Agent Spalko said:
PROOF Lucas has LOST IT!!! The prosecution rests.
?
How is the fact that Indy, and Raiders, and LC, and ToD his own ideas, characters and visions, proof that he's lost it? Just because the Star Wars prequels were weak doesn't mean that every thing he touches afterward shall be the same.
Again, in the SW PT, he had complete creative control. Even Ford, and probably Spielberg know the PT sucked. Indy is their baby too, they're not going to let him ruin it. In this film, his control is limited to the same role it was in the previous three. It was, after all, his stories and ideas which drove the last three.
As I recall, it was Lucas who first presented "Indy" to Spielberg. Lucas wanted to make Indy a womanizer, Spielberg wanted to make Indy a drunk (it may be the other way around), a compromise was made and Indy ended up being both a treasure hunter and teacher. It was Lucas who had the idea of the Ark of the Covenant. It was Lucas who had the idea to make the Holy Grail the MaGuffin of LC, which Spielberg rejected until he got his way.