There may not be any character in cinematic history that has more of a detailed timeline than Indiana Jones.
However, this is primarily because of the books, video games, and the 1990’s TV show The Adventures of Young Indiana Jones, which sees the character go on mini-adventures with many historical figures, such as Pancho Villa, T.E. Lawrence, Ernest Hemingway, and so many more that it would take up the entirety of this article if I keep going.
If you want to glimpse at how busy and detailed Indy’s timeline is, just check out this page on theraider.net and proceed from there.
However, what about just the movies? Well, we already listed how to watch the films in order, but we’ve compiled a quick chronology of when each major part of the Indy films actually takes place. Two of the movies cover two different periods, so I’ll separate them here, but I’ll then list the movies at the very end for a quick reference.
So, here’s a short breakdown in chronological order of each period shown in the films.
1912
The whole opening portion of Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade takes place in a year earlier than any other portion of any Indy film. This shows the origins of the Indiana Jones character as he’s just a 13-year-old boy scout, played by River Phoenix, hopping around Utah.
1935
All of the second film, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, takes place in 1935, which technically makes it a prequel to the first film. Indy, who flees Shanghai and somehow unintentionally ends up in India, helps a village retrieve their sacred stones while, more importantly, saving the village’s children who have disappeared. Indy eventually realizes that Pankot Palace is using the stones for evil practices and are enslaving the village’s children. For my money, this makes it Indy’s best achievement because instead of retrieving an artifact, he rescues hundreds of children and returns them to their home village.
1936
Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark takes place entirely in 1936 as Indy eventually finds himself on an adventure to find the Ark of the Covenant. It is the first film released in the franchise, introducing the character to the world. It also quickly establishes Indy as a globetrotting archaeologist adventurer. In fact, if you think about it, he visits five different continents just in this film: The opening sequence in Peru (South America), at a fictional college in Connecticut (North America), Nepal to visit Marion Ravenwood (Asia), Cairo to find the ark (Africa), and in Europe on an island north of Crete. That’s a busy year, even for Indy.
1938
Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade gives us the highly entertaining father-son adventure between Indy and his pop, Henry Jones Sr., played by the legendary Sean Connery. After the opening sequence, the rest of this film takes place in 1938 and leads us to the most excellent cup of all. Oh, not the Stanley Cup, not the World Cup, no, this is the Holy Grail, and, to spice it up and make it more entertaining, this movie version of the famous cup grants its drinker immortality, or so we’re told.
1944
The opening portion of the last Indy film takes place in 1944. Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny shows a younger Harrison Ford, thanks to de-aging CGI, in the first 25-minutes of the film, portraying the character as he searches for the Spear of Longinus while doing something that we all know Indy loves to do – fight against the Nazi’s.
1950
OK, I’m cheating here a little bit, but just for this one year. No, 1950 is not in any of the films, but Harrison Ford’s only portrayal as the character outside the movies was in the aforementioned Indiana Jones TV show. Ford’s brief appearance as Indy on one episode of that series is often forgotten but worth at least a mention here.
1957
Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull is the least loved of the Indy films and is now, in terms of timeline, cushioned in-between the events of the last film. It’s also the only film that shows his son, Mutt Williams, portrayed by Shia LaBeouf.
1969
Most of Dial of Destiny takes place in the year of the moon landing, and gives us our final Indy adventure of the movies. Now teaching at a smaller college, Indy is no longer the highly praised professor who teaches his students how to solve problems but rather he’s now just a man who has turned to drinking to solve his own.
That concludes our list but here are the films in order of release and what years they depict in the film.
Raiders of the Lost Ark – 1936
Temple of Doom – 1935
Last Crusade – 1912 & mostly 1938
Kingdom of the Crystal Skull – 1957
Dial of Destiny – 1944 & mostly 1969