George Lucas revisiting a massively successful film franchise more than two decades after the last film in the series, introducing a new and annoying character that his kids probably like but everyone else in the world hates? Sound familiar?
It happened with Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace, and there's some scuttlebutt from New York Magazine arising that it may be the same with Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, but it seems like the only thing Lucas learned from his first experience with this is to try and lowball everyone's expectations before the release of the film.
Now, amid rumors that the film hasn't turned out to be particularly good, comparisons are being drawn between Shia LaBeouf's introduction, likely as Indy's son, to Jar Jar Binks, the CG aggravation that permeated Lucas' first Star Wars prequel and introduced fart and poop jokes to the vaunted franchise, not to mention high-pitched squealing and bad comedy. However, these comparisons are not necessarily that the roles are equal in their annoying of audiences (yet it remains a distinct possibility), but rather the roles are both easy and obvious scapegoats for the suckage of their respective over-anticipated films.
Of course, an advantage Indy has over TPM is Steven Spielberg, a director of some standing, and likely one of the few people that could overrule Lucas on creative decisions if it became necessary. Plus, a great deal of what the Star Wars prequels were missing was a Han Solo kind of character - a cynical yet charismatic focal point for the audience to more fully relate to, outside of the realm of spunky Jedi monks. Indy has Han Solo himself, Harrison Ford.
So there's hope. But where there is great hope, there is also great fear. But we all know where fear leads (to anger, to hate, the Dark Side, yadda yadda), so let's all cross our fingers and try to have reasonable hopes.
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Incidentally, I do feel kind of bad for Ahmed Best, though - the guy who played Jar Jar Binks. What was supposed to be a big break that would give him a consistent source of income appearing at sci-fi conventions, if not a larger acting career, instead made him a nerd pariah. That ain't any kind of fair.