Overanalyzing Indy

Anyone who knows me (y'know, the real me, not the digital avatar version of me,) knows that I am kind of a fan of the Indiana Jones movies. In high school, I spent almost all of my free time during my junior and senior year working on a fairly ambitious Indiana Jones flick with my friend, spending the time my peers were using to get drunk, high, and laid making a nearly feature length homage to Spielberg's adventure trilogy. My friend crafted nazi armbands for the villainous extras, we researched the history of our mythic object Indy was hunting (Excalibur in our movie,) we drove out to remote locations for unimportant shots, we blew up a model of the nazi base, and we talked dozens of our friends into donating their time to dressing up as nazis and getting killed off quickly.
So yeah, I'm kind of a fan.
The trailer for the long awaited fourth installment of the franchise, "Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull" premiered last week, so I was obviously excited.
If you haven't seen it yet, check out the trailer right here, embedded for your viewing pleasure:

So how do I feel about the teaser after viewing it dozens of times in the last week?
Strangely unmoved, to be totally honest.
The trailer is just cut in a really odd way, and the pacing of the whole thing is off. This doesn't mean the movie looks bad- I just feel like the teaser didn't really convey much of anything about what we've got in store for us on May 22. That said, here are a few observations.
-The buildup in the beginning is fucking stupid. Indy movies are fun, light on their feet, cartoony adventures modeled after old school serials. The first half of the trailer implies the movies are some sort of "Lord of the Rings" epic style trilogy, which is exactly where the "Pirates" sequels went wrong... which makes me nervous.
-Ray Winstone looks sweet as Indy's sidekick. But Ray Winstone is pretty much always sweet.
-From this trailer, it looks like David Koepp (writer of "Kingdom of the Crystal Skull,") watched the original trilogy and said "oh, he uses that whip a lot," and somehow that was the biggest thing he got out of Indy. I hope they don't overuse the whip- it is part of what makes Indy Indy... but let's not carried away, people.
-Cate Blanchett looks totally ridiculous as a Nazi, I mean commie commander... which is not necessarily a bad thing.
-I love the moment when Indy tries to swing into a car, crashes into another truck and says "damn, I thought that was closer." Then he looks at the two goons for a beat before we cut to the outside of the truck as the goons are tossed out. That's the kind of moment that the original trilogy is filled with, and that moment, more than anything, gives me hope for the movie. But it also leads me to the moment I hated most in the trailer.
-Indy whipping up into the ceiling and pulling himself out of the speeding truck before it crashes into other speeding cars, which causes an awful looking CG explosion. The whip up move is a little too Batman for me, and I mean Schumacher Batman. And CG explosions are just not very Indy to me. Let alone CG Indy himself. These movies are all about insane stunts, done by Harrison Ford or his stuntmen. Now that Indy can do anything because of computers doesn't mean the character should be able to do anything- watch out for the "Die Hard" effect, as they try and turn Indy into a superhero.
-Shia, the jury is still out on you in this one. He doesn't look like he's gonna be Shortround or Jar Jar Binks... but will he serve a purpose other than to get teeny boppers in their seats (and he will. Despite his nebbishy looks, I heard a seventeen year old girl this weekend describe Mr. LeBouf as "gorgeous." Ooooooookay.) Shia is the luckiest fucker in the world after landing the Indy gig, and Spielberg has faith in the kid. I'm gonna give him the benefit of the doubt, especially since he was the least sucky part of Michael Bay's "Transformers."
-There are stereotypical "native" types chasing Indy and co. in the trailer. I'm glad Spielberg and his team didn't get all PC just because they've won some Oscars and made movies about "tolerance" and things like that. I'm being serious here though- it's the style of those old serials, and anyone who gets offended by that type of thing needs to lighten up.
-I don't know what that collapsing temple thing is, but it looks potentially cool.
-Ford looks like he can still bring it, which is the most important thing to take from the trailer.

So, a mixed bag, but I will obviously be there for the midnight shows, ready to give you my reaction to the actual movie, fair readers. I still think the title sucks, and worry about the thing that could really bring the whole movie down- the rogue Lucas factor. George Lucas already ruined "Star Wars" for us with his awful prequel trilogy, let's just hope he doesn't ruin "Indiana Jones." Because even though the trailer looks like it was cut by a retarded, over caffeinated monkey, I still hope the movie kicks ass and can't wait to find out if it does.
Until then:

Watch the Trailer on Yahoo! Movies