Due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, studios have halted their productions and pushed back release dates, and Disney played a pretty big game of release date shuffle earlier today as the majority of their Marvel Cinematic Universe films were given new dates. Another upcoming Disney flick which has been pushed back is the fifth installment of the INDIANA JONES franchise.
INDIANA JONES 5 was slated to hit theaters on July 9, 2021, but the film has now been pushed back a little over a year to July 29, 2022. The film has already been pushed back several times over the past several years, so this isn't exactly a surprise, especially given the current crisis. As we discovered back in February, Steven Spielberg will not be directing INDIANA JONES 5 this time around, as James Mangold (FORD V FERRARI) is said to be replacing him. Deadline states that Disney/Lucasfilm is still trying to lock down a deal with Mangold, and this release date shift will likely give them more time to do so.
While it would seem that this would be good opportunity to reboot the franchise with a new actor (which is bound to happen eventually) as Indiana Jones, Lucasfilm president Kathleen Kennedy has said, "We’re working away, getting the script where we want it to be and then we’ll be ready to go. Harrison Ford will be involved, yeah. It’s not a reboot; it’s a continuation." While the next film will feature Ford as Indy, former Disney CEO Bob Iger told THR back in 2016 that they're definitely considering what comes next. "Right now, we’re focused on a reboot, or a continuum and then a reboot of some sort," Iger said. "Well, we’ll bring him back, then we have to figure out what comes next… We [got] Harrison Ford as Indiana Jones in the film. But then what’s the direction? I’ve had discussions about what the direction is, [but] I don’t want to get into it. I don’t think it reaches the scale of the universe of Star Wars, but I see making more. It won’t be just a one-off."