Aren't You Glad You Saw Dial?

We knew we were going to watch it eventually, so we bit the bullet and put on Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny (2023). SPOILER - Harrison Ford de-aged pretty well.

It starts out on a Nazi train at the end of WWII. They are gathering up all the priceless artifacts, including Hitler's obsession, the Lance of Longinus. When Indy (de-aged Ford) and Toby Jones have infiltrated the train and find that the lance is a fake. Nazi Mads Mikkelsen figures this out as well - in fact, the whole trainload is fake, except for one artifact: a part of the Antikythera device, the eponymous Dial. Ford and Joes manage to get away with it, just before the train gets blown up (on a bridge, as is customary these movies).

In the present day, 1969, Ford is retiring from his professorship. Also, Marion is divorcing him and Mutt (Shia Lebeouf) has died offscreen (on his way back to his home planet, we assume). He's feeling very low, but his god-daughter, Toby Jones' daughter, Fleabag herself, Phoebe Waller-Bridge shows up, looking for info on the device. Ford had promised Jones he would destroy it because of its power, but he actually just filed it like the Ark, except in the school library. 

When they go to give it a look, they are attacked by Mikkelsen and his men. When the dust settles, Ford looks like he killed the librarians, and Waller-Bridge got away with the device. It turns out that she is not nice.

So, with the help of good old Sallah (John Rhys-Davies), Ford heads off to the stolen artifacts auction in Morocco. And so on and so on. The rest of the movie is a chase for the device, the other part of the device, the instructions for using the device, etc. Antonio Banderas gets a small part as an old friend of Indy's, but I don't think he's in the other movies like Rhys-Davies. 

The whole thing is fine - we get the usual fights, chases, and derring-do. Waller-Bridge makes a much better sparring partner/sidekick than poor Labeouf, and is served quite a bit better by the script. Ford is maybe better than ever, with the weight of age upon him. There's a cute scene of his last class before retirement where the pretty co-eds are ignoring his lecture instead of flirting with him. 

There isn't too much nostalgia and call-backery here, but I don't think this could really stand alone as a self-contained movie. But it doesn't really lean into the Last Movie in the Series feel. It pretty much has to be, given Ford's age. 

But I wish they had brought back Short Round, even for a cameo.