Harrison Ford Feels Very Differently About Snakes Than Indiana Jones
This post contains spoilers for "Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny."
One of the inherent problems for any sequel to Steven Spielberg's rousing serial adventure "Raiders of the Lost Ark" is the burden of having to follow up an instant classic. "Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom" skirted that responsibility by actually being a much darker prequel that showed a greedier Indiana Jones who was much more concerned with fortune and glory than retrieving ancient artifacts for the greater good.
The latest entry, "Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny," tries to recreate the glory of "Raiders" by literally going back in time. In Indy's final send-off, the pressure to capture lightning in a bottle once again is clearly evident just by the number of easter eggs and callbacks the fifth installment has to the 1981 original and other previous entries.
Out of all the classic beats in "Raiders of the Lost Ark," one sequence stands out among all the rest: "Snakes ... why did it have to be snakes?" In his search for the Ark of the Covenant, Indy and his long-lost love Marion Ravenwood find themselves trapped in the Well of Souls temple with literally thousands of snakes slithering all around them. The scene is so famous because it's both terrifying and hilarious at the same time, showing Indy's worst fear coming to life in the worst possible way. The moment humanizes Indy, and turns him into a hero for the first time in the film as he tries to keep Marion safe and find a way out of a grisly fate worse than death.
Thankfully, Indy's close-up with a tongue-flicking cobra wasn't nearly as traumatizing for Harrison Ford as it was for the character he played.
'I actually like snakes!'
Some of you may remember the eye-opening, star-studded Showtime series "Years of Living Dangerously" that featured first-hand accounts about the effects of climate change. Celebrity correspondents including Arnold Schwarzenegger, Matt Damon, and Jessica Alba all traveled around the glove to see the effects of global warming firsthand.
Ford also appeared in the docuseries, and used his considerable star power to help promote the show during an AMA (Ask Me Anything) Q&A on Reddit. When the questions weren't centered around the potential global catastrophe we're all facing, the discussion naturally turned to whether or not Ford was really afraid of snakes in real life. Surprisingly, Ford had this to say:
"I actually like snakes! When I was young, I was a boy scout nature camp counselor, and one of our projects was collecting snakes and creating an environment for them, so I'm quite familiar with snakes and think they'r[e] fantastic creatures."
Ford's actual love of snakes aside, his boyhood experience as a boy scout inspired the thrilling circus train opening in "Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade" showcasing River Phoenix as a young Indy. Falling victim to his ophidiophobia once again in "Dial of Destiny," Indy encounters a bed of eels as he and his companions dive into the sea to find the other half of the Antikythera — an Ancient Greek calculator that actually existed.
In the scene, Indy tries to convince himself that the eels don't really resemble snakes at all, making for one of the best callbacks in "Dial of Destiny" that doesn't feel overly forced or ham-handed. His fear of snakes encompasses everything we love about the character, and knowing that Ford himself isn't really phased by them at all adds another layer to what's arguably the most memorable scene in the entire franchise.