As development begins in earnest for Indiana Jones 5, fans are beginning to wonder which franchise favorites will return for Indy’s latest adventure.

In particular there are some questions about John Rhys-Davies Sallah, Indy’s Egyptian excavator friend who knows where everything is buried and has contacts all over the world. He has been seen in Raiders of the Lost Ark and Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade.

Director Steven Spielberg wanted Rhys-Davies for a cameo in the wedding scene at the end of Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, but he declined because he thought Sallah deserved better.

In an interview with Yahoo! Movies at the BAFTA Cymru Awards the actor said he would “love to have one last crack at Sallah.”

Rhys-Davies thinks that after all these years Sallah has become an artifact protector, keeping priceless items safe from thieves.

“What would have happened to Sallah? I like to think that he would have been somebody like Khaled al-Asaad – that marvelous 80-year-old man who was defending his museum in Palmyra and who hid its major treasures and refused to give them over to ISIS and was beheaded in the town square,” he said. “I think that’s probably how I would have seen Sallah.”

With the changing political climate the actor feels it’s important to see a character like Sallah on the big screen.

“Sallah is the last Arab in popular, contemporary culture, that we regard as a hero. The world has changed, and that’s a tragedy for the West and for the Arab world,” said Rhys-Davies. “Perhaps there is no place for a Sallah anymore. Although I trust that my mention of Khaled al-Asaad just reminds people that they are not all iconoclasts and that there are heroes there – real heroes, too.”

Indiana Jones 5 is currently scheduled for release July 2020.

Source: Screen Rant