Good afternoon,
Hope everyone's been enjoying the holiday weekend thus far. The focus of this article will be on the middle part of Marvel's adaptation of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. The cover, illustrated by the limited series' penciler, Butch Guice, showed Indy nearly being strangled by a miscolored Thuggee. The issue had a publication date of October 1984.
This issue began with Jones, Short Round, and Willie Scott walking to Pankot Palace in India. After entering the grounds, they were greeted by Chattar Lal, the new maharajah's prime minister. The trio was offered lodging for the night after being led inside. They were also introduced to another guest, British Captain Phillip Blumburtt.
The British military man and his troops were there on an inspection tour. He chatted with Indiana for a while before dinner began. Willie then learned why the maharajah had not taken a wife, as the leader, Zalim Singh, appeared to be around the same age as Short Round.
During the unusual dinner, conversation began, revolving around Indiana's observation that some of the pieces in Singh's collection looked like images once used by the legendary Thuggee cult to worship their goddess Kali. Lal replied that the group had been extinct for almost 100 years. Blumburtt added that the Thuggees had been eliminated by his nation's forces during the mutiny of 1857.
Indy talked about the parchment he'd been given by a boy in a small village (in the previous issue), noting that he saw what he thought was a Thuggee shrine underneath the palace. Singh said that he had heard those stories and was ashamed of the ancient evil. He swore that such atrocities would never happen again.
Later that evening, Jones checked in on Scott and provided her with a bowl of fruit. She was relieved to finally see food that she recognized, and the pair planned for some amorous activities later on. However, those plans were put on hold due to Indiana being attacked by a Thuggee guard. The villain met his untimely end after he was snagged by Indy's whip and drawn upward to the overhead fan in the room.
Short Round woke up just in time to see the end of that act, and he followed Jones to Willie's room. Indiana wondered where their attacker came from, and soon found the entrance to a hidden passageway. The friends wandered into the passageway and soon entered a trap. Willie waited for a while before running after them. She was forced to find a lever to free them, and the trio continued on.
They stopped before the light continued to illuminate the passageway. Indiana was stunned to see a Thuggee ceremony honoring Kali, in what we now know as the Temple of Doom. A man was locked in a cage about to be lowered into a pit, offered as a sacrifice to the deity.
Jones saw three of the Sankara stones placed in the eye and nose spaces of a large skull, and knew he had to determine if they were real. He climbed down, not knowing that Willie and Short Round were attacked moments later. As Indiana investigated, he peered into a hole in the chamber floor that revealed a mine that used children as slave labor.
Indy threw a large stone at one of the guards who was about to whip a small child. He was soon outnumbered and awoke in a cage, hearing Short Round rousing him. He explained that their cellmate was from the village. The cult brought in children to work the mines because they were small. The youth preferred that Kali's evil take him. He said that they made people drink the blood of Kali. Those who consumed it would still be alive, but it would seem as if they were in a nightmare.
The new captives were then taken before the cult leader, Mola Ram. He accused Jones of trying to steal the Sankara stones. Indy remarked that one of them had been stolen from a local village. Ram replied that there had originally been five stones, and that he was sure that the remaining two were somewhere in the tunnels. That explained their need for young laborers.
Once the Thuggees had all five stones, they would be all-powerful. Mola Ram was about to make Indy a convert and have the maharajah witness his conversion. Singh had already been converted and used a voodoo doll to prevent Jones from protesting further. He was then held in place and about to partake in the blood of Kali.
This was a rather dark story, and I fully understand why certain parts of the film were omitted from the comic book adaptation. I was surprised they showed the chilled monkey brains segment. There were also additional parts of the story that were not in the final cut of the film, which led me to believe that writer David Michelinie had to be working from the film script. This was still a good bridge between the first and last parts of the adaptation, and it kept the story moving along, covering the key parts of the secrets uncovered in Pankot Palace.
That's all I have for you today. Tomorrow morning, I'll wrap up my coverage of this film with a recap of the third and final issue of this limited series. We'll find out what happened to Indy and his friends, and learn if the final Sankara stones were recovered and if the shaman and his fellow villagers that we met in the first issue had any retribution. Until then, have a great week and don't forget to be kind to one another.
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