by Miguel Lopez (SoSF Guest Contributor)

I’m fresh out of a pre-screening show of “Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull”. I feel like a kid that has just seen his favorite uncle who has been missing since childhood. I’m happy almost beyond words.

Let’s get the nitpicking out of the way: this is not the best of all the Indy movies. You can call it a collage of most of the main plot points from all previous films. Mythical lost artifact? check. Crazy foreign villain? check. Funny, rapid-fire dialog? check. Creepy underground scenes? check. Over the top, unrealistic action scenes? check. Indy never losing his fedora? check, check, and check. There are almost no surprises in the plot, is predictable at every corner.

Now, is all that bad? No way. In fact, the movie rides on all these predictable plot points and Indy – cliches and delivers a totally satisfying end product that, while not bigger than the sum of its parts, is still really good. I doubt that any Indy fan will be disappointed (there is a LOT of obvious and not-so-obvious Easter eggs for the fans), but even someone that has never seen the previous movies will be in for a fun treat.

Indy is supposed to be about the same age as Harrison Ford in this story, and the part fits really well. This is an old Dr Jones, but one that can still kick butt, even if it hurts him a lot more than it used to. That said, my favorite action sequences belong to Shia LaBeouf, who really shows that he could carry the franchise over to a new generation, if The Powers That Be (cough, Lucas, cough, Spielberg) decide to do so. I’m not going to spoil any scenes, but I’ll just say can always win geeks over with a cool sword fight!

In short: I’m not so pumped up after seeing this as I was after seeing “Iron Man”, but this is close.

I’ll use the old star-rating system to give it a 4 out of 5.

It’s good to see you again, Uncle Indy, we missed you.