"The British in India will be slaughtered. Then we will overrun the Muslims. Then the Hebrew God will fall, and then the Christian God will be cast down and forgotten. Soon, Kali Ma will rule the world."
"We will crush the intruders out and wash the earth with their blood. Their deaths will cleanse us. Their screams from the stake will lull us to sleep. For it is such a purity death has, such a perfect beauty."
— Mattias Targo, The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles, "Masks of Evil"
Indiana Jones may hate snakes, but the Adventurer Archaeologist has faced far worse.
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Films
Examples
- Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom: Mola Ram, head of the cult of Kali Ma, intends to find the Sankara Stones to bring forth the reign of Kali in a wave of slaughter. To find the stones, he has children abducted from their villages and enslaved, forcing them into grueling labor and abuse. Ram also has a habit of ritualistic sacrifice by ripping the hearts out from his victims and dipping them in lava to burn alive and screaming. Mola also uses the "Blood of Kali" to brainwash local politicians and royalty to become devout servants of Kali, doing the same to Indy and nearly having him sacrifice his own love interest Willie, and finally attempts to plunge Indy to ravenous crocodiles in the climax, dumping his own men to their deaths while attempting to hit Indy.
- Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny:
- Oberarzt Jürgen Voller is defined by his withering disdain for the "occult" and the Führer's obsession with it, an obsession Voller rules as the reason for Germany's failure in World War II. With no faith in Hitler but still a heartless, racist Nazi even twenty years after the war ends, Voller sets his sights on the Antikythera, an ancient dial that Voller reasons is a time machine that will allow him to rewrite world history, plotting to assassinate Hitler as to replace him and steer Germany to victory. Voller gets multiple innocent people killed during his pursuit of the dial, apathetically permitting his unhinged right-hand man Klaber to murder anyone he comes across. In one instance, Voller kidnaps Indy's friend Renaldo, has the man's crew slaughtered, then shoots Renaldo dead right in front of Indy just to spite him. Willing to kill children and leave even his own loyal men for dead, Voller's ultimate interest in rewriting history is to play God and satisfy an ego that eclipses even Hitler's own.
- Klaber is an American Neo-Nazi and Voller's Trigger-Happy right hand attack dog who shares his boss' goal of rewriting history for a Nazi success. Enforcing Voller's "No witnesses" policy with sadistic glee, Klaber guns down anyone who witnesses Voller's plans, even for simply being there at the wrong time. Captured by the CIA along with Voller for being reckless, Klaber slaughters all of his captors, gloating to his handler Mason before executing her. Tailing the heroes, Klaber infiltrates Indy's ally Renaldo's boat and wipes out his entire crew. Sent back in time by the Antikythera to a Roman siege along with Voller, Klaber ignores his boss's attempt to try and save themselves and instead focuses on mowing down dozens of Roman soldiers with maniacal contempt, regarding them as savages.
Comic Books
The Further Adventures of Indiana Jones
Examples
- Issues #15 & 16—"The Sea Butchers" two-parter: Emeralda Vasquez is the leader of a group of Ruthless Modern Pirates who prowl the waters around the Aleutian Islands in a stolen American submarine. When she encounters the crew of Indy's ally Katanga, Emeralda cows him into cooperating with her by having one of his innocent crewmen murdered, then shortly after tries to kill Katanga and his entire crew anyway. A vicious Bad Boss, Emeralda forces a mook who stole from her to play a game of Russian Roulette, telling him he has a five-to-one chance to survive. When he blows his brains out, Emeralda reveals every single chamber was loaded. Later, Emeralda tries to blow up a ship full of dozens of people to rid herself of Indy, totally apathetic to the idea this would wipe out all of her remaining men.
- Issue #19—"Dragon By The Tail!": General Makimura is a Japanese mystic who attempts to capture a living dragon to unleash it off the coast of California, allowing it to ravage most of the USA and countless lives with it before he and his men take over the rest. Inevitably—and to his apathy—Makimura's recklessness cause the dragon to be freed and destroy his men and whatever else is in its path, nearly killing numerous children before being stopped by Indy.
