UNBOXING HELENA: Unboxing Helena Shaw Action Figures… Also some thoughts on DIAL OF DESTINY: Great Movie/ Bad Indiana Jones Adventure?

When I saw a Phoebe Waller-Bridge ne Helena Shaw action figure and playset show up at Target, I just had to buy them. Yes I am a big fan of PWB. I loved RUN on HBO. I loved KILLING EVE. I loved CRASHING. I liked FLEABAG (little too vulgar for me but hey, that’s on me). Still I was really excited when I saw her show up in the new Indy film. Was I little concerned she might be a “replacement” for Indy – maybe – but I was also like, let’s wait and see. Replacements aren’t all bad and also (spoiler alert) she wasn’t. Though it is arguably not an Indiana Jones Adventure (more on that later), Dial of Destiny is about Indiana Jones through and through. I talk about it later in the post, so if you are not interested in toys, please and absolutely scroll down past the photos.

Still I liked Helena Shaw. I liked the way she mirrored a less worldly, more cynical Indiana Jones, a child of the post-war, post- atomic space age, of big dreams and big nightmares. Her philosophy of “If it doesn’t belong in a museum, lets at least make some money off of it… (paraphrased)” is refreshingly unheroic. She is no Mary Sue. She is no Indiana Jones. She is just Helena Shaw. And I like her for that. I wouldn’t even mind a Helena Shaw TV series because in my mind it would be SOOOO different than an Indiana Jones series, half of it would be about dealing with the scoundrels that she knows trying to buy all of the stolen art and artifacts off the black market (which I think would be pretty cool).

So anyway, when I saw the action figures, I had to unbox them, and I thought I would document the unboxing for the blog as a way to set up my (unfocused) thoughts on DIAL OF DESTINY.

Here are the two products I purchased HELENA SHAW 6 inch figure in the INDIANA JONES ADVENTURE and HELENA SHAW AND MOTORCYCLE in the  INDIANA JONES: WORLDS OF ADVENTURE line.

The HELENA SHAW 6 inch unwraps to reveal some cardboard and two wrapped items. The wrapping is really kind of neat, it’s an old-style map – evoking the feel of an Indiana Jones story.

The figure looked solid. Though I thought the face sculpt could have been better for PWB herself – it did match the box fairly well.

It comes with three accessories: a backpack, a flashlight, and a piece of an artifact (you have to collect the other figures in the wave to finish it – though I like this as a one-off piece for further photos and posing.

Overall she looked good!

The second box was a smaller toy set featuring Helena Shaw with her iconic (I know, I know) white hat and a motorcycle.

The motorcycle features a net gun and case as well as an idol of some sort (it looks like it could be “pirate” in nature).

I really like this because the cycle stands easily – even with Helena on it. And although Helena’s arm detached when mounted on the bike, it was easily reattached. 

They look great!

And here are some photos of them in action!:

And I especially like this one as Helena Shaw tries to climb through the birds of paradise…

SCATTERED THOUGHTS ON DIAL OF DESTINY – CAN IT BE A GREAT MOVIE BUT ALSO A FLAWED INDY ADVENTURE?

Or maybe in this case, it is a great movie because of it. Let me explain, I’ve wanted to write about Dial of Destiny since I saw it a few weeks ago, but I didn’t quite know how to approach it. On my first watch, I didn’t love the film but it made me think a lot – and revisit the other Indiana Jones films again. Not that I had been away from Indy for a long time.

I rewatched all four Indy films during 2020 and got REALLY into them. I love all Indiana Jones – probably loved Indy more than Star Wars as a kid – at least from 1983-89. I wasn’t the biggest fan of LAST CRUSADE when it hit back in 1989, primarily because BATMAN and HONEY I SHRUNK THE KIDS came out that year and I gravitated towards those over Indy (I make no apologies because we all know what a huge Batman fan I’ve grown into and HISTK remains such an underrated classic). Also it had been 5 years since TLC and as a very little kid that gap felt longer than the 15 years between KINGDOM OF THE CRYSTAL SKULL and DIAL OF DESTINY. Though I have come to appreciate TLC in the ensuing decades. I still, however, feel like the Nazi angle of the story feels like a repeat.

My favorite Indy adventure has always been TEMPLE OF DOOM. As a kid, it felt like it broke all the rules as an overly violent prequel that ditched all of the characters from the first film and focused less on western religions and lore. I also loved that Indy returned the Sankara Stones to the villagers at the end of the film. Even as a kid that felt like character growth (though it was technically a prequel so…).

I didn’t love CRYSTAL SKULL but I’ve learned to enjoy different parts of it over the years – especially the “hound dog” open (including the infamous “nuke the fridge”), the greasers vs. preps fight scene, and the general emphasis on ESP as the driving “belief system” in the film. Moreover, the idea of Indy in a changed world in the 1950s (which even in the 1980s felt like a long time ago) exemplified by the wonderful shot of Indy in front of a massive a-bomb cloud.

I have to admit, I went into DIAL OF DESTINY with knives out. The first red flag was the title: INDIANA JONES AND THE DIAL OF DESTINY. Only in lazier versions of Indy (like side novels and some of the TV episodes of Young Indy) was the title focused on the object that was the focus of the story’s search. It is INDIANA JONES AND THE TEMPLE OF DOOM and not SANKARA STONES. It is THE LAST CRUSADE and not THE HOLY GRAIL. Even KINGDOM OF THE CRYSTAL SKULL focuses on the culture surrounding the Crystal Skull, though by the end I personally believe that the title is actually a twist and is referring to the aliens. And of course RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK is its own title never to be called INDIANA JONES AND THE RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK.

