When Disney bought Lucasfilm, they purchased not only Star Wars but the whole lot, including Willow, Radioland Murders and that little franchise known as Indiana Jones. As the 72-year-old Harrison Ford looks less and less likely to step back into his most iconic role, rumors have swirled that Chris Pratt might become the first actor to re-interpret the lead role in features, and now AintItCool is reporting scuttlebutt they’ve heard about Lucasfilm pencilling in a release window for Indiana Jones 5 in the fourth quarter of 2018.
Despite the site’s “trusted sources,” even they recommend taking the word with a grain of salt, and even if it is true it may only be internal wishful thinking, especially given the already ambitious slate of Star Wars films and TV shows the company is launching over the next several years. In a May interview with Lucasfilm head honcho Kathleen Kennedy, she stressed that a new Indiana Jones adventure “will one day be made inside this company. When it will happen, I’m not quite sure. We haven’t started working on a script yet, but we are talking about it.”
This slightly contradicts what her husband and producer on all four previous Indy films, Frank Marshall, told SlashFilm recently,
“No, there’ve been no discussions on that,” Marshall said. “We’ve had no discussions on ‘Indy 5’ to date.”
And then there are the statements that George Lucas has made in the past to multiple outlets that he is trying to crack a story, or that he had cracked a story, or rumors that the McGuffin was the Bermuda Triangle (a hot property in Hollywood right now). Lucas has stated that despite being retired from blockbusters, he might still be open to shepherding another Jones film to the screen. Given the fact that Disney and J.J. Abrams reportedly threw out many of his concepts for the new Star Wars trilogy, the maverick billionaire may be disenchanted by the idea of working within the strictures of the Mouse House.
As for the Chris Pratt rumors, it’s important to remember that not too long ago many sites were reporting Bradley Cooper as “a lock” to take over the whip and fedora from Harrison Ford. Pratt is the new box office king thanks to Guardians of the Galaxy and Jurassic World, but as he told the Nerdist Podcast recently, he’s only had one conversation about becoming archaeologist Indiana Jones.
“I actually got a call today from my brother and he said it’d be cool if I did it, so I have my brother’s permission,” Pratt said jokingly. “That’s the first of many steps, none of the other steps have happened. (laughs)”
