Do we like Indiana Jones?
A character from Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)
Our score: 8 out of 10. Yes, we'd back him. He's brave, funny and loyal, and he's usually the one stopping the villains from getting the loot. He is also a bit reckless, and he complains a lot.
Indiana Jones is a tenured archaeology professor who teaches in a lecture hall and spends the rest of his time chasing relics around the world. The 1981 film Raiders of the Lost Ark is set in 1936. It opens with him lifting a golden idol from a booby-trapped Peruvian temple. Soon after, government agents recruit him to find the Ark of the Covenant before the Nazis do. The Ark is said to make an army invincible.
He is a mix of scholar and scrapper. He is clever with puzzles and ancient languages, and he is also quick with a whip and a punch. He is afraid of snakes, he improvises badly, and he gets hurt a lot. He is also sarcastic and a bit of a mercenary. Even so, he has a code that shows up when it matters. He won't let history be turned into a weapon, and he won't walk away from people in trouble.
That is why he scores well. He is not a saint, since he is cocky, careless with ruins and not always a great partner or boyfriend. But he is charming and persistent, and he is brave in a way that makes you want to follow him into the next cave. Across the sequels he grows from a rogue chasing fortune into someone who cares about other people. In Temple of Doom he ends up fighting to free enslaved children. In Last Crusade he races to save his father.