The three-part Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom comic adaptation was published by Marvel Comics from June through August 1984.
Plot summary[]
It is 1935. After escaping from the gangster Lao Che in Shanghai, Indiana Jones along with his pickpocket sidekick Short Round and singer Willie Scott, crashlands in India near the village of Mayapore. Mayapore's shaman tells of how men from the distant Pankot Palace kidnapped their children as well as their sacred stone, which Jones theorizes is one of the lost Sankara Stones. He thus undertakes a mission to rescue the children, and upon arriving at the palace discovers it is a hotbed of activity for a resurgence of the evil Thuggee cult, led by the sinister and hypnotic Mola Ram, who are using Mayapore's children as slave labor to mine for precious gems. Jones and his companions must put an end to the cult, free the children, and recover the Sankara Stones.
Differences from the film[]
As with the novelization, the comic book differs from the movie in many ways:
- Nurhachi's ashes are inside a box instead of a urn.
- Lao Che doesn't scoff at Indiana Jones' threat of gutting Willie Scott with a fork.
- Wu Han is by the side of Lao Che and his sons rather than at Indy' side, dying without anything to Indy.
- During the brawl at Club Obi Wan, Willie kicks in the behind a fat woman who tries to recover the Peacock's Eye for herself, demanding that the Eye is her diamond, but this causes her to lose the diamond as the woman knocks down the ice buckets, which is what the Chief Henchman does in the film when Indy throws a cymbal at him.
- Indy isn't able to drink the antidote until he and Willie escape from the club and land into Short Round's car.
- Kao Kan isn't present at the Nang Tao Airport when Che smiles at Indy's predicament, with his father being the only one looking at the plane.
- The Chinese Pilot and the Chinese Co-Pilot only appear when they jump off the plane. In addition, Willie wakes up as they leave and she innocently remarks that they must be leaving due the plane reaching their stop until she realizes that no's piloting, not even needing to check the cabin.
- Ranjit is taller and makes it back to Mayapore by night rather than by evening.
- Willie is attacked by a large snake while bathing during the journey to Pankot Palace. Indy, too afraid of the snake to help her, tells her to pet the snake, which causes it to fall asleep. Afterwards, Willie says, "I hate snakes!" and smacks Jones, to which Indy replies, "I know the feeling".
- Indy and Captain Phillip James Blumburtt discuss some of the odder decorations of the palace, in particular kryta. Blumburtt calls voodoo "mumbo-jumbo", but Indy warns him that the old superstitions still rule India in many ways.
- During the dinner scene, Indy is the one to jokingly suggest that the young Zalim Singh likes older women, not Short Round. Also, Indy and Blumburtt sit beside Chattar Lal, rather than across from him.
- Lal doesn't mention Indy's "grave-robbing" incident in Honduras.
- When Willie waits for Indy to come to her room, she doesn't comically fall behind its curtains due to resting on a cushion.
- Short Round doesn't wake up until the fight between the Thuggee assassin and Indy ends.
- When Indy and Shorty near get killed in the trap chamber and yell for her help, Willie thinks about how her mother wished for her to become a nurse.
- The trap chamber isn't reactivated so Indy, Willie and Scott aren't deprived of their means to escape and Indy doesn't barely retrieves his fedora.
- Mola Ram keeps his cattle skull headdress on for most of his scenes, rather than only wearing it for ceremonial purposes.
- When the Sacrifice Victim is killed, he doesn't have his heart removed and is lowered into the lava while looking the other way around.
- Willie escapes from the guards who ambush her and Short Round, and returns to her room where she encounters Chattar Lal and a Thuggee guard. Lal reveals himself as a member of the cult, and Willie is taken prisoner.
- The Chief Guard looks older, catches a boulder Indy throws at him (instead of the rock Indy threw to him in the film) and goes to capture Indy assisted by two Thuggee strongmen.
- Indy and Short Round aren't whipped by the Chief Guard and Zalim Singh.
