COMIC-CON: Indiana Jones 5 News

You’ve read about my interview with head of fan relations at Lucasfilm Steve Sansweet about Star Wars, and there’s a story in the interview that has been overlooked a little bit and that was about Indiana Jones 5 and the Blu-ray of the existing 4 Indiana Jones movies.

Here’s a transcript of the pertinent bits:

Q: As head of [fan relations] at Lucasfilm, you talk about Indiana Jones, although it seems a lot more overshadowed under the fandom of Star Wars, and I’ve got two questions about that, one, the same thing about the high definition of that, and then there’s been talk, obviously, well there’s been talk of the Internet of there being talk of a fifth movie and… And even just a no comment on that.

A: All I know is what I’ve seen on the Internet. I personally would be surprised to see a fifth Indy movie because of all the well known stories about how long it took to get a fourth Indy movie done and everybody in agreement. Who knows.

As far as future DVD releases, Indy is a little different. Star Wars is completely controlled by one man. George. Indy is controlled by George and Steven and to a certain extent Harrison and Paramount. So you have a lot more parties that have to be in agreement when it comes to anything when it comes to Indy. So, that’s something we hear about after some decisions have been made. At least at my level.

Q: So a Blu-ray, maybe, after everybody all sits down and talks about it?

A: I would think that at some point, yeah. But I know absolutely nothing about any Indy plans.

We weren’t really involved very much in the marketing of Indy as far as I’m concerned because there really isn’t a fan community like there is for Star Wars. Indy was never a very toy-etic movie and I really think that got a lot of kids into Star Wars or revived their interest years later and so that whole, the books and the comics, there’s so much more with Star Wars, it’s such a huge galaxy. Whereas Indy is not supernatural, although he goes after the supernatural stuff. He’s a man. And he ages and you know. There’s still more to fill in his story, but it’s not the same depth of fandom interest as it is in Star Wars.

That’s a pretty bleak outlook for the Indiana Jones franchise, both as far as a new movie is concerned and as far as the Blu-ray.

Anything is possible, but it sounds like it will take a lot longer than the Blu-ray of Star Wars to see Indy in hi-definition.

The Geek Show Podcast was kind enough to host the full interview on their iTunes feed, for the full 15 minute interview, click this link.