Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull2008

62/100 It's alright, I guess? I don't know, I just expected a better comeback for a hero I've grown to love, rather than yet another cynical Hollywood attempt at modernization. Now, I will compliment the most competent aspects of the film first, starting off with John Williams' score. The iconic franchise theme is as good as ever, and the rest of the soundtrack is good enough to prevent the movie from slipping into mediocrity even through the worst scenes. The performances are also really good here. Harrison Ford is obviously great as ever as Indiana Jones and it was a nice surprise to see Karen Allen as Marion Ravenwood. In fact, I like her here somewhat more than in Raiders. When you look past the great performances and score, however, you find a mixed bag of a plot with some terrible CGI and scenes without logic thrown in for good measure. On one hand, I do like the pulpy vibe of the film, seeing as I love 60s sci-fi and this film is basically just that mixed with the adventure serials of old. However, I don't think the alien plot quite works for Indiana Jones, which is a character rooted far more in adventures with a more mythological twist. Furthermore, there are some truly idiotic scenes here. Thankfully, though, the stupidity climaxes early in which Indy climbs inside a fridge to hide from a nuke. If there's anything primed to shatter the suspension of disbelief, it's the sign of a whole town being obliterated until there's nothing left except this one fridge just flying out of the rubble, tumbling down until it finally spills open to reveal our protagonist, miraculously still alive. I guess his dad being a Christian really did pay off after all. This isn't a bad movie, not by any means. It's still Indiana Jones at it's core, and that's always fun to watch. It's just a shame that core has to be buried under tons and tons of garbage to sift through, dragging the film down to just kind of average overall.