- Indy doesn't spit the Black Sleep of the Kali Ma despite gagging and choking to not swallow it, so Mola Ram just forces him to drink it once without needing the Chief Guard to assist him.
- All of the members of the Thuggee cult, including Mola Ram, had taken the Blood of Kali and are under the influence of the Black Sleep. At one point a guard is non-fatally burned by some lava and he returns to normal, but is taken away by other guards to be "reconverted" (this is where Short Round gets the idea to burn the possessed Indy).
- When Mola Ram burns his hand on the Sankara Stone at the end, he returns to normal, too, but still falls to his death.
- Short Round's escape from the mines isn't as elaborated, as he uses rocks to break his chains in contrast to a pike and doesn't push a Thuggee guard with a ladder off to his death neither.
- The text states that Short Round is twelve years old even though he is actually nine during the events of the film.
- During the initial battle inside the temple, Chattar Lal attacks Indy and they both fall onto the sacrificial frame hanging over the lava pit. Indy swings free, but Lal is killed when the frame drops down into the pit.
- Indy is only alerted of the Chief Guard's presence due to Willie pointing him behind Indy.
- The Chief Guard wears a different set of clothing. Similarly, Singh wears his formal Maharaja clothes instead of his Thuggee ones.
- During Indy's fight agianst the Chief Guard, Short Round doesn't futilely attack the Chief Guard, Willie doesn't give Indy weapons to defend himself and Zalim starts pricking Indy's kryta doll before they get into the rock crusher's conveyor belt, doing so from a rock balcony instead of the rocky spot near a water elevator where he was in the film.
- Indy doesn't hurt the Chief Guard with a large saw upon breaking free of the Maharaja's voodoo attacks.
- The Chief Guard's turban, not his sash, gets pulled by the rock crusher so he is pulled from the head rather than the waist, with Indy not being able to save him or do anything at all.
- In an apparent mistake, the conveyor belt turns into mine rails behind Indy as he witnesses the Chief Guard's death.
- The Maharaja doesn't prick Short Round with a feather.
- The mine rails end up in a stone wall that Indy hits while trying to stop the mine cart instead of the stopping mechanism from the film.
- The Thuggees corner Willie and Short Round as they get to the bridge, but Indy has yet to reach the bridge when this happens, though the attack prompts him to go there to save his friends.
- Short Round doesn't nearly fall to his death because he doesn't jump on the bridge.
- The scene of the two Thuggees referencing the Arab Swordsman's scene is ommitted in favor of seeing Indy kill the Thuggees.
- When Indy is attacked by two Thuggee guards near the bridge, one of the charges at him, shrieking, "Yaaaa!" Indy yells back, "'Yaaaa,' yourself!" and kills him using the sword purloined from the other guard.
- All Thuggees on the bridge, save ofr Mola Ram, fall straight into the river.
- The Eleventh Poona Rifles arrive before Mola Ram falls to his death.
- How the Mayapore kids reunite with their parents is ommitted, though they are seen in a horde returning to the village from the mountains.
- Marhan tells Indy that he can return to Mayapore once life fully comes back to the village.
- Indy and Willie do not get sprayed with water by the elephant when they kiss, Big Short Round being absent. Short Round merely grumbles, "Grown-ups!".
- The Mayapore kids don't round up Indy and Willie.
Appearances[]
Characters[]
- Phillip James Blumburtt
- Lao Che
- Chen
- Chief Guard
- Chieftain
- Chinese Co-Pilot
- Chinese Pilot
- Wu Han
- Indiana Jones
- Kao Kan
- Chattar Lal
- Marhan
- Nainsukh
- Mola Ram
- Sacrifice Victim
- Sajnu
- Willie Scott
- Short Round
- Zalim Singh
- Thuggee assassin
- Art Weber
- Temple Guard
- Guard
Collections[]
- Marvel Comics Super Special 30
- Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom Annual 1985
- Omnibus: The Further Adventures Volume 2
Issues[]
- Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom 1
- Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom 2
- Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom 3
