Between the unforgettable characters, the iconic costume work, memorable lines and awe-inspiring action sequences, it's no wonder that Indiana Jones has become one of the greatest franchises to ever grace the silver screen. Of course, it's popcorn cinema at its finest, but that doesn't mean the Harrison Ford-led franchise isn't without its fair share of absurd moments. In the 2008 film Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, one particular fridge-related scene was so unbelievable that fans, critics and scientists alike left the theater scoffing.
During Kingdom of the Crystal Skull's opening sequence, Indiana Jones found himself in yet another life-threatening situation. Only this time, it was one that nobody could ever survive. Regardless, Indy does just that, bringing forth a swarm of scathing reviews that likened the highly implausible action scene to "jumping the shark," a term used to signal a dramatic drop in quality in a TV show or movie.
Indiana Jones' Fridge Scene Encapsulates The Fourth Installment's Issues
In what is now popularly referred to as "nuking the fridge," Indy hid inside a lead-lined refrigerator during a close-range nuclear explosion to shield himself from the imminent atomic blast. Ultimately, he escaped the perilous ordeal virtually unscathed by riding the bomb's shockwave at great speed through the air and out of harm's way. Although the fourth film in the franchise had more than a few ridiculous scenes of a similar, preposterous nature, the opening action sequence was by far the most heavily criticized moment in the entire series.
With CGI aside, and in contrast to the earlier films, much of the fourth Indiana Jones movie was comically over the top. Any given audience is expected to have a willing suspension of disbelief when attending a film, but, at a certain point, the unbelievable nature of a situation cannot be ignored if a scene goes well beyond what's reasonable. Unfortunately, the spell was broken at the start of the film when Harrison Ford's Indy survived his stint inside the nuked fridge. Consequently, this improbable and silly feat set a dangerously low bar where quality and tone were concerned for the rest of the movie's duration.
The Scientific Inaccuracy Of The Nuke The Fridge Moment
One major criticism of the "nuke the fridge" debacle comes in response to Lucas defending the science behind the chances of Indy escaping with his life. He explained in a 2012 New York Times profile that "the odds of surviving that refrigerator -- from a lot of scientists -- are about 50-50," In a hilarious scientific peer review published on Overthinking It that was made in response to his outlandish claim, Dr. David Shechner scrutinizes the science behind the scene. "[For Indy] to be accelerated by an atomic blast to the speeds observed in this sequence, it would need to be placed so close to the bomb as to be surely obliterated by the blast's other myriad effects," he explained.
Dr. Shechner goes on to list the various ways in which Indy would have died in the film's opening, highlighting such painful ends as lethal acceleration and fatal whiplash, spontaneous combustion, being scorched by molten lead, stainless steel and incendiary air, being crushed under the shockwave of his reentry, as well as dying by suffocation or radiation. So, contrary to the previous assertion made by Lucas, the odds of Indy remaining alive after the nuclear blast is "roughly 0±0%," not "50-50." While Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny does take a dip into the absurd, thankfully nothing from the latest installment tops the infamy of the "nuking the fridge" setpiece.