My mum and Grandma loved it, which surprised me considering they are normally bigger critics than I am. I didn't
hate it, but I very far from loved it. To me, it seemed more like a 'Indiana Jones Comedy Reunion' or a 'X-files in the past, but with Indiana Jones instead of Mulder' than an Indy movie. I'm gonna throw in some spoilers, if you wish to see them, highlight the text below. I can't really express my BIG problems with the movie without spoiling it for people who haven't seen it yet and still wish to do so.
Well, here's the real big problem. Let's take a look at the Indiana Jones movies. Okay, each one deals with a religious artifact and religious mythology, and inbetween the history and myth, they have fun action sequences and great humour inbetween. Although Kingdom started out good, there is one HUGE problem: ALIENS. Now, where do you expect to see Aliens? In a sci-fi movie. Do you honestly expect Aliens to be in an Action Adventure, especially Indy? I was willing to accept the Aliens at first, because it is true what they say about the crystal skulls, how they were modeled after the peoples 'gods,' and how they would make those symbols in the fields for their 'gods' to see, suggesting Aliens, but that's all historical, so I felt it was believable. However, I wasn't going to buy that the aliens were made of crystal, were psychic, and aren't dead and will come back to life if their leader has his skull back. WTH!? Also, why did they throw in El Dorado for no reason? The movie almost had NOTHING to do with El Dorado yet it was in there. The plot was confusing, and another big problem is besides Indy, you don't care about the characters! The other movies had great supporting characters, my favourite is still Indy's father. They even bring back the main female lead from Raiders, yet in this movie she ends up being uninteresting and annoying. There's even one character, this is serious now, that does not have a name, looks like a hobo, acts like an idiotic hobo, and you suddenly notice he's with the gang and you are like "Huh!? What?! Where the hell did he come from!?" Some of the action scenes are fun, but there are too few, sadly.
I was hoping even if the film was bad, it would at least be better than Temple of Doom. Sadly, its confusing plot, uninteresting characters, overuse of humour to the point it gets stale (Which is a first, considering the humour was great in the first 3) and CGI animated Whips and Gophers and other things that they could have EASILY done in live action, just make it feel fake and dumb. And as bad as Temple of Doom was with plot, at least Temple of Doom had some exciting moments, whereas Crystal Skull didn't put me on edge for more than a minute. If you are a diehard Indy fan, see it anyways, it's still worth seeing it as it wasn't HORRIBLE, but it was bad. I know it sounds weird to say to the people who are likely to be the most disappointed that they should still see it, but at least some of the humourous scenes are funny and of course, the best part of the film is the titular character.
