A couple of weeks ago, Aint It Cool News broke the story that Shia LaBeouf would be appearing in Indiana Jones IV as Indy’s son. We quickly corroborated that story, and it hit the web in a big way. But of course Variety likes to pretend that only they generate news (like… Zyzzyx Road, perhaps), and so the article they have confirming this development (weeks after the fact) makes no mention of Aint It Cool at all. In fact reporter Pamela McClintock couldn’t get a comment from Paramount or Lucasfilm about the actor is currently in advanced talks for the role, so no one is recycling a press release here, and AICN was the first place to run the story. Yet again, terrible journalism from Variety.
When Moriarty ran his scoop at AICN, he said that he heard that Shia would play Indy’s son; that was the one detail I couldn’t back up from what I had heard. It turns out that Moriarty was completely correct – LaBeouf is in fact playing the offspring of Dr. Jones. Guess he found some time for love after all.
There’s still a chance that LaBeouf won’t end up in the picture – he is only in talks, and I feel like this Variety story is an attempt by his people to light a fire under the studio’s ass – but I would imagine this is essentially a done deal. I have made my feelings on this whole fiasco in the making known before, so I’ll spare you this time.