Recap / Young Indiana Jones And The Treasure Of The Peacocks Eye

Time, Indy, is the most precious thing we own.

Treasure of the Peacock's Eye is the second of four TV movies produced between 1994 and 1996, made from what had originally been planned as episodes of the abortive third season of The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles. First broadcast on 15th January 1995. Chronologically, it is the eighteenth instalment of The Adventures of Young Indiana Jones.

The First World War finally ends, but not before Indy and Remy (back on the Western Front) try and fail to apprehend an Indian soldier suspected of passing information to the Germans — but they do obtain a treasure map from this encounter. Following the Armistice, our two heroes return to London — only to set off for Egypt (subsequently Java and, later still, the islands of the South Pacific) to try and find the treasure, the legendary Peacock's Eye diamond. But they are not the only ones trying to find it.

This episode contains examples of:

• Acrofatic: Despite being rather overweight, Remy — by this point, a veteran of several World War I theatres — is very handy in a fight, at one point taking out several gun-toting pirates with a wooden oar before being overwhelmed.
• Actor Allusion: Adrian Edmondson's portrayal of Zyke may bring to mind his portrayal of Baron von Richthofen in Blackadder Goes Forth, although this time he's playing it more sinister than camp.
• All for Nothing: After going through his tribe's initiation ritual, Biok dies in a meaningless skirmish against the warriors of another tribe. What makes it so pointless is that the tribes are not enemies, they just have the occasional skirmish because their ancestors apparently told them to do so.
• All There in the Script: In a scene that didn't make it into the final cut, Indy tries to find Vicky after returning to England when the war finishes, only to be told by her father that she has moved to San Francisco to become a writer.
• Almost Dead Guy: Rajendra Singh, whose dying words (mere seconds before World War I ends) set Indy and Remy off on their quest.
  Rajendra Singh: The eye of the peacock. You must stop him. Stop him! The eye of the peacock...
• Ambiguous Situation: Was Rajendra Singh passing information to the Germans? Indy and Remy have been ordered by French military intelligence to apprehend him on suspicion of this, but his (British) commanding officer refuses to believe it. Singh is seen conversing with a German soldier in No Man's Land, and is shot by said soldier — who turns out to have been Zyke, but he was after the Treasure Map, not military-related information. The question of whether or not Singh was aiding and abetting the enemy is rendered moot by his death, followed (a few seconds later) by the Armistice.
• British Stuffiness: Exemplified by Howard Carter, whose addressing of Indy as "Henry" actually counts as a term of endearment (given that he addresses E.M. Forster by surname only in the same scene).
• The Bus Came Back: A few examples.
  • Remy, last seen heading off to be a a spy in occupied Belgium at the start of Attack of the Hawkmen, returns ^note  chronologically at least, although this TV movie was actually broadcast before that one .
  • Suzette, who Remy met and married in Love's Sweet Song, returns; even though the war is over, she still lives in London and runs the Café Belgique.
  • Pip Torrens reprises his role as Howard Carter — although this is his first appearance alongside Indy as played by Sean Patrick Flanery. He'd previously appeared in My First Adventure, which originally aired as the Corey Carrier part of Young Indiana Jones and the Curse of the Jackal, the first-ever episode.
  • There's also an aversion — after returning to England, Indy goes to Oxford to see his old tutor Helen Seymour, only to find out that she has recently died (although she did leave a letter for Indy which is read out in the voice of her actress).
• Call-Back: This is not the first time Remy ends up disguised as a woman.
• Call-Forward: A few.
  • There's one to Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, given that it was later confirmed ^note  via two officially-sanctioned books, namely the junior novelisation of Temple of Doom and Indiana Jones: The Ultimate Guide, both of which were published in 2008 to coincide with the release of Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull that the Peacock's Eye is the diamond that's in the possession of Lao Che in the opening scene of that movie — thus validating a long-held fan theory. Whatever happens to Remy after this episode (chronologically, his final appearance in Indy's adventures), he evidently doesn't manage to find the diamond.
  • The scene in which Indy and Remy watch Zyke while he's looking for the Peacock's Eye in the Java temple is reminiscent of the scene in the prologue of Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade in which Indy and the other Boy Scout come across the original Fedora guy and his associates looking for the Cross of Coronado. This also counts as an allusion to Raiders of the Lost Ark, given that Indy quickly figures out that Zyke is "looking in the wrong place".
