Jumping The Shark: 9 Franchise Derailing Films

8. Indian Jones and The Kingdom of the Crystal Skull

Early into the run time of Indian Jones and The Kingdom of the Crystal skull comes a moment that itself has now become synonymous with franchise-ruining debacle. A bedraggled Indiana Jones evades his Soviet pursuers by commandeering a rocket sled that brings him to a deserted town in the middle of the New Mexican desert. To his horror, Indy realizes he's stumbled into the middle of a nuclear test site that is about to host an atomic denotation. Indy scrambles to find a way to escape as a loud speaker counts down to Indy's nuclear annihilation. It seems that escape is impossible....that's because it is. Indy survives the blast via one of the most catastrophically stupid and insulting screenwriting brain-farts ever perpetrated on the movie going public. Indy hides himself in a lead-lined fridge that is able to withstand a nuclear explosion. The blast catapults the fridge hundreds of feet into the air and when it lands, Indy emerges unscathed. Thus a new phrase for a staggeringly poor artistic decision that destroys a franchise's credibility was born: "Nuking the Fridge."

The rest of the film includes CGI monkeys, Shia Labeouf and inter-dimensional aliens. Indy fans waited 19 years for Harrison Ford to don the fedora and crack the whip again, and, after Kingdom of the Crystal skull, I can stand to wait another couple decades for Indy 5.