After-Action Report: Indiana Jones Adventure

FIRST, AN ASIDE:
I try not to dwell on news items here at the Disneyland Dilettante, but seeing as it's Adventureland month and all, I couldn't ignore the announcement that Disney is finally going ahead with a movie based on the Jungle Cruise, an idea the studio has been toying with for the past decade. So far the only details released are a) it will be a period piece and b) it will star Dwayne Johnson. The second bit amuses me because of his role in the upcoming animated film Moana—are they just making him their Adventureland mascot or what? I'll have to hold off on forming specific opinions until I know more about the project, but for now I am cautiously optimistic. Even before I knew they were thinking about doing it, I thought the Jungle Cruise would be a decent enough candidate for a ride-turned-movie. It has the same big strength as Pirates of the Caribbean: a strongly defined mood and setting without much in the way of an established plot to shackle the writers...which I believe is where the 2003 Haunted Mansion movie went wrong. (Well, that and letting Eddie Murphy stomp all over it.)
END OF ASIDE. ON WITH THE MAIN POST.

This is where I reveal that I am an enormous hypocrite.

I have multiple posts on this blog where I denounce Star Tours—and the whole phenomenon of Star Wars in Disneyland—for various reasons. Chief among them is that it began as, basically, an intruder—an outside property that wasn't quite a thematic fit with the area where it was placed, but which subsequently took over said area to an extent, imposing its aesthetic on the non-IP-based attractions that had been there all along. Another is that it's too focused on recapping famous scenes from its source material to add much to its canon.

Um.

In the interest of basic human decency, I have to admit that the Indiana Jones Adventure is guilty of these same sins...yet for some reason, I have no objections. I love this ride. Its existence feels as natural to me as the existence of Star Tours feels forced. I can accept this as another wacky installment in the serialized adventures of everyone's favorite fedora-wearing archaeologist, even if it bears suspicious resemblances to many of his other adventures.

Part of it, of course, is that I just plain like the Indiana Jones franchise better than I like Star Wars.* Just knowing that it's there in the Happiest Place Where Dreams Come True on Earth doesn't automatically make me roll my eyes. And maybe that's hypocritical in itself—I tend to look down my nose at people who get all excited about the prospect of Marvel superheroes and MOAR STAR WARS in Disneyland because they love the movies. I don't think that stuff is a natural fit for the park, so I disdain the fan loyalty that causes people to like the idea. But is Indiana Jones really any more appropriate for Adventureland than Lucas's other, bigger baby or Stan Lee's portfolio is for Tomorrowland?

Actually...I would argue that it is.

Theme and Variation

The theme of Tomorrowland, as originally drafted and executed (admittedly with varying degrees of success), is not simply “the future.” Nor is it “space” or “technology.” It's a bit narrower than that. It's about how human innovation and discovery will impact our everyday lives going forward—hopefully for the better. Star Wars doesn't gel with this plan not because it takes place “A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away...”** but because it's more of a fantasy epic than anything else. You might as well call it Lord of the Ringed Planets. (rimshot) The Marvel stuff fares a little better in the analysis but still feels out of synch with Tomorrowland, not because the movies take place in the present but because the “weird science” that creates some of the heroes starts and stops with them, plus or minus a few allies and antagonists. Powered armor is Tony Stark's personal toy, not his gift to humanity.

The theme of Adventureland is simpler, therefore less restrained. It represents the tropical wilderness—or more accurately, the First World fantasy of the tropical wilderness, of the wonders and dangers that might be lurking far outside the bounds of human civilization in these little-explored areas. The interesting thing is that as of 1955, that fantasy was fairly current. There were still a few remote places that Westerners had little experience of or influence over. Don't forget that part of the impetus behind the Enchanted Tiki Room was Hawaii's elevation to statehood just a few years prior. The mystery (from a Western perspective) and exoticism (to Western eyes) of the tropics was a going concern.

By the mid-Nineties, this concept could no longer claim to be contemporary. The days were long gone when anyone would write a serious jungle survival story and include things like headhunters, lost civilizations, or gorilla attacks. Pulp adventure of the sort that inspired Adventureland had become a tongue-in-cheek niche genre, and when new stories of the type were written they were always set decades in the past. The best way for Adventureland to survive was to embrace this aesthetic wholesale and root itself in that period.

In that sense, the addition of the Indiana Jones Adventure (and corresponding changes to the Jungle Cruise next door) isn't a digression from theme at all, but a refinement of it. The fantastical nature of the setting has been brought to the fore. Indy's (and our) exploits in the Temple of the Forbidden Eye are just some of the outlandish events that might come to pass in these outlands, right alongside the birds singing words and Trader Sam plying his gruesome (but reportedly tasty) wares.

Movie Moments

It's definitely true that the Indiana Jones Adventure is, in the main, an amalgamation of the most exciting bits of all the “exploring the ruins” sequences in the original film trilogy. But I find the presentation to be more transformative of those moments than the similarly derivative aspects of Star Tours...which seem to me to boil down to “The very same events from the films, only you're there! Sort of!”