  • A further allusion to Raiders comes later, when Indy and Remy narrowly escape from a group of native warriors in a scene reminiscent of the prologue of that film — although here, the escape is done in a rowing-boat rather than a seaplane.
• Captured by Cannibals: Implied, then defied. When captured by the natives on the second island, Indy and Remy think they're destined for the pot, but nothing the natives actually do indicates that this is so.
• Chairman of the Brawl: Indy uses a wooden chair to knock out one of Zyke's mooks in the Alexandria hotel room scene.
• Chased by Angry Natives: Occurs on the first of the Pacific islands that Indy and Remy land on. The pirates, who got there first, are not just chased, but killed. Our heroes manage to escape.
• Dark and Troubled Past: Seemingly the case with Lily, who became an associate of Zyke (and shot him when he tried to kill her); by her own admission she has something of a dubious reputation beyond this, but it is not expanded on in the all-too-brief time she has on screen.
  Lily: I'm an embarrassment to anyone that knows me, so why would you like me to sit with you?
• Dead Woman Writing: Helen Seymour (Indy's former tutor) dies before he can meet up with her after the war. But she wrote a letter to him, urging him to make peace with his father, and then make something of himself.
• Disc-One Final Boss: It looks as though Zyke, the one-eyed German who shot Rajendra Singh at the start, is the story's primary antagonist — he's certainly in competition with Indy and Remy to find the diamond, However, he is abruptly killed (by Lily, it later transpires) at the halfway point.
• Eyepatch of Power: Zyke sports one, having presumably lost his right eye at some point during World War One.
• Fire-Forged Friends: Indy and Remy, who have fought together as Belgian soldiers throughout World War I and seen more action than most. Saldy, their friendship doesn't last long in peacetime as Remy succumbs to greed in his obsession to find the diamond, while Indy would rather follow his dream and return to the USA to study archaeology (his "fortune and glory" phase will come later).
• Friend to All Children: Indy, as ever; on the island, he quickly befriends Biok, one of the native boys.
• The Gambler: Remy displays shades of this, as he never sees a card game he doesn't want to join ... even though he and Indy don't exactly have the funds to back him. It helps that he's a pretty good player.
• Happily Married: Remy and Suzette, who've only seen each other for a few days since their wedding in 1916, come across as this in the brief time we see them together ^note  presumably she doesn't know that he invariably availed himself of the services of prostitutes whenever he was on leave from the frontline . She gives the heroes her grandmother's necklace in order to finance their adventure, as she hopes they'll find the diamond and make themselves (and, by extension, her) rich. Which helps to explain why Remy becomes so obsessed with finding the diamond — his wife put up the money for the quest by selling a family heirloom, making him somewhat reluctant to go home empty-handed.
• Headscratchers: How did Lily, a young Englishwoman, end up in a bar in Batavia (the capital of the Dutch East Indies ^note  nowadays known as Jakarta, the capital of Indonesia )?
  • The Doylist explaination is that character was meant to be Dutch, but the (English) actress who got the part used her own accent. No Watsonian explanation is forthcoming as she dies in the shoot-out on the pirate ship.
• Historical Domain Character: A few, as ever. Indy and Remy meet Howard Carter and E. M. Forster for tea while in Alexandria. Later, in the South Pacific, they meet Bronislaw Malinowski a Polish-Austrian anthropologist who spent many years studying Pacific Islanders. He convinces Indy to abandon the hunt for the diamond and follow his dream of returning to the USA and studying archaeology.
• Homage: This episode is pretty much this to The Maltese Falcon. The titular MacGuffin was once part of a priceless gold statue of a bird with diamond eyes, and (some of) the villains plan to sell it to a mysterious figure referred to as "The Fat Man".
• I'm Dying, Please Take My MacGuffin: Subverted, given that Indy and Rémy have to find the Treasure Map on Rajendra Singh's corpse rather than him giving it to them.
• Invisible Writing: The Treasure Map has some secret instructions that are revealed when Remy inadvertently knocks a glass of wine over the map.
• Low-Speed Chase: After the pirates' ship blows up and sinks, the pirates escape in a rowing-boat. Indy and Remy attempt to pursue them in a similar vessel.
• MacGuffin: The titular Peacock's Eye, a 140-carat diamond — one of a pair that once formed the eyes of a gold peacock statue that used to be owned by Alexander the Great. We never actually see it, although we do see a glass replica in the museum scene.
