The new Indiana Jones is so intent on being exciting it ends up boring. It’s a perfectly fine action movie with a strong third act. It’s a fitting grace note for a beloved character who, like the films, had his own ups and downs. It is in no way a classic like Raiders of the Lost Ark or Last Crusade. But it’s also not a wild swing and miss like Temple of Doom or Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, largely because it doesn’t try to be anything besides a reasonably entertaining send off to the character and in someways Harrison Ford himself. And that’s why it’s so disappointing.

The plot is nonsense and nothing we haven’t seen before (in the same franchise no less). Some gewgaw with ancient pedigree on the loose, and it must be stopped before the Nazis get it and do Nazi stuff with it. The good guys have it, the Nazis have it, the good guys have it again, rinse and repeat. Yawn. The set pieces, most of which you’ll recognize from the trailer, are pretty impressive, with the exception of an especially dull dive sequence. By the third act, we’re finally treated to something truly spectacular, a bravura aerial sequence followed by a… different sort of battle which would give away too much to describe here. But it’s great, and it works well.

What doesn’t work is the whole “why are we doing this” ness of the the whole enterprise. Indy’s getting old; he doesn’t fit in anymore. The world he doesn’t fit into anymore is the hippie dippie moon landing 1969. (Fun fact: The Mummy was basically created because Harrison Ford was getting too old to believably play Indiana Jones anymore. Think on that. That was 1999.) So when an old friend of the family comes to him in search of an ancient relic that can literally change the fabric of time, he leaps at the opportunity. Well, no, that’s not really true. He participates for some reason, why was that?… Ah! I remember. It’s because the script needs him to.

And they’re off! Adventure! A parade! A horse in a subway station! Tangier Drifting in a rickety cart in Morocco! Scenery-chewing henchpeople! Easter eggs galore! That aforementioned dumb dive! Antonio Banderas for some reason! Mads Mikkelsen plays a Nazi villain with an interesting twist on going back in time to kill Hitler, but like so many Indy villains his plan was never really going to work, even without Indy’s interference. It’s all very paint by numbers, eye candy for the viewer just to get to a final reckoning with time’s passage itself.

The concept of the Dial of Destiny as the macguffin of the film is obvious; the passage of time is written all over the film. The child Indy knew once is all grown up, there’s familial grief, lost friends, retirement, Harrison Ford’s age-regressed face smash cutting to the 80-year-old legend as he exists now. Just like the original Raiders of the Lost Ark was created to recall the serial adventure stories George Lucas and Stephen Spielberg grew up, this is coming out to evoke the nostalgia of people like me. The first film I remember watching in theaters was The Last Crusade, and I fucking loved it. I still remember getting home and telling my grandparents all about it. I have no idea why they were at my house, but I still recall that interaction. Those films at their best took those cheap, serialized adventure stories and turned them into massive spectacles.

Now I’m pretty far removed from being 10 years old, but I can’t imagine any kid is going home to tell their grandparents about this one. Time has moved on, Hollywood has caught up, and frankly sticking with Nazis as the easy-to-root-against bad guy is… let’s say “complicated” these days. I’d also describe it as “quaint.” What we’re left with is a bloated, CGI-clogged flick pointing at what came before and pleading, “remember how much you enjoyed those movies! Please love me, too!”