This might be a good time for me to do a rundown. Shall I do a rundown? I shall.

• The Temple of the Forbidden Eye itself: The basic premise of a secret temple in India devoted to the worship of a hostile deity is familiar to anyone who has seen Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. But it's a pretty common conceit in the pulp adventure genre, and clearly the general idea is all that was copied directly from the film. The ride's Mara, probably based on a demonic figure from Buddhist folklore, has very little in common with Temple's version of Kali-Ma.*** Also, this temple seems to have been abandoned by its original worshipers, which has potentially intriguing implications...
• Spike Room: The most memorable portion of the queue (unless you're a tremendous fan of John Rhys-Davies) is probably the short corridor where yanking on a fake bamboo pole causes the spiked ceiling to descend a few inches accompanied by a horrendous noise of collapse. To the left and right are other sections which have dropped much further, impaling unfortunate victims. This is another lift from Temple of Doom and is much more specific than the first. The main differences are that it's a quick startle rather than a drawn-out sequence, and the ceiling stops on its own rather than requiring the most pathetic member of your party to stick their hand in a slimy hole.
• Diamond-Shaped Stones: “Step on the wrong spot and suffer a messy demise” was used in both Raiders of the Lost Ark and Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. The execution here, though, is markedly different from either. Since this is one of the standard booby-trap setups in pulp adventure (among other genres), it's pretty spurious to call out its use in the attraction.
• Cavern of Bubbling Death: This is probably the part of the ride that most resembles the Thuggee worship site from Temple, what with its massive, ferocious stone face and lava pit. There appears to be no evidence that people are sacrificed to the former by being dropped into the latter, however.
• Mummy Chamber: The precedent for mummies was established in Raiders, but there they were just dead bodies induced to move by other forces such as gravity or being bumped into. Here they are definitely undead creatures coming after you on their own initiative. This is a significant difference—Marion was not in any real danger (though one cannot fault her for panicking), while you are.
• Bug Room: Back to Temple for a bit, and this is one bit I will agree is pulled right from the movie with no real change. There are bugs. They might crawl on you and/or sting you. The music is creepy.
• Snake Temple: This obviously hearkens back to Raiders, what with the masses of snakes all over the floor. That colossal cobra sure is new, though! This is apparently a central feature of the Temple of the Forbidden Eye, given the many paintings and sculptures of cobras throughout the attraction. And it's one of the more interesting parts of the ride—what is that giant snake? Mara's pet? Mara himself in a totemic animal form? Cobras have certain divine associations in Hinduism and there exist temples devoted to reverence of serpents, inhabited by populations of semi-tame cobras. It makes me wonder—if we hadn't pissed off Mara by looking him in the eye, would we still encounter the giant snake, but in a friendlier context?
• Mud Slide: This is potentially a callback to Last Crusade—the skulls lining the walls evoke the Venice catacombs scene, especially with the fire effects. That's a big stretch, though, especially because the context of the peril is entirely different.
• Rat Cave: This, on the other hand, is definitely a reference to the catacombs scene in Crusade. The resemblance is still pretty thin—the rats were a major part of the atmosphere in said scene, while on the ride they're just there to bridge the gap between the previous scene and the finale. This tunnel would be entirely dark and featureless without the projection; it seems there isn't enough room for a more elaborate scene, but neither could the tunnel itself be omitted due to the way the temple fits into the show building.
• Dart Corridor: This is another Raiders gimmick, played relatively straight without a lot of embellishment. Not much to say here.
• Rolling Boulder: And this is of course the Raiders gimmick, played entirely straight with basically no embellishment. The very same event from the film, only you're there! Really!
• (Did I miss anything?)

So yes, most of the ride's content is heavily inspired by specific scenes in the Indiana Jones film trilogy...but what it's not, in the main, is copied wholesale. And even when it is...well, we really are there. We're not just watching a fancier movie; we're physically in the presence of the effect in question. That helps smooth over any remaining objections I might have.

In Conclusion

Part of my purpose in maintaining this blog is championing the notion that Disneyland is more than the sum of its parts and should be celebrated as its own thing. But it goes beyond that...the individual parts also function best when they are allowed to be their own things, and not just promotions for whatever IPs they might be based on. The Tea Cups are technically an Alice in Wonderland tie-in, but does anyone really think of them primarily in that way? Of course not—they're the Tea Cups. The ride transcends its origins to become a star in its own right. The same is true of the Indiana Jones Adventure—its identity and some of its sense of direction come from the franchise that inspired it, but you don't need the Indy movies to fully understand and appreciate the ride. That's why it works. It's an original story masquerading as an installment in a familiar film franchise...or possibly the other way around. Either way, it's an example of an outside IP successfully blending with an existing Disneyland environment.

And it's just plain awesome.

* The reasons for this could constitute a post all on their own, but this is a Disneyland blog, not a film blog.

** We're not meant to take the wording literally anyway.

*** Who in turn has very little in common with the Kali worshiped by actual Hindus. But this is also not a comparative religion blog.