EVERYTHING 'Indiana Jones' Is Coming To Disney+ Very Soon
You'll be called to Professor Jones's office at the House of Mouse ahead of 'Dial of Destiny'
During The Walt Disney Company’s Upfront presentation on Tuesday, they had a Lucasfilm segment presented by company president Kathleen Kennedy. While it included trailers for this year’s Skeleton Crew, next year’s The Acolyte, and a behind-the-scenes look at Ahsoka, for once Star Wars wasn’t the big ticket facet, but Indiana Jones.
It was announced that all four previous Indiana Jones films, Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, and Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, will arrive on Disney+ on May 31, ahead of the June 30 release of the fifth film, Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny.
While Disney acquired the future franchise rights to Indiana Jones in 2013, everything before would still be under Paramount’s control. Even on future productions, the deal stipulated that they would receive “financial participation on any future films that are produced and released” under Disney. It’s why before even seeing how that entails onscreen, the Paramount Pictures logo is on Dial of Destiny posters. The four films currently stream on Paramount+ as well and will remain there, so the two services will share the films.
However, Disney+ is getting something more, quite the obscurity these days: The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles. Created by George Lucas, the series premiered on ABC running for 28 episodes from March 1992 to June 1993, producing 4 subsequent TV movies that aired from 1994 to 1996. In it, young Indiana Jones, played by Sean Patrick Flanery as a teen and Corey Carrier as a younger child, travels the world for adventures that tend to lead to encounters with historical figures. Such figures include Leo Tolstoy, Louis Armstrong, Winston Churchill, Sigmund Freud, Norman Rockwell, Al Capone, George Gershwin, and, as evidenced by the episode count, many more. Episodes were framed by being told by an older Indy played by George Hall. There was one episode where it was at a younger age that Ford reprised his role. Like that one episode of Disney’s Hercules animated series with adult Herc and Meg.
In 1999 the series was edited to 22 TV films under the title The Adventures of Young Indiana Jones and seems to be the format by which it will land on Disney+ by the use of such title. The show’s streaming history starts with that, and its general home media availability has been spotty. VHS editions of several episodes were released in 1999, but VHS was never an efficient format for full series releases. The full series was finally released on DVD to tie into 2008’s release of Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. No word on whether the 94 historical documentaries Lucasfilm created for the historical figures are coming with it.
While full library series being added to Disney+ has slowed, there’s certainly something of a pickup, with Doogie Howser M.D. added last month, and Home Improvement coming in June. Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny is directed by James Mangold, and stars Ford, Phoebe Waller-Bridge, John Rhys-Davies, Mads Mikkelsen, Boyd Holbrook, Thomas Kretschmann, Toby Jones, and Antonio Banderas.
Sources: Deadline, The Hollywood Reporter, IndieWire