The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles

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The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles

Before the world discovered Indiana, Indiana discovered the world.
Genre Action/Adventure/Serial
Camera setup David Tattersall
Picture format 1.33:1
Running time 45 min. per episode
Creator(s) George Lucas
Executive producer(s) George Lucas
Starring Sean Patrick Flanery
Corey Carrier
George Hall
Ronny Coutteure
Country of origin USA
Original channel ABC
USA
Original run 1992–1996
No. of episodes 44
IMDb profile

The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles is a TV series that ran from 1992 to 1996. A form of "edutainment", the 44 episode series explores the childhood and youth of the fictional character Indiana Jones. The series primarily stars Sean Patrick Flanery as Indy aged 16-20, but also includes several episodes with Corey Carrier as Indy aged 8-10. George Hall also played Indy at age 93 for the bookends of each episode. The show was created and executive produced by George Lucas, who was also behind the Indiana Jones feature films.

Contents

[edit] Production

During the production of the Indiana Jones feature films, the cast and crew frequently questioned creator George Lucas about the Indiana Jones character's life growing up. During the concept stages of Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, Lucas and director Steven Spielberg decided to reveal some of this backstory in the film's opening scenes. For these scenes, Lucas chose River Phoenix to portray the character, as Harrison Ford believed that Phoenix most resembled Ford as a young man. (Phoenix had previously appeared as Ford's son in The Mosquito Coast.) This decision to reveal an adventure of a young Indiana led Lucas and crew to the idea of creating the series.

Harrison Ford was originally offered the role of the older Indiana Jones (which eventually went to George Hall), but he turned it down, it is said, because he thought television had nothing to offer his career. However, Ford appeared as a middle-aged Indy (age 50) in the episode "The Mystery of the Blues," which aired in March 1993. For the brief appearance as the middle-aged Indiana, Harrison sported a beard. This is because he was filming The Fugitive (1993) at the time his scenes were shot, and he didn't have time to shave it off.

River Phoenix, who played young Indy (aged 13) in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, was originally offered the title role in the series, but turned it down, since he didn't want to return to television. It was originally planned that after The Last Crusade, a second trilogy would be made with Phoenix as the young Indiana Jones and Ford as Henry Jones Sr. (effectively playing his own father). It became increasingly difficult for all parties to fully realise a second trilogy and so a TV series was thought of as the next best thing and a way to test if a prequel set of films could work. However, Phoenix's untimely death in 1993 changed all that.

The series was unusual in that it was shot on location around the world. Partly to offset the cost of this, the series was shot on 16mm film, rather than 35. The series was designed so that each pair of episodes could either be broadcast separately, or as a 2-hour film-length episode. Each episode cost about $1.5 million and the filming with Young Indy usually took around 3 weeks. The first production filming alternated between "Sean" and "Corey" episodes. The segments with old Indy were referred to as "bookends." Filming a pair of them typically took a day and most were shot at Carolco Studios in Wilmington, North Carolina and on location in Wilmington. The show also featured footage from other films spliced into several episodes.

A wide variety of filmmakers both wrote and directed many episodes of the series, including such high-profile names as Frank Darabont, Nicholas Roeg, Mike Newell, Deepa Mehta, Joe Johnston, Jonathan Hensleigh, Terry Jones, Simon Wincer, Carrie Fisher and Vic Armstrong. George Lucas was given with a 'Story By' credit in many episodes, along with his input as a creative consultant.

Paul Freeman, who played Rene Belloq in Raiders of the Lost Ark, portrayed an unrelated character named Frederick Selous in a couple of episodes. The black horse Sean rode in the Pilot episode was called "Hurricane" and was the same black horse Harrison Ford rode in the Indiana Jones movies. In some of the new additional scenes that were shot in 1996 with Corey Carrier, digital techniques were used to shrink Corey to make him appear younger.

[edit] Story

Map of all places Indiana visits in the series
Enlarge
Map of all places Indiana visits in the series

Most episodes feature an elderly Indiana Jones (played by George Hall) in present day (1993) New York City encountering people who spur him to reminisce and tell stories about his past adventures. These stories would either involve him as a young boy or as a teenager. In one episode, a fifty-year-old Indy (played by Harrison Ford) is seen reminiscing. Initially, the plan was for the series to alternate between the adventures of Indy as a child (Corey Carrier) and as a teenager (Sean Patrick Flanery), but eventually the episodes featuring Flanery's version of the character dominated the series.

