Line #13 YMMV/IndianaJonesAndTheKingdomOfTheCrystalSkull


1	* AluminiumChristmasTrees:
2	** The CrystalSkull and the story about returning all 13 of them to some place for... something. They even mention Mitchell-Hedges. What they don't mention is that the four well-known RealLife skulls are now proven hoaxes, as is the story of the 13 skulls. Though the first examination to prove this happened in 1967, a decade after the film's setting.
3	** Artificial cranial deformation was actually practiced by ancient Native Americans.
4	** The Soviets did have an interest in parapsychology, although it was more popular before Stalin's death in 1953.
5	** The derided "Kung Fu [[{{Mayincatec}} Aztecs]]" guarding the Andean graveyard has a sort of precedent. There is a purportedly Pre-hispanic Andean martial art called ''rumi maki'' (Quechua for "stone hand") which focuses on combinations of hand strikes supplemented by rapid kicks, just as portrayed in the film. As with the crystal skulls, however, many believe it to be a modern hoax in the vein of the supposedly Basque martial art of zipota (''rumi maki'' is a real idiom, but the art itself was virtually unknown before its modern promoter claimed to have learned it from an ancient secret lineage during TheSixties).
6	** Not only does [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dry_quicksand dry sand]] of the type Indy and Marion get caught in exist, it's depicted relatively accurately; the different formation between quicksand and dry sand means that they follow different principles.
7	* AmericansHateTingle: You'd be hard pressed to find any hardcore fans of this entry in most latin countries, particularly with Peruvian audiences as the movie doubles down on the geographical inaccuracies commonly found with {{Main/Mayincatec}} tropes, with most people finding the presence of Maya structures too ignorant for a 21st century film.
8	* SugarWiki/AwesomeMusic: About the only thing fans have agreed on about the movie is that Music/JohnWilliams’ music is as majestic, epic, and awesome as the early entries.
9	* BaseBreakingCharacter: Mutt Williams is either one of the better aspects of the movie or part of the problem depending on who you ask. Some argue his father-son dynamic with Indiana strengthens the movie and his eventual growth into adventurer is an interesting development. His detractors find him annoying in part because his actor, Creator/ShiaLaBeouf, behaves too similarly to his role in equally controversial ''Film/TransformersFilmSeries''. It doesn't help he's tied to some of the worst received scenes, including the CGI monkeys.
10	* CommonKnowledge: Contrary to popular belief, the beings in this movie are not aliens; they are inter-dimensional beings. This distinction is reinforced by Harold Oxley crucially mentioning the "space between spaces," highlighting their existence beyond conventional dimensions. However, [[RightForTheWrongReasons they are not from Earth]].
11	* ContestedSequel: Some people say it is total crap, others say it was fun but not up to ''Indiana Jones'' standards, some liked the acting and characters but not the writing, some liked it all except for the GainaxEnding. Creator/ShiaLaBeouf blames himself and his monkey-swinging Tarzan act. And then there are those that hold it as being better than ''Temple of Doom'' for having less MoodWhiplash and ValuesDissonance issues, but not up to the standards of the "Nazi" movies. With the release of ''Film/IndianaJonesAndTheDialOfDestiny'', ''Crystal Skull'''s defenders argued that this movie allowed the ''Indiana Jones'' series to end on a happy note, with Indy and Marion marrying, while the later film turned to a HappyEndingOverride with [[spoiler:Mutt's offscreen death driving Indy and Marion apart again]].
12	* CriticalDissonance: Critics generally enjoyed it, while fans seem to loathe it. On Rotten Tomatoes, the audience score is lower than the critics score.
13	* DelusionConclusion:
14	** Owing to the contentious reputation of the film, a common theory is that the adventure is just Indy's DyingDream after the infamous 'nuking the fridge' scene.
15	** A far less bitter take is to pretend that Indy and Marion's wedding is the only thing that truly happens, while everything prior is Mutt [[FantasySequence imagining]] a silly adventure about ancient aliens during the ceremony.
16	* DracoInLeatherPants: [[TheBaroness Irina Spalko]]. In her defense, she does have ''some'' genuine AntiVillain-ish character traits but not enough to fully qualify for the {{trope}}.
17	* EnsembleDarkHorse:
18	** The ViolentlyProtectiveGirlfriend of the jock Mutt decks is one of the film's most popular {{Bit Character}}s despite only having less than twenty seconds of screen time.
19	** The two BitPartBadGuys in the opening scene who get into a drag race with some teenagers (and the teenagers themselves, for some) make the scene pretty entertaining for most fans, whether they like the movie as a whole or not.
