along with SW and I'm in a minority of fans who loves them all, even the much-hated Crystal Skull. How do you rank all four in order of preference? My ranking is probably quite controversial but it goes:

Temple Of Doom

Raiders Of The Lost Ark

Kingdom Of The Crystal Skull

The Last Crusade

I think Raiders is the best in a lot of ways but I find TOD the most entertaining. TOD gets a ton of flack but I love it for the much darker, harsher tone and Horror elements of it, and it's many great setpieces and action. I actually like Last Crusade and Crystal Skull about the same and alternate on them, but I find lately I like KOTCS a little better. Last Crusade is great but too similar to Raiders and too jokey at times for my liking, but it's still awesome. I often feel alone in thinking all four are excellent.

Temple of Doom

Raiders of the lost ark

Last crusade

There I ranked all three films.

Temple of Doom & Last Crusade -- a tie, more-or-less

Raiders of the Lost Ark

[big, honking gap]

Kingdom of the Crystal Skull

1. Raiders of the Lost Ark

2. Last Crusade

3. Temple of Doom

4. Kingdom of the Crystal Skull

Anyone who ranks any other way is just wrong, wrong, wrong.

Just watched all four last week, so it pleases me to see this thread.  I agree in my ranking with DominicCobb, but I also agree with the OP in that all four are good films.  My least favorite is KOTCS, but I appreciate it for what it is.  It was meant to focus on the fascination with sci-fi during the 50s, with flying saucers and Area 51.  I'm okay with that.  I like its lighter tone, its humor, its self-deprecation.

And IMO, the Mummy films are moderately enjoyable, but don't even approach Indiana Jones in style or enjoyability.

I bumped this thread recently.

http://originaltrilogy.com/forum/topic.cfm/Young-Indiana-Jones/topic/5847/

I wish we could get the original episodes with Old Indy.  Not that I enjoy those parts, but I don't really care for the format they've been released in now, with two episodes edited together. :(

darth_ender said:

Just watched all four last week, so it pleases me to see this thread.  I agree in my ranking with DominicCobb, but I also agree with the OP in that all four are good films.  My least favorite is KOTCS, but I appreciate it for what it is.  It was meant to focus on the fascination with sci-fi during the 50s, with flying saucers and Area 51.  I'm okay with that.  I like its lighter tone, its humor, its self-deprecation.

And IMO, the Mummy films are moderately enjoyable, but don't even approach Indiana Jones in style or enjoyability.

 I completely disagree with you on KOTCS.   It is so bad, that I don't consider it part of the cannon.   It is a movie that should have never been made.  

Here is my rankings:

1. Raiders of the Lost Ark

2. Indiana Jones and The Last Crusade

3. Indiana Jones and The Temple of Doom

666. Indiana Jones and The Kingdom of The Crystal Skull.

ATMachine said:

Raiders of the Lost Ark

The Mummy

The Mummy II

The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor

Strange you should mention The Mummy films, this past weekend I actually mixed The Mummy films in with the Indy films. Had a lot of fun marathoning them together, The Mummy makes for a good companion piece to the Indy films.

darth_ender said:

Just watched all four last week, so it pleases me to see this thread.  I agree in my ranking with DominicCobb, but I also agree with the OP in that all four are good films.  My least favorite is KOTCS, but I appreciate it for what it is.  It was meant to focus on the fascination with sci-fi during the 50s, with flying saucers and Area 51.  I'm okay with that.  I like its lighter tone, its humor, its self-deprecation.

And IMO, the Mummy films are moderately enjoyable, but don't even approach Indiana Jones in style or enjoyability.

 Completely agree with everything you said.

Temple

Raiders

Crusade

Skull

ID's edit of Temple of Doom is great.  I never bothered with his edit of Last Crusade because I like that movie on its own.

KotCS was saved by a couple of good edits, both Q2's and njvc's.

Oh, and reading people's lists is generally really boring.

How would I go about seeing ID's edit of Temple of Doom?

Warbler said:

How would I go about seeing ID's edit of Temple of Doom?

 fanedit.info

Raiders is clearly first

Last Crusade second

Temple Of Doom close third (maybe a tie)

Crystal Skull distant fourth, probably shouldn't count, even though it's not as bad as it's reputation suggests.

I think the problem is if one movie sets a tone, we expect the whole franchise to follow that tone. It's certainly not a great film, but KOTCS is light and different, and I really don't mind that. Above all else, my main complaint was Mac, whom we hardly got to know before he betrayed Indy, and therefore it carried absolutely no emotional weight when he did. If I can buy the Ark frying a bunch of Nazis, an evil priest ripping out hearts and the victim surviving, or a cup aging someone hundreds of years in an instant, I can overlook the survival of a nuclear blast in a fridge.  It's all fantasy anyway.

The Ark and that cup were no ordinary objects, in the Indiana Jones universe, they pocessed special powers.  As for the the guy ripping out hearts, maybe he had very sharp finger nails?  The fridge had no mystical magical powers. It stretched the line of believability beyond the breaking point.  At least it dig for me.  Also imho, aliens have no place in an Indiana Jones movie.

Warbler said:

As for the the guy ripping out hearts, maybe he had very sharp finger nails?

Seemed more like an example of psychic surgery to me.