How to Watch Indiana Jones Movies in Chronological Order

Indiana Jones Movies successful Chronological Order

These blurbs incorporate mild spoilers, including characters, settings, and wide crippled points.

0. The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles (1992-1996)

Though nonessential to the Indiana Jones movie saga, The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles is the story’s canonical starting point. It’s optional viewing, but we’ve included it connected this database for those funny successful the full story.

The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles stars 4 iterations of the intrepid adventurer: the kid (played by Corey Carrier), the teen/young big (Sean Patrick Flanery), the middle-aged antheral (played successful a azygous occurrence by Harrison Ford), and the elder (George Hall).

The bid chiefly follows Flanery’s teenage/young big Indy adventuring astir the world, encountering and moving with real-life humanities figures, including erstwhile U.S. president Theodore Roosevelt, writer Leo Tolstoy, creator Pablo Picasso, infamous gangster Al Capone, famed jazz instrumentalist Louis Armstrong, and neurologist Sigmund Freud, among others. The bid besides explores Indy’s background, notably his narration with his father.

1. Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (1984)

Temple of Doom is the archetypal Indiana Jones movie chronologically, contempt being released aft Raiders of the Lost Ark. Set a twelvemonth earlier its predecessor, Temple of Doom kicks disconnected with Indy surviving an assassination effort successful Shanghai earlier parachuting retired of a cargo level into bluish India. There, alongside companions Willie Scott (Kate Capshaw) and Short Round (Ke Huy Quan), Indy agrees to assistance the locals find their missing children and stolen ineffable stone.

Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom is considered the series’ “darkest” movie — the film’s dozens of deaths see a man’s bosom being ripped from his chest, portion a grotesque meal country features delicacies specified arsenic unrecorded snakes, elephantine beetles, eyeball soup, and monkey brains served caller wrong their decapitated heads. Temple of Doom, alongside Gremlins, led to the instauration of the MPAA’s PG-13 rating. (The standing strategy antecedently consisted of G, PG, M, and X.)

2. Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)

Over 40 years ago, Raiders of the Lost Ark kicked disconnected the Indiana Jones franchise. Set successful 1936, Raiders of the Lost Ark takes Indy connected a globetrotting escapade from South America and the U.S. to Africa and Asia. His archetypal on-screen escapade pits Indy against Nazi forces, a recurring antagonist radical successful the series. The 2 parties contention to retrieve the Ark of the Covenant, a gold-plated thorax believed by Adolf Hitler to location divine powerfulness susceptible of aiding the Nazis successful satellite domination.

3. Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989)

Indy’s adjacent planetary escapade featured different quest for an past artifact: the Holy Grail, a relic said to clasp the powerfulness of immortality. Indy’s estranged father, Henry (Sean Connery), spent overmuch of his beingness researching the Grail, yet going missing successful its pursuit. Guided by his father’s extended notes, Indy sets disconnected to find some his begetter and the relic, erstwhile again racing against the Nazis. Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade is the past movie earlier the clip leap to newer films.

4. Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (2008)

After a astir 20-year hiatus, Indiana Jones returned successful 2008 with Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. The series’ 4th and astir caller introduction introduced Shia LaBeouf arsenic Mutt Williams, the lad of Indy and Marion Ravenwood (Karen Allen), who returns for the archetypal clip since Raiders of the Lost Ark. Cate Blanchett stars arsenic the superior villain, a Soviet cause named Irina Spalko.

Kingdom of the Crystal Skull erstwhile again sees Indy and his companions racing against a nefarious entity (this clip the Soviets) to get different artifact of large power: a telepathic crystal skull with which the Soviets program to power the masses. In summation to the acquainted globetrotting and double-crossing, Kingdom of the Crystal Skull introduces extraterrestrial elements into the bid formula.

Read IGN’s Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull review.

5. Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny (2023)

The adjacent and last Indiana Jones movie is Dial of Destiny – the archetypal Indy movie since Kingdom of the Crystal Skull was released 15 years ago. Alongside Harrison Ford and Mads Mikkelsen, Dial of Destiny stars Boyd Holbrook, Antonio Banderas, John Rhys-Davies, Toby Jones, and Phoebe Waller-Bridge arsenic Indy’s goddaughter Helena. The communicative follows the latter's reunion with Indy, arsenic the 2 of them enactment unneurotic to pursuit down an past artifact with unthinkable power.

James Mangold (Logan) directed the film, making Dial of Destiny the franchise’s archetypal movie not helmed by Steven Spielberg. (Spielberg told Deadline helium was “peripherally involved” with the movie.) It's besides the archetypal Indiana Jones movie distributed by Disney, pursuing its acquisition of Lucasfilm successful 2012.

Read IGN's review of Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny oregon spot where to ticker Dial of Destiny.

Future Indiana Jones Stories

While Dial of Destiny is being called the decision to Indiana Jones's story, Disney and Lucasfilm were said to beryllium "actively" pursuing a Disney+ TV bid arsenic of November 2022. Outgoing Lucasfilm brag Kathleen Kennedy has much precocious stated that determination are nary plans for a caller Indiana Jones movie, going truthful acold arsenic to assertion "I don’t deliberation anybody is funny close present successful exploring it.” Could that mean there's a inactive a TV bid retired there? Possibly, but unlikely.

Outside of movies/television, Microsoft released Indiana Jones and the Great Circle backmost successful 2024, an archetypal communicative successful the franchise acceptable during "the tallness of" Indy's career. IGN awarded it a reappraisal people of 9, calling the action-adventure crippled "an irresistible and immersive planetary treasure hunt, and acold and distant the champion Indy communicative this century."

Jordan covers games, shows, and movies arsenic a freelance writer for IGN.

Originally posted:

Jan 16, 2026 9:14 pm