Many of the episodes involve Indiana meeting and working with famous historical figures. For example, Curse of the Jackal prominently involves Indy in the adventures of T. E. Lawrence and Pancho Villa. Indy also encounters (in no particular order) Pablo Picasso, Louis Armstrong, Winston Churchill, and Sigmund Freud; At one point, he competes against a young Ernest Hemingway for the affections of a girl, is nursed back to health by Albert Schweitzer, and goes on a safari with Teddy Roosevelt.

[edit] Cast

[edit] Main characters

[edit] Historical Figures


[edit] Episodes

Main article: List of The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles episodes
An early advertisement for the show
Enlarge
An early advertisement for the show
Sean Patrick Flannery as the young adult Indiana Jones
Enlarge
Sean Patrick Flannery as the young adult Indiana Jones

The pilot episode was aired by ABC in the United States in March 1992. For the pilot, the episodes "Egypt, May 1908" and "Mexico, March 1916" were edited together to form the television movie Young Indiana Jones and the Curse of the Jackal. Eleven further hour-long episodes were aired in 1992 (seven in the first season, four were part of the second season). Only 16 of the remaining 20 episodes were aired in 1993 when ABC cancelled the show. USA Network later broadcast the unaired episodes and also produced eight more episodes (each part of two-part television movies, making four TV movies) that were broadcast in 1994-1996.

Listed below are all 44 episodes of the series, organized by story chronology:

Episode Title Airdate Prod. #
1. "Egypt, May 1908" March 4, 1992 1-1
2. "Tangiers, 1908" UNAIRED 3-9
3. "British East Africa, September 1909" March 18, 1992 1-4
4. "Paris, September 1908" June 19, 1993 2-16
5. "Vienna, November 1908" April 10, 1993 2-11
6. "Florence, May 1908" UNAIRED 2-23
7. "Russia, 1910" June 16, 1996 3-7
8. "Athens, 1910" June 16, 1996 3-8
9. "Benares, January 1910" July 3, 1993 2-18
10. "Peking, March 1910" June 26, 1993 2-17
11. "Princeton, February 1916" March 20, 1993 2-7
12. "Mexico, March 1916" March 4, 1992 1-2
13. "Ireland, April 1916" June 12, 1993 2-15
14. "London, May 1916" March 11, 1992 1-3
15. "Somme, Early August 1916" September 28, 1992 2-2
16. "Germany, Mid-August 1916" October 5, 1992 2-3
17. "Verdun, September 1916" March 25, 1992 1-5
18. "Paris, October 1916" July 10, 1993 2-19
19. "German East Africa, November 1916" (1) June 5, 1993 2-13
20. "German East Africa, November 1916" (2) June 5, 1993 2-14
21. "German East Africa, December 1916" April 1, 1992 1-6
22. "Congo, January 1917" April 8, 1992 1-7
23. "Ravenelle, Germany, 1917" October 8, 1995 3-5
24. "Ahlgorn, Germany 1917" October 8, 1995 3-6
25. "Austria, March 1917" September 21, 1992 2-1
26. "Petrograd, July 1917" March 27, 1993 2-8
27. "Barcelona, May 1917" October 12, 1992 2-4
28. "Prague, August 1917" UNAIRED 2-22
29. "Palestine, October 1917" (1) UNAIRED 2-24
30. "Palestine, October 1917" (2) UNAIRED 3-11
31. "Northern Italy, June 1918" April 17, 1993 2-12
32. "Morocco, 1917" UNAIRED 3-10
33. "Transylvania, January 1918" UNAIRED 2-25
34. "Istanbul, September 1918" July 17, 1993 2-20
35. "London/Egypt, November 1919" January 15, 1995 3-3
36. "South Pacific, November 1919" January 15, 1995 3-4
37. "Paris, May 1919" July 24, 1993 2-21
38. "Princeton 1919" UNAIRED 3-12
39. "Chicago, April 1920" March 13, 1993 2-5
40. "Chicago, May 1920" March 13, 1993 2-6
41. "New York, June 1920" April 3, 1993 2-9
42. "New York, July 1920" April 3, 1993 2-10
43. "Hollywood, August 1920" (1) October 15, 1994 3-1
44. "Hollywood, August 1920" (2) October 15, 1994 3-2

The revised and updated edition of the book George Lucas The Creative Impulse, by Charles Champlin, explains how The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles series would be re-edited into the new structure of twenty-two Chapter TV films. New footage was shot in 1996 to be incorporated with the newly re-edited and re-titled "chapters" to better help it chronologically and filmicly. Two Indy segments shot, which were Tangiers, 1908 and Morocco, 1917 is explained that, Morocco, 1917 is joined with Northern Italy, 1918 (now re-dated as 1917) to form Tales of Innocence. As Rick McCallum indicated, the new Corey Carrier, segment, Tangiers, goes with the Egypt segment of the original Curse of The Jackal, but the title is now My First Adventure.