• Mr. Fanservice: Indy (played by Sean Patrick Flanery) has a couple of shirtless scenes.
• Noodle Incident: We do not find out how or why Indy and Remy got assigned to the task of investigating espionage on the part of Allied soldiers on the Western Front, and nor do we learn anything of what Remy has been up to since he was last seen in Attack of the Hawkmen.
• Oh, Crap!: Indy and Remy have this reaction when the second remote island they come across turns out, like the first one, to be inhabited by (initially) angry natives.
• Paper-Thin Disguise: When Indy and Remy disguise themselves as Arabs in order to follow Zyke on board the S.S. Van Diemen (sailing from Port Said to Batavia) without him recognising them, Remy sports what appears to be a somewhat unconvincing burqa and niqab.
• Rite of Passage: Indy and Remy witness the island natives performing what appears to be one of these.
• Ruthless Modern Pirates: The S.S. Vondel (the ship Indy and Remy take from Batavia to Singapore) is raided by a well-organised gang of these. The female singer from the restaurant turns out to be one of them.
• Screw This, I'm Outta Here: After discussing things with Malinowski, Indy comes to realise that he should stop trying to find the diamond and concentrate on going to university and studying to fulfil his dream of becoming an archaeologist. Remy, by contrast, is obsessed with finding the diamond, and becomes angry with Indy for apparently quitting on him.
  Remy: We are so close! When I close my eyes, I can feel it in my hands!
  Indy: No, no! Remy, you don't know if we're close. We could go on searching for clues for years! It has to stop somewhere, and for me it stops here!
• Shout-Out: While studying native tribes, Bronislaw Malinowski is reading Brewster's Millions.
• Shout-Out to Shakespeare: Lily's last words — "Goodbye, my prince" — echo the words spoken by Horatio to the dying Hamlet.
• Single Woman Seeks Good Man: Lily warms to Indy because, unlike everyone else she's met on Java, he's actually nice to her.
• Surprisingly Realistic Outcome: Indy believes he can track down the titular gemstone that belonged to Alexander the Great. He may be an intelligent would-be Adventurer Archaeologist, but the Peacock's Eye is an immensely valuable relic that was looted by treasure hunters centuries ago, has traveled far ever since and is still being hunted by men who will happily kill for it. Indy could spend the rest of his life following up leads and never find it. The fact that he realises this and backs out sours his friendship with Rremy, who invested his wife's fortune backing Indy's hunch. This is made more poignant with the retcon that made the Peacock's Eye the diamond at the start of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom — by that point, Indy has gone to even more elaborate lengths to find it, only to fail to obtain it again.
• Took a Level in Jerkass: Remy, thanks to his growing obsession with finding the diamond. He becomes strongly resistant to anyone who he sees as trying to muscle in on his and Indy's plan — even towards Malinowski, who genuinely isn't interested in the diamond but helps Indy to translate the inscription on the stone (by contrast, Remy himself had earlier got the man at the museum to translate part of the map). Ultimately, Remy's increasingly petulant behaviour leads to him and Indy falling out; by the end, they are barely on speaking terms.
• Treasure Map: Remy finds one on Rajendar Singh's body which seems to indicate where the Eye of the Peacock is hidden; once he finds out that said item is a diamond, he's very keen to try and find it.
• Troubled, but Cute: Lily is a female example of this trope.
• We Hardly Knew Ye: Lily is presented as a potential love interest for Indy, but is killed in the shoot-out on the pirate ship before they can get anywhere romantically.
• We Used to Be Friends: Indy and Remy fall out over their differing attitude to the diamond; Remy has become obsessed with it, while Indy would rather get on with his life. At the end of the episode, they leave the island together but are barely on speaking terms; Indy is looking forward to studying archaeology, while Remy has no thoughts for anything but the diamond.
• Wham Episode: In this episode, Miss Seymour dies (off-screen) and Indy and Remy's friendship ends. Indy is never quite the same after either event.
• What the Hell, Hero?: On finding that the strong-box contains a stone (and not the diamond as he'd hoped), Remy becomes angry and starts sulking. Indy notices that the stone has an inscription on it, and gets Malinowski to help him translate it. When Remy learns of this, he angrily asks Malinowski what he wants in return — prompting Indy to call him out on his behaviour.
• You Never Asked: The man at the museum says this to Remy when he starts to tell the heroes the story of how a British officer in India in the early nineteenth century apparently found the diamond, only for Remy to interrupt to say that he hadn't told him this when they first met.