I love Indiana Jones. I really do. Raiders was a GREAT movie. It's in my top five favorites. Temple is great, and I'll even tolerate Crusade.

I was excited about getting to see Crystal Skull.

The first review that came out about it on AintItCoolNews.com didn't have enough bad things to say about it, but the following review from the New York Times said it was great, and it got a 3 1/2 minute standing ovation at Cannes. I was wary, but hopeful.

Tragically, for those of you who follow my reviews, there is not a sigh big enough in the entire world to sum up how I feel about this movie.

First of all, take all the traditions you have about Indiana Jones, and throw them out the window. None of them come up here, except for the Paramount logo turning into the opening shot of the movie. Which revolves around a prairie dog. Which becomes a motif for the whole first third of the movie.

Indiana Jones, of course, is brought into the room from the very end of the first movie to find an artifact that was placed there ten years previously. Yes, we get a gratuitous shot of the Ark.

Turns out, that the artifact comes from Roswell, New Mexico, dated 1947. I'll give you three guesses what's inside. Also, along the way, we find the good guy who becomes a traitor along the way, btu he skips all the rigmarole, and goes straight for the betraying.

So, not a whole lot happens after that, until Indy decides, for reasons I don't remember and don't particularly care about, to go find the crystal skull and return it to where it goes. So, he heads off to Nazca, and tracks down the final resting place of some Spanish Explorer, and finds the tomb by making a discovery that anyone else could have made under the circumstances, but didn't. We know they didn't, because apparently there was someone else there just seconds before them.

Anyway, they go trekking off through the jungle, and before you know it, they're being chased by Russians. An Indiana Jones vehicle chase scene. Awesome. And the first half of it is awesome. Finally, I thought, they're getting back on track.

And then Shia Lebeouf gets caught up in some vines, and Indy drives off without him. So Shia goes all Tarzan on us, swinging through the trees with a whole pack of Bonobo monkeys following along behind, and manages to catch up.

Indy's buddy, in the meantime, reveals he's actually a double agent, and didn't really betray him. See if you can guess where THAT's going to go.

Meanwhile, on the ground, Indy's in a fight with a Russian, and they're surrounded by really ticked off Army ants. Russian guy gets thrown into the ants, who attack him. Several gratuitous shots of ants crawling in his mouth and nose follow, and then Russian Guy is picked up and carried into an anthill.

Alright, I say. Fine, I say. That's the Indiana Jones version of army ants. I'll go with it.

So, they finally get to the temple to put the crystal skull back where it goes, and plot points shown to us basically pick us up and beat us over the head that Indy's buddy IS actually on the Russian side, and now Indy looks like a fool, trusting him.

So, they put the crystal skull back (I can't even bring myself to describe the aliens, the skeletons, or the fact that inanimate objects are moving on their own- oh wait, I just did), and things start to happen.

It all culminates in- and I wish TO GOD I was making this up, but I'm not- an interdimensional portal opening. Indy and crew leave the premises just in time to escape the crashing pyramid, the flooding water, and- I wish I was making this up, but I swear to God I'm not- the rising UFO.

I cannot even begin to explain to you the depths of feeling to which my soul has been crushed. I am completely and totally devoid of all feeling. This was a terrible terrible movie, and one that absolutely, should not, under any circumstances, have been made. If this is the end result of passing up on 20 years of scripts that no one liked or agreed on, how bad were those? I can't imagine they were much worse. I refuse to imagine.

This is not an Indiana Jones movie. This is a travesty. A spoof. Some sort of sick joke by Paramount, prior to releasing the REAL film, but alas, I fear it is not. I know it is not, because George Lucas is just stupid enough to do something like this. He knows it's been 20 years, so he'll throw us a bone, and everyone in the world will go see it, because it's been 20 years, and Lucas will laugh all the way to the bank. What a terrible movie.

I cannot explain to you how bad it is. I've brought all this here, and I hope you've read it, so you don't waste two hours of your life with such a monumentally stupid, worthless piece of tripe as this.

I understand that possibly what I'm feeling is an inverse Pirates Syndrome* effect, where I've waited for so long to see it, and I'm disappointed because it doesn't live up to my idea, but HONESTLY- even taken as a movie, and not compared with the others, this is a bad film. Full of plot holes (How did they figure out to go to point A from point B when, Point A hasn't even been mentioned previous to it's appearance?), and shoddy CGI at points(I don't care what Spielberg said, did you honestly believe that Lucas was gonna keep his hands out of it? Shame on you if you did), this movie fails to disappoint on almost every level.

But, who am I kidding? This review isn't going to stop any of you from seeing. Go shell out your nine bucks to see the flick, spend another twenty on concessions, and don't complain to me about how bad it was, I tried to warn you.

Crap. Worse than crap. This is what Crap aspires to be at it's penultimate moment, as it's about to enter the big wide world, and thinks, Wow, there's a whole world out there, and I can be anyth- plop.

*Pirates Syndrome is confusing the exultation of seeing a much hyped film with the exultation of seeing a genuinely good movie. I coined it from all the people who came out of Pirates 3 crowing and screaming in orgasmic joy about how great it was, when in actuality, it was an extremely stupid movie. Still, I think I'd rather sit through that again then see this film.