- Issues #26 & 27—"...Golden Guns" two-parter:
- Count Alexander Salkovich is a wicked Russian nobleman oppressing Cossacks in southern Ukraine at the behest of his sponsors, the Bolsheviks. Salkovich conducts a steady campaign to erode their support among the peasantry in preparation for a Final Solution that will wipe the Cossacks from the face of the Earth. In confrontation with Indy, the Count shoots one of Indy's Cossack allies dead just because he can, and permits his lecherous minion Ilya Pugachev to rape Indy's female friend, stipulating only that he kill her afterward.
- Ilya Pugachev is a slimy traitor to the Cossacks who has willingly signed on with Salkovich to help with the extermination of his own people. Ilya introduces himself vamping onto Indy's ally Elizabeth Cody, and takes Indy's intervention as an excuse to try and murder Indy by means of drawing-and-quartering. Revealing his true allegiances after this, Ilya later on once again attempts to rape and murder Elizabeth.
Others
- Thunder in the Orient, written by Dan Barry: General Masashi Kyojo, a wicked Japanese soldier with ambitions of conquering Asia, introduces himself double-crossing and murdering a treasure hunter who imparts vital information to him. In pursuit of the fabled Covenant of Buddha, Kyojo spares no expense: killing his own Giant Mook on a whim; forcing three of his own soldiers to commit hara-kiri for their failure; and even gleefully having a village airbombed. Kyojo sneers to Indiana Jones that today his head will roll, and tomorrow the West will follow him.
Literature
Bantam Books series
Examples
- Indiana Jones and the Interior World, by Rob MacGregor: Maleiwa, the tyrant ruler of the Waluya people in the "interior world" Indy discovers, revels in defying the one creed of his people: nothing by force. Maleiwa has hundreds executed in his regime, and, with designs to rule the exterior world as well, attempts to use a powerful talisman to ingratiate himself with the Nazis, allowing them to win and kill millions in the process. Maleiwa intends to betray Adolf Hitler and take over himself when all is done, brushing off the chaos he'll throw both worlds into and attempting to have Indy trapped forever in the Land of the Lost for opposing him. Speculated to be the counterpart of Hitler himself, Maleiwa demonstrates himself to be worse than almost any Nazi or enemy of Indy's fought then or since.
- Indiana Jones and the Sky Pirates & Indiana Jones and the White Witch, by Martin Caidin: Konstantin LeBlanc Cordas is a sadistic crime lord and billionaire, who under previous identities worked slaves to death in drug fields and sold weapons to the Nazis. Cordas faked his own death to escape justice and comes into conflict with Indy when he and his terrorists come upon the village of St. Bernard's Glen. Cordas massacres 39 innocent people, women and children among them, while personally torturing the village's leader to death in full view of her husband and promising worse atrocities should the remaining villagers not cooperate. When the daughter of the deceased leader finds him, Cordas is totally remorseless, and simply tries to implore her to kill him, the ultimate testament to a man whose chief philosophy in life is that Murder Is the Best Solution.
- Indiana Jones and the Dinosaur Eggs, by Max McCoy: General Tzi is a Mongolian warlord and a monstrous cannibal who decorates his camp with the body parts of his victims. In the past, Tzi murdered and ate the wife and children of one of Indy's allies, Tzen Khan, before torturing Khan's friend to death and sending Khan an ear to spite him for having anything left to call precious. When Tzi captures Indy, he decides to eat his brain and heart to gain his courage, trying to have the American missionary Joan sold as a prostitute and his other friend fed to his abused, man-eating dogs. At the climax, Tzi attempts to destroy an entire valley of innocent, pacifistic villagers just to get to Indy.
- Indiana Jones and the Hollow Earth, by Max McCoy: Rudolf Reingold, an SS captain appointed by Hitler himself to make the Nazis gods, wastes no time in proving himself one of the worst in the Nazis' ranks, ruthlessly running a helpless old man over to steal his briefcase and attempting to bury Indy alive. Reingold manipulates his subordinate Alicia into Nazi clutches, and when she attempts to renege due to her love for Indy, Reingold shoots her dead, mocking her as she dies at the prospect that he would ever let a woman into the SS ranks. Reingold fully intends bring glory to Germany upon finding the godlike power he's been searching for, allowing the Nazis to destroy millions and annihilate entire cities as gods among men.
