The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles

The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles is a TV series that ran from 1992 to 1996. A form of "edutainment," the 44 episode series explores the childhood and youth of the fictional character Indiana Jones. The series primarily stars Sean Patrick Flanery as Indy aged 16-20, but also includes several episodes with Corey Carrier as Indy aged 8-10. George Hall also played Indy at age 93 for the bookends of each episode. The show was created and executive produced by George Lucas, who was also behind the Indiana Jones feature films.

The series was designed as an educational program for children, spotlighting historical figures and important events, using the concept of a prequel to the films as a draw. Most episodes feature a standard formula of an elderly (94-year-old) Indiana Jones (played by George Hall) in present day (1993) New York City encountering people who spur him to reminisce and tell stories about his past adventures. These stories would either involve him as a young boy (10, played by Corey Carrier) or as a teenager (17, played by Sean Patrick Flanery). In one episode, a fifty-year-old Indy (played by Harrison Ford) is seen reminiscing. Initially, the plan was for the series to alternate between the adventures of Indy as a child (Corey Carrier) and as a teenager (Sean Patrick Flanery), but eventually the episodes featuring Flanery's version of the character dominated the series. The series revealed that the elderly Jones has a daughter, and a grandson named Spike.


Many of the episodes involve Indiana meeting and working with famous historical figures. Historical figures featured on the show include Leo Tolstoy, Pancho Villa, Charles de Gaulle, and John Ford, in such diverse locations as Egypt, Austria-Hungary, India, China, and the whole of Europe. For example, Curse of the Jackal prominently involves Indy in the adventures of T. E. Lawrence and Pancho Villa. Indy also encounters (in no particular order) Pablo Picasso, Eliot Ness, Charles de Gaulle, Al Capone, Norman Rockwell (same episode as Picasso) Louis Armstrong, Winston Churchill, and Sigmund Freud; At one point, he competes against a young Ernest Hemingway for the affections of a girl, is nursed back to health by Albert Schweitzer, and goes on a safari with Theodore Roosevelt.

The show provided a lot of the back story for the films. His relationship with his father, first introduced in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, was further fleshed out with stories about his travels with his father as a young boy. His original hunt for the Eye of the Peacock, a large diamond seen in Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, was a recurring element in several stories. The show also chronicled his activities during World War I and his first solo adventures, including his first run-ins with Belloq, the villain from Raiders of the Lost Ark.