Review of Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny (2023) by Healingtoolbox — 30 Jun 2023

8.5/10 for me. RTomato has it as 68 for critics and 89 for fans. This makes sense to me. At a reported cost of $300 million, this is the most expensive rehash of 1980s Indy tropes ever made. If you are eight years old now, it will make you want to play the video game (which is in the works).

This may be it's main reason for existing, to feed the franchise. As a critic, I'm aware it's a script in search of a soul; or, which has given up on having a soul. As a fan, I felt like I was time-traveling back to the first three Indy's for a fourth.

There is not any acknowledgement of how audiences and the world has changed since the 1980s. In this Indy5 is "opium for the masses" in a world desperately in need of local, regional and national mobilization against corporate monopoly governing making our world a dystopia.

I think most Indy fans will appreciate the Indy-flavored opium and admire the amazing effort and professionalism which is up on the screen.