Add to that the use of Nazis in DOD – which feels like a repeat of LAST CRUSADE which was a repeat of RAIDERS – and one which George Lucas was never really satisfied with (again points to TOD and KOTCS for using a cult and the Soviet Union respectively).

Add in Phoebe Waller-Bridge, who I like quite a but was getting a lot of hate for being another brunette Lucasfilm protagonist meant to potentially replace the legacy character (similar to FORCE AWAKENS and Rey – though I still vehemently disagree with that take, Leia in KENOBI – no true at all, and characters in WILLOW, which I did not watch).

And finally add in an aging Harrison Ford who seems in no shape to be cracking the old bull whip and running through secret chambers at 78/79. I mean Carey Grant stopped acting at 62 and John Wayne at 69 (far too young for an actor now but it stands to reason that as good actors who made their bread and butter in thrillers – they had to know when to say when, especially if your career is made on more intense and less dramatic or comedic roles).

But DIAL OF DESTINY, one by one, alleviated all of these red flags. Though the title DIAL OF DESTINY (DOD) seems a bit lazy, after watching the film, my criticisms were abated. To its credit, no one ever calls either half of the Antikythera mechanism the “Dial of Destiny” per se. So one could argue that the title is actually a term of art – especially when put in the greater context of Indy’s life (more on that later). So I give the title a pass. It is still a little bit too on the nose for my liking but I guess its the equivalent of calling TEMPLE OF DOOM something like INDIANA JONES AND THE STONES OF SALVATION (kind of cool) or calling LAST CRUSADE something like INDIANA JONES AND A TASTE OF ETERNITY (dumb). It is STILL the object but it is a little better and more artful. Some might call this a quibble but as a purist, you really love to dissect those Indiana Jones titles, at least people did 20 and 30 years ago.

Next I want to address the Phoebe Waller-Bridge and Harrison Ford concerns together because the story is neither a Helena Shaw story or an Indiana Jones story. That’s right, DIAL OF DESTINY is almost most like what the original title RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK invoked: a globetrotting race for an artifact by a group of people, sometimes opposed and sometimes working together – not unlike IT’S A MAD, MAD, MAD WORLD or AROUND THE WORLD IN 80 DAYS. Though RAIDERS was an Indiana Jones adventure, DIAL OF DESTINY is not. Indiana Jones is the main character but James Mangold (who took over for Steven Spielberg when Spielberg was either burned out, disinterested, frustrated or some combination of the three) has positioned him more like the way John Wayne was positioned in THE SHOOTIST. The arc is more about him coming to terms with the fact that he can no longer adventure and less of a “return to the hat and whip” that KOTCS was trying to be.

Taking this path is something that frustrates A LOT of fans. But that also makes it an interesting movie. KENOBI tried for something similar in repositioning Obi-Wan as less of a fighter and more of an advisor, strategist, and instructor but it kind of lost that thread after episode 3 and devolved into a Kenobi getting his mojo back story – which was fine to be honest, because Ewan MacGregor is like three decades younger than Harrison Ford.

Nonetheless, Harrison Ford’s Indy is closer to Alec Guiness’ Kenobi in age and attitude than McGregor and Mangold realizes this. Sure he pushes over some bookshelves and rides a horse but beyond that he is a passenger (both literally and figuratively) for a lot of the action in the film. But that’s ok – as it makes him someone who is able to advise Helena (who desperately needs it at time), outsmart Mads Mikkelson’s Voller, and most importantly makes a conscious decision that he wants to STAY IN (spoilers spoilers spoilers)

…ancient Greece at the end of the film instead of returning to the present. While the resolution to this realization is played for a kind of laugh and he is quickly spirited to 1969 NYC for the denouement, that powerful realization, though not effectuated, becomes one of the most haunting and interesting moments in ANY Indiana Jones film. That a professor, a legend, can become so disheartened and so hobbled through age, loneliness, and the coming of death that they prefer to live in the past than pursue the future is something that should be relevant to all who see this film, as everyone is going to have to grapple with getting older – and dying. TLC wanted to be the Indy film about mortality but DOD is actually that film.

Lastly I want to talk about the Nazis as the antagonists in the film, or more specifically Mads Mikkelson’s Jurgen Voller. I give credit to Mangold because he almost has created a film that creates these Lucasfilm hallmarks of the last few years – replacement protagonists, dumb names, legacy villains and then flips each on their head. In the case of the Nazis, the fact that Voller wants the Antikythera device to (spoiler spoiler spoiler)…

… kill Hitler to right the Nazi party is a wild enough turn in the film for me to forgive the third use of the Nazis as villains. Again, I think this is a pretty skillful move by Mangold the writer to both satisfy the (misinformed) fans that think Indy is a Nazi-fighter only and also give those looking for something deeper who know Indy as a more diverse hero. So I was ok with it – also the fact that Voller repurposes members of the CIA into the Nazi party is a really subversive and subtle move that has gone over the heads of a lot of viewers but which I think is quite telling of Mangold’s overall approach to the material – straightforward at first glance but a lot more lurking underneath.

Overall, I really, really liked DIAL OF DESTINY. I am not sure I loved it, but I think that is also to be expected with Mangold’s approach. I might LOVE it after studying it some more and I think James Mangold would be ok with that journey. I would currently rank it, however, as my THIRD favorite Indy film – which is pretty good, after TEMPLE OF DOOM (all time favorite film), RAIDERS, DOD, KOTCS, and TLC (which in retrospect feels the most like something the Lucasfilm of today might actually try to make).

I do hope that somewhere down the line I can continue to give a more expansive, more in-depth, and more pointed critique of DOD but for now, these are my thoughts. Thanks for reading and taking the time.