Others
Examples
- Find Your Fate's Indiana Jones and the Eye of the Fates, by Richard Wenk: Dr. Kroton Orlock is a seemingly benign historian who in actuality has been using a precognitive MacGuffin called the Eye of the Fates to scry the future, letting him steal strategic information from nations and sell it off for billions. Not content with this, Orlock intends to use the Eye to drive humanity to destruction and despair for his own amusement, gloating he'll kill hundreds of millions with war and famine.
- Indiana Jones and the Army of the Dead, by Steve Perry: Boukman is a powerful, ancient bokor in Haiti with powers over zombis. Boukman either drugs his victims into servile slaves or literally murders them so he can resurrect them, favoring the "young and beautiful". Boukman is willing to sacrifice his own great-niece—whose mother he murdered—as a sacrifice to empower himself, as well as the entire village of innocent people he's terrorized for so long, and in the end, he seeks to unleash a Zombie Apocalypse so he can rule the graveyard he's made of the planet.
- Indiana Jones and the Staff of Kings novelization
, by Rob MacGregor: Magnus Völler, former Adventurer Archaeologist and rival to Indy in his student years, is by the time of the novel an ice-cold Nazi officer. Magnus seeks the Staff of Moses for Nazi Germany, and to this end launches a bloody attack on a holy city that his old mentor Professor Kingston is living in. In short order, Magnus massacres dozens of people in the city's temple, kills Kingston himself, and is stopped only seconds before he can have his warplanes fire upon a gigantic crowd of men, women, and children. Magnus is scarcely any better to his own allies, executing them for failure, for being wounded, or even for giving him key information about Indy and his allies.
Other Media
Examples
- Indiana Jones and the Monkey King script, by Chris Columbus (link): Sgt. Helmut Gutterbuhg is the slimy, conniving second-in-command to Lt. Werner Von Mephisto. Co-leading an expedition to find the lost city of Sun Wukong, the Monkey King, Gutterbuhg slithers his way into power by murdering the lost city's benevolent ruler and exploiting a tradition of Klingon Promotion to become their new king. Gutterbuhg gleefully begins driving the entire city into Nazism for the hell of it and gluttons himself on the pleasures of his new kingdom, promising Indy that when his Nazi allies arrive, he'll share with them the bounties of his kingdom before they massacre every last person in the city. All this is to plunder the city of its garden of immortality-giving peaches, ensuring the Führer becomes immortal and plunging the world into a literal thousand-year Reich.
- The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles' "Transylvania, January 1918" (later remade into "Masks of Evil"): Mattias Targo is a bloodthirsty Romanian general and a literal vampire all but explicitly stated to be the reincarnation of Vlad Tepes himself. Targo liberates an Austrian POW Camp simply to murder all of the dozens of soldiers being held captive there, either to transform them into members of his vampire army or simply leave them staked around his castle. When three foreign spies investigate his affairs, Targo kills them and sends their body parts back to their superiors as a grisly warning. Targo later kidnaps them Indy and his allies with gruesome designs for them, vivisecting one of them alive and screaming. A sadistic nightmare so in love with his brutality that he falls asleep to the sound of tortured screaming, Targo plans to have his army sweep through Romania and cleanse it in a wave of blood, slaughtering all those he decrees "intruders" onto his land.
- Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis: Nur-Ab-Sal, the old king of Atlantis and creator of the God Machine, attempted to create man-made divinity through the sacrifice of countless "unworthy slaves". To test the God Machine, Nur-Ab-Sal experimented on his subjects, turning them into mutated abominations; inevitably, they perished in agony, and their warped skeletons are strewn all along Atlantis. In a room bloated with these skeletons, the spirit of Nur-Ab-Sal himself attempts to possess Indy's companion Sophia after having acted as her malevolent Spirit Advisor for the game, callously attempting to dispose of her the moment he sees fit so he can reclaim the God Machine. Nur-Ab-Sal's arrogance and pride are directly mirrored by the Nazis themselves, who pay the price for attempting to exploit Nur-Ab-Sal's monstrous technology for themselves.