The original pilot, Young Indiana Jones and The Curse of The Jackal is no more. As stated Egypt is now apart of My First Adventure, and Mexico has been hooked up with Princeton, 1916 to form Spring Break Adventure. The 93-year-old Indy bookends for the original series are gone. Also gone is Sean Patrick Flanery's bookend for Travels With Father. It would seem that bookend was dropped, so that it could be expanded into the second half of Winds Of Change. Even with all these bookends cut, Harrison Ford is still in The Mystery of The Blues.

The new collection also includes the four episodes that were made for the ABC network that never aired. Including Florence, May 1908, Prague, Aug. 1917, Transylvania, Jan. 1918, and Palestine, 1917 (note that the dates of these episodes have changed to be a part of the collection). Palestine may end up as the most interesting as it has been made into a film of its own, versus the one-hour version that aired in Europe. As stated above Tangiers, 1908 and Morocco, 1917 were filmed just for this collection. Finally, the little bit of Princeton, 1919 that was shown in the Family Channel's airing of Young Indiana Jones Travels With Father, was actually a part of its own one-hour story now combined with Paris, May 1919.

[edit] Reaction

[edit] DVD release

Lucasfilm has confirmed that a DVD release of the complete series is scheduled. At a press conference, series producer Rick McCallum explained that he expects there to be 22 DVDs in all, which, in addition to the series, will include around 100 documentaries which explore the real-life historical aspects that are fictionalized in the show. Lucas and McCallum hope that the DVDs will be helpful to schools, as they believe the series is a good way to aid in teaching history. If all goes well, the plan is to tie the DVD release to the theatrical release of Indiana Jones 4, which is still in early stages of preproduction.[1][2][1][2]

DVD Name Region 1 Region 2 Description
The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles TBA TBA TBA

[edit] Notes

  1. ^ Hettrick, Scott (October 24, 2002). Bigger Picture: Producer to Rattle the Sabers. Videobusiness. Retrieved on 2006-06-24.
  2. ^ Wiest takes part in documentary on Lucas series. Hattiesburg American (June 10, 2005). Retrieved on 2006-07-09.

[edit] References

  • George Lucas: The Creative Impulse
  • [3]

[edit] External links

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to:
The Indiana Jones series
Films Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981) | The Temple of Doom (1984) |The Last Crusade (1989) | Indiana Jones 4 (2008)
Television The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles (1992-1996)
Theme Park Attractions Indiana Jones Adventure (Disneyland, Tokyo Disney Sea) | Indiana Jones et le Temple du Péril (Disneyland Paris)
Characters Indiana Jones | Willie Scott | Marion Ravenwood | Elsa Schneider
Marcus Brody | Sallah | Short Round | Henry Jones, Sr.
Cast Harrison Ford | Sean Connery | Corey Carrier | Sean Patrick Flanery | George Hall
River Phoenix | John Rhys-Davies | Denholm Elliott
Crew George Lucas | Steven Spielberg | Frank Marshall | John Williams
George Lucas
Films THX 1138 (1971) | American Graffiti (1973) | Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope (1977) | Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace (1999) | Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones (2002) | Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith (2005)
Short Films Look at Life (1965) | Herbie (1966) | Freiheit (1966) | 1:42:08: A Man and His Car (1966) | The Emperor (1967) | Electronic Labyrinth THX 1138:4EB (1967) | Anyone Lived in a Pretty How Town (1967) | 6-18-67 (1967) | Filmmaker (1968) | The Making of 'The Rain People' (1969) | Bald: The Making of 'THX 1138' (1971)
Productions The Star Wars Holiday Special (1978) | More American Graffiti (1979) | Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back (1980) | Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981) | Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi (1983) | Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (1984) | Caravan of Courage: An Ewok Adventure (1984) | Ewoks: The Battle for Endor (1985) | Star Wars: Droids (1985) | Star Wars: Ewoks (1985) | Howard the Duck (1986) | Labyrinth (1986) | Star Tours (1987) | The Land Before Time (1988) | Tucker: The Man and His Dream (1988) | Willow (1988) | Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989) | The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles (1992-96) | Radioland Murders (1994) | Star Wars: Clone Wars (2003-05) | Star Wars: Clone Wars 3D (2007) | Indiana Jones 4 (2008) | Red Tails (2008) | Star Wars live-action TV series (2008)
See Also Lucasfilm | Industrial Light & Magic | Skywalker Sound | LucasArts | Skywalker Ranch
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