20	* FanficFuel: This installment definitively establishes that Indy was an active OSS agent for the entirety of UsefulNotes/WorldWarII proper [[note]] The main trilogy takes place in the years just prior to the war[[/note]], and that he spent around a decade spying against the Soviets with the CIA during the UsefulNotes/ColdWar. That's around seventeen years of undocumented high-stakes adventures.
21	* FanonDiscontinuity: As this is the most [[BrokenBase divisive entry]] in the franchise to date, there's a good number of Indy fans who like to pretend this film doesn't exist.
22	* HarsherInHindsight: However you feel about Mutt's character, his presence at least brought his parents, the most popular pairing in the franchise, back together. ''Film/IndianaJonesAndTheDialOfDestiny'', taking place 12 years later, reveals [[spoiler:Mutt has since died in Vietnam, causing his parents endless grief that eventually lead to their separation.]]
23	--> '''Charles''': We seem to have reached the age where life stops giving us things and starts taking them away.
24	** Indiana Jones picking up his hat in the final scene before Mutt can grab it and turn Indy into a LegacyCharacter also seems to uncomfortably foreshadow [[spoiler:Mutt's abrupt absence due to his death]] preceding the following film.
25	* HesJustHiding: A theory about [[spoiler:Henry]] that grew at the time was that [[spoiler:the next movie would reveal he was never dead]] and an article also said they were trying to convince [[spoiler:Sean Connery to return for the fifth one as well and that Henry would indeed have been FakingTheDead if he did agree to return]]. Unfortunately, [[spoiler:Connery's passing in 2020 at age 90]] now has everyone thinking the character did indeed die here after all.
26	* HilariousInHindsight:
27	** Creator/JimBroadbent had a very small role in the 1980 film ''Literature/TheDogsOfWar'', which had among its cast Paul Freeman (Belloq) and George Harris (Katanga).
28	** This won't be the last time that Creator/JohnHurt would portray a [[Franchise/DoctorWho doctor]] involved with aliens.
29	** At one point, Mutt makes a crack about Indy's advancing age, snidely asking ''"What are you, like, 80?"'' (Creator/HarrisonFord was actually 65 at the time). The fifth ''Indiana Jones'' film, ''Film/IndianaJonesAndTheDialOfDestiny'', would eventually be released in June 2023--when Ford actually ''was'' 80.
30	** Indy is defended by a General Ross against accusations of being a Soviet collaborator. Creator/HarrisonFord would later be chosen as the recast [[Franchise/TheIncredibleHulk General Thunderbolt Ross]] for the Franchise/MarvelCinematicUniverse following the passing of Creator/WilliamHurt.
31	* InferredHolocaust: The tribe that lived near the temple most likely were killed by the departing spacecraft or drowned by the river flooding the valley, had any members survived the massacre from the Russians.
32	* ItsTheSameNowItSucks: While many were miffed at the whole reveal that the MacGuffin was more sci-fi than supernatural and feeling it was a pull away from the original films, some criticism levied against the movie was that it was ''too'' similar and pretty much follow the same beats as ''Raiders'' and ''Last Crusade'' (even ''Fate of Atlantis'') i.e.: Indy and his small group against a bigger military organization, the race to get to the target place before the bad guys and the bad guys being done in by what they were seeking. Yes it's traditional and likely a throwback, but many felt like it was just a copy and paste of those stories, only moving the timeline to the 50s and dealing with Soviets, with really the only original thing being Indy learning he has a son and reuniting with Marion. Heck, some reviews even ''praised'' the sci-fi twist because it at least tried to shake up the formula, and only argued there wasn't much explanation about the creatures and the sudden reveal being the reason why it leaves such a bad taste in a lot of fan's mouths, whereas in the previous films we get to learn about the [=MacGuffins=] in question during the adventure.
33	* JerkassWoobie: UsefulNotes/FranciscoDeOrellana becomes this in the movie novelization, which expands on his backstory and motivations. He's a notorious greedy conquistador who loots Akator of its treasures. However, the further he takes the Crystal Skull from the city, the more guilt and madness he experiences, which makes him feel compelled to take the skull back. His companions don't share his feelings, and he is fine with letting them go until they try to take the skull, which causes him to murder all six of them. The killings leave him guilt-ridden and praying for forgiveness. Then, right as he's about to begin his journey back to Akator to return the skull, he's attacked and killed by the cemetery guardians, who he mistakes for demons out to take him to Hell. The guy didn't exactly start out with good intentions, but it's not hard to feel a little sorry for him.
34	* MisBlamed: Thanks to already being in a bad spot due to the polarizing reception of the ''Star Wars'' prequels, many fans blamed Creator/GeorgeLucas for a lot of problems in the film.
