INDY III BY MENNO MEYJES, BASED ON A STORY BY LUCAS AND MEYJES: FIRST- AND REVISED FIRST-DRAFT SUMMARIES, OCTOBER 2 AND NOVEMBER 21, 1986
The first draft opens with a battle in Mexico between Indy and Banano, a crazed individual with a whip and a loyal band of gorillas. The object of their dispute is the death mask of Montezuma. Indy manages to throw Banano off a cliff, and his gorillas go free.
No sooner is he back in the States than Indy has to depart for France to look for his father?who has disappeared while looking for the Holy Grail. With a friend named Maude he goes to Montsegur, where they meet a nun named Chantal and her relation De La War, who explains that they had found a map that led Indy's father to Venice. But Nazis, led by Baron Balder von Grimm, were hot on the trail of Indy's dad. Grimm has a hapless sidekick named Hans, whom he is always calling "Idiot!" and then throttling.
After adventures in Venice and on the Orient Express where they are disguised as royalty, Indy and Chantai arrive in Istanbul. Clues and escapades put them on a train to Petra, where they are soon fighting for their lives. Fortunately Indy's old friend Sallah arrives with two horses, which they mount. Sallah then leads them to a Bedouin on horseback?who turns out to be Indy's father. Together they find the Grail in Petra, within the City of the Dead. At the climax Grimm shows up, but when he touches the Grail, he explodes; when Henry Sr. touches the Grail, a stairway to heaven appears, which he ascends. The nun Chantal is tempted to take the stairs as well, urged on by Indy. But her love for Jones makes her stay.
In the revised first draft the Nazi villain is Greta Von Grimm. And this time Indy finds his father tied to a pillar in a crusader's castle called Krak Des Chevalier. He'd been forced to help the Nazis in their search for the Grail, but they'd left him to die when he was no longer useful. At the place of the Grail, Indy does battle with a fantastic demon creature, whom he defeats by stabbing it in the belly with a dagger inscribed with the words GOD is KING. Bad girl Greta is vaporized by the Grail.