Indiana Jones And The Dial Of Destiny Has Another MacGuffin From Indy's Past, But Not In Other Movies
This article contains spoilers for "Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny."
You might notice a trend in the Indiana Jones films. The artifact Dr. Jones is going after in the opening sequence is never the main focus of the movie. In "Raiders of the Lost Ark" it's the fertility idol, in "Temple of Doom" it's a big diamond, in "The Last Crusade" it's the Cross of Coronado and in "Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny" it's the Spear of Destiny.
Strangely enough, the only Indiana Jones movie that doesn't start with a fake MacGuffin is "Kingdom of the Crystal Skull," which has the Russians going after the body of an alien right off the bat. Granted, that's not the Crystal Skull itself, but it's tied directly to the main artifact being hunted throughout the movie.
"Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny" goes back to the tried and true formula by having Indy and his new sidekick, Basil (Toby Jones) trying to stop the Nazis from absconding with the Holy Lance, also known as the Holy Spear, the Spear of Destiny, and the Lance of Longinus, which is supposedly the spear that pierced the side of Jesus Christ while he was on the cross.
It is revealed right away that the Spear of Destiny is an obvious fake, even though the train the Germans are running away with is filled with real artifacts, including half of Archimedes's Dial which becomes the object everyone is after for the rest of the movie.
Turns out, Dr. Jones has encountered the real Spear of Destiny before, but you have to dig into the comic books to get that story.
The comic books went to some wild places
In 1995, Dark Horse had a four-issue run of "Indiana Jones and the Spear of Destiny" which saw Indy hunting for the Spear of Destiny in Ireland in the waning days of World War II. He encounters Irish Nazis (almost as annoying as Illinois Nazis), fairy folk, and not one, but two plucky young red-headed sidekicks.
The Spear of Destiny as portrayed in the comic carries a power that makes it a deadly weapon that acts a lot like Yondu's arrow in the "Guardians of the Galaxy" films, but even more dangerous is the prophecy that the one who "claims the spear and solves its mystery holds the fate of the world in his hands." This is what Hitler wants with it most of all. Should this be true then it's yet another Christian artifact with immense destructive power.
But Indy, with a little help from his dad, ends up triumphant and once again turns the prize over to the US Government. The postscript indicates that the US being in control of the spear times out with the dropping of the Atom bomb, thus fulfilling the prophecy of the one in control of the spear holding the fate of the world in their hands.
Of course, none of this is canon to the film series, but it is fun to point out that this isn't the first time the cold open artifact from one of the movies was toyed with in another Indiana Jones story. A time travel device is way more cinematic than the spear, so they definitely made the right decision to go that route, but it does make me wonder if one of the writers remembered that old Dark Horse limited series while they were cooking up their fake MacGuffin that kicks things off in the new film.