35	** Lucas gets blamed for the decision to make Soviets the villains rather than [[ThoseWackyNazis Nazis]] like in the previous films. In reality, due to the harrowing experience of making ''Film/SchindlersList'', Spielberg felt he could no longer make movies featuring Nazis as simply stock villains, although Creator/HarrisonFord's advanced age since the previous film and the fact that the Nazis had been defeated in World War II also accounted for it.
36	** Lucas only wrote the story draft (along with Jeff Nathanson), the one who wrote the screenplay was Creator/DavidKoepp. Indeed, most fans solely blame Lucas and Koepp for the story in spite of the fact that Koepp just wrote a screenplay based on the story that Lucas and Nathanson conceived, whereas Nathanson tends to not be criticized by fans.
37	** Lucas was dead-set on having Indy survive a nuclear explosion by using a fridge as shelter, but he never said that the nuclear explosion had to be that close or that Indy should fly away in the fridge ([[WhatCouldHaveBeen one of the first scripts]], ''Indiana Jones and the Saucermen from Mars'', has Indy ducking in a foxhole and turning the fridge over his head as a cover). That belongs to Koepp and Spielberg.
38	** Although Lucas had already eliminated the "Old Indy" bookends from the DVD version of ''Series/TheYoungIndianaJonesChronicles'', which showed 93-year-old Indy being cared for by a daughter, it was Spielberg who vetoed Indy having a daughter in this film, feeling that it would be a retread of Kelly and Ian Malcolm from ''Film/TheLostWorldJurassicPark''.
39	* OlderThanTheyThink:
40	** The 1999 video-game ''VideoGame/IndianaJonesAndTheInfernalMachine'' used Soviets as villains and featured {{Sufficiently Advanced Alien}}s from another dimension as a major plot point about nine years before this movie did.
41	** Likewise the comic book adaptation of ''VideoGame/IndianaJonesAndTheFateOfAtlantis'' which revealed the Atlantian technology was given to them by aliens.
42	** The 1996 video-game ''VideoGame/IndianaJonesAndHisDesktopAdventures'' had a possible random encounter with a friendly alien, and one of the scenarios ends with Indy summoning an UFO then meeting the alien piloting it.
43	** The original script for ''Film/BackToTheFuture1'' from 1982 featured Marty [=McFly=] surviving a nuclear blast in a fridge-time machine, in order to return to the present. This was scrapped because it was too expensive to pull off, and there were concerns that kids who watched the movie might climb into abandoned refrigerators to "play Marty." If that sounds at all familiar, it's because Spielberg was also executive producer of that film, and also used the idea in an earlier version of the script in the earlier years of the franchise that was later adapted into this movie.
44	* OneTruePairing: There is one aspect of this movie about which pretty much everyone can agree, and that is that Karen Allen's return (and spot-on performance) as Marion Ravenwood is ''AWESOME''. [[spoiler:And is made even better by having her and Indy married at the end, especially given they were by far the most popular pairing of the franchise]].
45	* OvershadowedByControversy: While most discussions on the film among fans center on the fridge and alien scenes, the film is hard to bring up in Latino communities without the wild inaccuracies being brought up into conversation too, as the film became controversial in those regions for the widely dated and ignorant depictions of Perú being too many to ignore for a movie made as recent as 2006.
46	* QuestionableCasting: Creator/ShiaLaBeouf's casting as Mutt wasn't well-received, as he hadn't exactly made a great name for himself among audiences in regards to his abilities or capability to be an ActionHero. The fact Mutt turned out to be Indy's son didn't help matters either.
47	* SignatureScene: For better or for worse, the atom bomb scene, which stuck with the public consciousness so much that the phrase "nuking the fridge" became a synonym for "{{Sequelitis}} meets JumpingTheShark."
48	* SpecialEffectFailure:
49	** The prairie dogs, the monkeys, and the aliens have been derided for this.
50	** The first (overhead, panning) shot of the graveyard shows what is very obviously a miniature set, and the chase scene in the final act uses a good deal of conspicuous green screen as well.
51	** The truck chase through the jungle was real, but was layered with so much CGI the real footage ends up looking fake and greenscreen-like.
52	* StrawmanHasAPoint: Two government agents angrily interrogate Indy after Russian spies kidnap him and an old partner of his, murder several American soldiers at a top secret test facility and make off with an alien corpse. This doesn't seem that unnecessary, considering what just happened and that Indy's old partner was working with the Russians (the movie is set during the Cold War). That said, attempting to get him fired from his teaching position (and nearly succeeding) even after General Ross vouched for him was a bit beyond the pale.

Context YMMV / IndianaJonesAndTheKingdomOfTheCrystalSkull