Ever since he debuted on the big screen in 1981’s Raiders of the Lost Ark, Dr. Henry “Indiana” Jones Jr. has earned a spot as one of cinema’s greatest heroes. Born after Steven Spielberg was denied the chance to direct a James Bond movie, Indiana Jones travels the world in search of rare artifacts, though he sends what he finds to museums. However, a hero is only as good as his villain… or villains, since Indy’s appeared in four movies with a fifth on the way. From Nazis, to cultists, to rival archeologists, to more Nazis, Indy fought just about every villain on the planet. Today, we’re going to rank some of the best villains from the Indiana Jones franchise.
MOVIEWEB VIDEO OF THE DAY
8 Colonel Vogel
Distributed by Paramount Pictures
Colonel Vogel is a henchman who appears in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. He’s an SS officer tasked with eliminating Indiana Jones and his father directly from Adolf Hitler himself, and his pursuit of the two Joneses is relentless. He gets a fantastic final fight on top of a tank with Indy, but he also gets some good moments before that, like when he interrogates the elder Jones inside the aforementioned tank about why they came back for Henry’s Grail diary at all. He is the butt of the joke for the scene where he gets tossed off a blimp, but he also shows the difference between the German and Austrian ways of saying goodbye. The German way is much more painful.
MOVIEWEB VIDEO OF THE DAY
MOVIEWEB VIDEO OF THE DAY
MOVIEWEB VIDEO OF THE DAY
7 Walter Donovan
The main villain of Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, Donovan will allegedly sell his mother for an Etruscan vase, if Henry Jones Sr. is to be believed. An American businessman, he allies with the Nazis to find the Holy Grail, seeking to keep the cup for himself and live forever. On paper, there’s nothing wrong with him as villain. It’s just that he is a little bland. He likes expensive things, as shown when he says he’s fine with Hitler ruling the world as long as he gets to keep the cup. He gets a memorable death, but he really should have been smarter. After all, he tells Indy at the beginning not to trust anyone. Really should have taken his own advice when selecting the real Holy Grail from all the false ones. Shooting Henry Jones Sr. to make Indy brave the three booby traps guarding the Grail is pretty despicable, though.
6 Lao Che
Lao Che’s appearance was brief. He’s only in the first 10 minutes or so of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. A Chinese gangster, he owns Club Obi Wan (Yes, the club was named for the Jedi) and hired Indy to find the remains of the Chinese Emperor, Nurhaci. Of course, he sends some underlings to get the remains without paying, so any deal you make with him is probably worthless. It’s a shame his appearance is so brief. He’s a lot of fun, especially when he reveals to Indy that he just drank poison and that Lao Che has the only easily available antidote.
5 Irina Spalko
Inspired by actual research into psychic warfare done by the KGB, Colonel Irina Spalko not only seems to be psychic herself, but is also Steven Spielberg’s favorite of all of Indiana Jones’ adversaries. She seeks the Crystal skull of Akator, believing it will somehow give her ultimate knowledge. Given one possible interpretation of her fate at the end of the movie, she gets precisely that. Unlike a lot of other villains, Spalko’s not afraid to do some fighting herself. She’s a master fencer and she’s played by Cate Blanchett, which automatically makes her even better.
4 Major Toht
The secondary villain of Raiders of the Lost Ark, Toht is one creepy guy. In fact, his name is pronounced the same as the German word for “death.” An intelligence agent for the SS, Steven Spielberg originally wanted him to have a mechanical flamethrower for an arm, but George Lucas had to talk him out of it. Everything about him is unsettling. He wears black in the blistering Egyptian heat, and he’s a complete sadist, as shown when he’s about to torture Marion with a fire poker. He’s fairly quiet. He only has 16 lines in the entire film, but he makes them count. He totally deserves the fate the Ark of the Covenant has in store for him.
3 Elsa Schneider
An Austrian archeologist, this deceitful villain not only seduced Indiana Jones, but his father as well. She’s a wonderful femme fatale, though she does talk in her sleep, according to Henry Jones Sr. She works with the Nazis, though she claims not to believe in their ideology. Admittedly, that part may have a shred of truth to it. When Donovan asks her to pick the real Holy Grail out for him, she chooses the most opulent one, despite the fact that Jesus Christ would never have had a cup like that. She wants the Grail for herself, but she didn’t listen to the Grail Knight and fell to her death trying to grab the Grail instead of giving Indy her other hand so that he could pull her up.
2 René Belloq
Belloq is the main villain of Raiders of the Lost Ark. This French archeologist always seems one step ahead of Indy, a fact he enjoys rubbing in Indy’s face. He claims to be a shadowy reflection of Indy, but given some of the less than honorable things Indy’s done or been said to have done, what does that say about Belloq? Well, he’s allied with Nazis to dig up the Ark of the Covenant. They want to use it to take over the world. He wants to speak directly to God with it, believing the Ark behaves likes a radio. He’s highly intelligent and capable of holding his liquor. He does live up to his self-proclaimed shadowy reflection of Indiana Jones declaration, but he also gets overridden a few times by his fellow Nazis. Still, he gets under Indy’s skin in the worst ways and God tells him His opinion loud and clear at the end of the film.
1 Mola Ram
Theft, kidnapping, child slavery, murder, and brainwashing are among the many crimes of this heinous leader of the Thuggee cult. The main villain of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, Mola Ram is absurdly hard to forget. His evil scheme is to collect all five Sankara Stones and use them to bring about the reign of the goddess, Kali. What makes him the top villain of the franchise? Simply put, he’s the most memorable one. He wears the skull of a cow, which would be sacrilegious to Hindus, he’ll kill his own followers if he has to, plus he’s got that whole “rip your heart right out of your chest” move that he does on a hapless sacrificial victim and later attempts on Indy himself. It’s such a disturbing tactic that it ended up leading to the creation of the PG-13 rating. To make it worse, he does a lot of this with a smile on his face.
