Although the Indiana Jones movies aren’t lacking in supporters by any means, the film series is certainly no stranger to polarizing responses. Arguably the best example of this is Kingdom of the Crystal Skull; while there are those who will defend the 2008 movie, critical reception among the fanbase was unquestionably mixed, with many feeling it wasn’t at the same level of quality as the original trilogy. James Mangold, the director and co-writer behind Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny, is among those people, and he’s shared his big issue with Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.
If you’ve been following the news surrounding Dial of Destiny, you know that the 2023 new movie release opens with a World War II-set action sequence featuring a de-aged Harrison Ford, while the movie’s main story takes place in 1969. As Mangold explained to Variety, this sequence serves as a nice contrast to his main complaint with how Indy was depicted in Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, namely that it, as the outlet put it, “barely acknowledges that Indy is not only older but has aged out of the 1930s and ’40s era that he’s meant to embody.” In the filmmaker’s words:
