The MacGuffin has become synonymous with blockbuster filmmaking over the last five decades, but it was arguably popularized in the first place by the Indiana Jones franchise. Each installment in the series relies on an inanimate object to power the narrative, giving all parties a shared goal as the plot advances from one set piece to the next.
So far we’ve seen Harrison Ford’s iconic adventurer hunt down the Ark of the Covenant, the Sankara Stones, the Holy Grail and a crystal skull, so we’re all eagerly waiting to discover what Dr. Jones ends up stumbling upon next. Shooting is currently located in Glasgow, which is doubling for 1969 New York as parade scenes celebrating the return of the Apollo 11 crew are being filmed.
That doesn’t shed much light on specifics other than confirming the long-held rumors that the Space Race was set to be the driving force of the story, but a new rumor claims that the MacGuffin of Indiana Jones 5 is set to be a mysterious artifact that possesses the capabilities to power a time travel machine being developed by rogue Nazi scientists.
After sci-fi crept into the mythology at the end of Crystal Skull, the thought of time travel is enough to generate more than a few raised eyebrows among the skeptics, but it could tie into those World War II scenes glimpsed in set photos that hinted we could be getting a de-aged Ford for flashbacks. It also ties into some of the speculative tidbits we previously heard a while back, so while it’s far from being an official confirmation, there could well be some merit to Indiana Jones 5 focusing on the title hero’s old adversaries trying to rewrite the course of history.
