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Who should be the New Indiana Jones? My initial reaction to this question was not an answer, but another question: Do we need another Indiana Jones? I'm not sure about you, but the last one did just fine, right up until he popped out of that refrigerator. Of course, we've had our share of Batmen, Spidermen, and Men of Steel. It should be noted that technically, even Harrison Ford had his stand-ins with a couple different Young Indianas. That's really the problem, isn't it? The world isn't exactly waiting on pins and needles for the AARP tales of everyone's favorite archaeologist. Many of us are unsure about how Medicaid will cover Han Solo as he zips about the galaxy in his Golden Years. This nerf-herder isn't getting any younger.
And that's really the rub. Being an action hero is really a young person's game. Just as Laurence Olivier moved through his career first as Hamlet and then Henry V and ultimately King Lear, a man's got to know his limitations. The trouble is, we live in a world where "reboot" is now a real thing, not just something we do to recalcitrant computers. Beloved characters don't need to sit on the shelf very long before someone in accounting gets the bright idea: "Hey, we haven't done a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie for a while." Of course, there aren't a lot of folks who associate a particular actor with Donatello. That's not the case with Doctor Jones. It is Mister Ford's craggy visage that most of us connect to the finder of Lost Arks and Temples of Doom. How does one go about shaking that particular connection?
Ask James Bond. Sean Connery, Roger Moore, Timothy Dalton, Pierce Brosnan, Daniel Craig, George Lazenby and even Woody Allen have played this international man of mystery. The box office express that is the Bond franchise hasn't slowed for much in over fifty years. Who will be the new James Bond? Who cares? It is, to borrow another computer term, plug and play. Some are more successful than others, but as long as the shell of the production company keeps bringing us bigger and better ways to save the world from SMERSH or SPECTRE or ANTHRAX, it won't matter. Ultimately, it won't matter for Indiana Jones.
Let Tom Selleck have a bash at it. Why not?