Indy is off to New York.  He’s planning on meeting up with Sidney Bechet who is playing in Harlem and has promised Indy a job as a waiter at the club.

On the train, Indy meets Peggy, an aspiring dancer and singer.  Promising to meet her later, Indy heads off to find somewhere to stay but ends up crashing a party hosted by Kate.  Talking the night away, Indy ends up missing his rendezvous with Peggy.  Later, whilst involved in the crazy world of Broadway, Indy meets Gloria, a socialite who he convinces to get her father to bankroll the production he has become involved in – The Scandals.

The rest of the story concerns Indy’s attempts to keep all three relationships going whilst also helping out with the Scandals – ending up responsible for keeping the whole thing afloat.

With the focus of this story being on Indy’s eye for the ladies, it is unfortunate that, in these final episodes, we return to the aspect of Young Indiana that I have found the most unpalatable – his treatment of women.  Time and again, Indy has lead women on with deceit and false promises.  It does chime, I think, with how Indy is portrayed in the films (certainly Marion is less than impressed with the way he left her when they reunite in Kingdom of the Crystal Skull) but I will need to rewatch the films (as I plan to do) with his portrayal in these stories in mind – just to see if it is an element of Indy that needed to be sown into the TV series.

But in the TV series it has made me dislike Indy on more than one occasion.  Admittedly it makes him a more rounded character – he has flaws – but it doesn’t do much for the portrayal of female characters in the series.  After Indy’s mum had been such a poorly-written character, it’s a shame that other women in the series haven’t been written with more strength.  

However, there is some attempt to deal with that in this episode when all three women find out what Indy is up to and confront at a huge after-show party, shoving his face into a congratulatory cake and striding off together.

The Broadway aspect is much more appealing.  Indy quickly meets one George Gershwin, and later a certain Irving Berlin.  Consequently the episode is filled with music.  One of my favourite pieces of music is Rhapsody in Blue which opens the episode and continues to influence the incidental music throughout.  There are also a number of Gershwin songs peppered throughout.

The show itself is in the mould of Ziegfield Follies (and that famous show is mentioned as being playing nearby and in direct competition with the Scandals).  It is a large number of pretty ladies dancing in a variety of colourful outfits (and at one point, a lack of colourful outfits – just feathers).  They are at points accompanied by a male performer and at others by a female ‘star’.  She reminded me hugely of the role Bonnie Langford briefly plays in Bugsy Malone – the spoilt star who waltzes in at the eleventh hour of rehearsals and expects everyone to bend to her wishes.

There is an entertaining sequence where Indy is backstage trying to keep the performance of the show afloat with various scenery needing to be pulled on and off and the meddling of a chimpanzee preventing its smooth running.

Historically, Indy meets, as mentioned Gershwin (who he strikes up quite a friendship with) and Berlin, but also the Algonquin Round Table – a collection of theatre critics and writers (whom Kate is a part of).  Ernest Hemingway also returns briefly, to be part of the show’s audience.

Playing Kate is Anne Heche who has appeared in a number of films including the remake of Psycho, Six Days Seven Nights and I Know What You Did Last Summer.  She is perhaps best know for being in a relationship with Ellen Degeneres.  Other than Heche, though, the cast is devoid of any other significant ‘names’.  After the previous episodes in the series being positively packed with recognisable people, it is striking that these final three films (with the exception of Harrison Ford popping up in Mystery of the Blues) have lacked star power.

The Scandal of 1920 leads into the final film in the world of Young Indiana Jones with Indy moping about the loss of his three women.  So we will return to Henry Jones Junior, for the final time, in Hollywood Follies.