Indiana Jones 2 and 4: why the drop in quality?

[Ernest Rister]

Originally Posted by UniSol GR77

Indiana & the Temple of Doom:

No plot, no good dialogues, but iconic last parts.
Especially the bridge sequence, it's a legendary scene.... impressive.
But the movie is so childish. No plot, no story, I don't like the dialogues at all and Indy looks VERY out of character.
The humour is so cliché and overdone in this, especially Kate's. Tons of scenes where she is afraid of wild animals and insects. Jesus...
Most of the action in the titular temple is a bit weak and tired. Children fighting skilled warriors... oh God.
But I love this regardless, it's an iconic and fun movie. Still, it's vastly inferior to Part 1 and 3. Vastly.

Couldn't POSSIBLY disagree more. Last Crusade turns Indiana Jones from the rough-edged, Bogart-tinged rugged survivor willing to do almost anything, even kill, to obtain the Ark or save the stolen children and the Sankara Stones...into a boy scout. Literally. Marcus is turned into a clueless idiot, Sallah into a bumbling Egyptian stereotype and when he's not rounding up camels he's saying things like, "Indy! Your father is trapped in the belly of that steel beast!" The best digger in Cairo can't say the word, "tank"? The screenplay is cheap, a structural copy of Raiders, and goes for easy laughs, Spielberg looks like he's on autopilot.

Temple of Doom is glorious. Spielberg is on fire with masterful choreography and energy, from beginning to end. Characters pop off the screen, John Williams delivers one of his best scores, the film has drive and unique action set pieces and is unlike anything I've seen before or since.

Indiana & the Crystal Skull:

What was Spielberg thinking???

"Maybe now George will shut up about this movie." ???