One week from today, my inner child will delight as one of my favorite heroes, Indiana Jones, returns to the big screen for the 5th and final time.
That comes a day after Chasing Blue Blood launches and I have a signing at Hippie Girl Collection from 6-8PM.
To say that I am excited for this is an understatement. For many fans who disliked his last adventure, this is another opportunity to “right the ship”. I personally enjoyed the film and was entertained, but it is far from the best film in the series.
For me, it’s one last opportunity to enjoy Indy’s adventure and have my inner child come out once again – though if you ask Michelle, that is a daily occurrence.
You see, unlike Luke Skywalker, who has the Force, and James Bond, who has years of training (and a generous gov’t budget), Henry Walton Jones, Jr is an everyman. He’s just a college professor who trots around the globe trying to find some fortune and glory. No superpowers, no gadgets, just surviving off his wit and guile. He gets hurt, he loses, but he’s an ideal to strive for. And unlike my other cinema faves, I could get closer to Indy than the other two – well, I could dress like Bond, but that’s likely it.
In fact, I started crafting Garrison Chase as a modern version of Indiana Jones, but I realized it might be hard in a world where Nathan Drake (Uncharted) and Lara Croft (Tomb Raider) exists.
Speaking of Lara Croft, like most video gamers in the 1990s, I had played the Tomb Raider game. It was a different take on the world of archaeology, and for a lot of reasons, became very popular. Since it involved finding historical artifacts, comparisons to Indiana Jones naturally popped up, including in the world of fan fiction.
According to Wikipedia, Fan fiction or fanfiction is fictional writing written in an amateur capacity by fans, unauthorized by, but based on an existing work of fiction. The author uses copyrighted characters, settings, or other intellectual properties from the original creator as a basis for their writing. Writers who create fan fiction cannot profit from the work, but showcase skills as a writer and to share the love of the subject matter.
There’s a problem with that, in my view. The Tomb Raider video game came out in 1997. Indiana Jones was born in his fictional universe in 1899, which would make him 96 then. Granted, fiction allows you to do crazy things like make Indy and Lara Croft contemporaries, but that didn’t work for me.
What did I do? I wrote my own take on it. I started crafting a tale around the release of Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull in 2008. With the release of that film, Indy merchandise was everywhere, including the release of the Young Indiana Jones television series on DVD. Those shows dealt with a Young Indy and his experiences with historical figures, as well as fighting in WWI. The episodes were bookended with a nonagenarian Jones recounting the adventures of his youth.
Because I wanted some verisimilitude with the characters in my story, this was the way I could get them to co-exist in a world. But to make the story work, I had to find something they had in common.
Enter the Spear of Destiny.
Also known as The Holy Lance, or the Lance of Longinus (named after Saint Longinus), it’s the spear that pierced the side of Christ when he was on the cross to ensure he was dead.
Both characters had stories involving the spear: Indy in comics and Lara Croft’s world in the video game Tomb Raider: Chronicles.
While I did post the story online, I am now making it available for everyone. I’m offering a free gift to you: if you sign up for my mailing list, you will get a copy of The Writer and The Professor, which brings these characters together.
Keep your eyes peeled this site next week, as we get closer to the launch, as I have some more surprises.
