CHARLIE DUNNE

Real Name: Charlie Dunne (may be short for Charles)

Identity/Class: Human (1930s), possibly extradimensional (see comments)

Occupation: Archeologist;
    formerly Marshall College student

Group Membership: None

Affiliations: Marcus Brody, Henry "Indiana" Jones, Jr.;
   formerly Edith Dunne

Enemies: Edith Dunne, Jerry

Known Relatives: Edith Dunne (sister)

Aliases: None

Base of Operations: Unrevealed

First Appearance: The Further Adventures of Indiana Jones#1 (January, 1983)

Powers/Abilities: Charlie was an excellent archaeologist.

Height: 5'9" (by estimation - see comments)
Weight: 150 lbs. (by estimation)
Eyes: Unrevealed
Hair: Red-brown

History:
(The Further Adventures of Indiana Jones#2 (fb) - BTS) - As a child Charlie Dunne was allowed to play on swings, but his sister Edith was forbidden to do so (see comments).

(The Further Adventures of Indiana Jones#1 (fb) - BTS) - In the 1930s Charlie was a student at Marshall College in Bedford, Connecticut, studying archaeology under Professor Henry "Indiana" Jones, Jr.
     Jones considered Charlie to be headstrong, undisciplined and irresponsible, and the best student he ever had.

(The Further Adventures of Indiana Jones#2 (fb) - BTS) - His sister Edith was in the same archaeology class.

(The Further Adventures of Indiana Jones#1 (fb) - BTS) - After graduating Charlie worked with Edith, but she gradually grew frustrated that from her perception nobody ever recognized her share in the discoveries the two Dunnes made, instead always giving the credit to Charlie.

(The Further Adventures of Indiana Jones#2 (fb) - BTS) - Edith grew tired of always being in Charlie's shadow, and that resentment grew into hate strong enough for her to be prepared to murder him.

(The Further Adventures of Indiana Jones#1 (fb) - BTS) - Together the siblings discovered that the Ikons of Ikammanen, legendary statues made of solid gold and reputed to come to life to...

(The Further Adventures of Indiana Jones#2 (fb) - BTS) - bring vengeance to the wicked...

(The Further Adventures of Indiana Jones#1 (fb) - BTS) - were hidden on an island located off the East coast of Africa.

(The Further Adventures of Indiana Jones#2 (fb) - BTS) - Intent on claiming all the fame and glory she felt would come with the discovery, Edith plotted with her lover Jerry to murder Charlie. Knowing Charlie was planning on returning to America before seeking the Ikons, Edith stayed in Liberia, providing herself with an alibi, while Jerry followed Charlie to the United States.

(The Further Adventures of Indiana Jones#1 (fb) - BTS) - Seeking Jones' help retrieving the Ikons, Charlie returned to his Alma mater, and Dean of Students Doctor Marcus Brody left Charlie waiting in Jones' office while he fetched Jones from his classroom.

(The Further Adventures of Indiana Jones#1) - When Marcus returned with Jones, Charlie warmly greeted his former teacher, who in turn told Charlie to forget calling him either "sir" or "professor" and stick to "Indy" instead. Charlie informed Jones about the discovery he and Edith had made, but Jones was skeptical that the statues that could come to life could truly exist, initially suspecting Charlie was attempting a practical joke. Charlie clarified that he didn't know if the "becoming avengers" aspect was true, but insisted he could prove the Ikons did exist. However, before he could extract his evidence from his stachel,...

(The Further Adventures of Indiana Jones#2 (fb)) - he suffered a fatal wound from a knife thrown in through the office window by Jerry.

The Further Adventures of Indiana Jones#1) - Dying almost instantaneously, Charlie collapsed face down on Jones' desk. Jones swiftly looked out the window, trying to spot Charlie's murderer, but the guilty party had ducked out of sight. Checking Charlie's satchel, Jones found a map providing the location of the temple where the Ikons were, as well as Edith's address in Africa. Eager to avoid wasting time answering police questions, Jones departed immediately, leaving Marcus to deal with reporting the murder while he investigated and tried to find out who had murdered Charlie and why. Marcus also sent a cable to inform Edith of her brother's demise and that Indy was on the way to Liberia to meet her.

Comments: Created by John Byrne and Terry Austin.

   Since Charlie is seen shaking Indiana Jones' hand we can use that panel to compare their heights. I ran with the assumption that Indy is the same height as his main (and at the time this story was published, only) actor, Harrison Ford (5'103/4"), to get an estimate of Charlie's height.

   As might be expected of the hero, over the remainder of the story and the first two issues of Marvel's Further Adventures of Indiana Jones series, Indy retrieved the Ikons, uncovered Edith and Jerry's villainy and activated the Ikons to avenge Charlie.

   The adventure covered in the first two issues formed the basis for a scenario in the TSR licensed Indiana Jones RPG. Charlie gets name-checked as part of that, but no further details are provided about him.

   It's not clear who forbade Edith to play on swings while Charlie was allowed to. Mentioned as an early hint to the eventual reveal that Edith felt she was denied things all her life while Charlie was permitted them, fueling her growing resentment, it was probably her parents who prohibited her, but since it's not actually stated I haven't listed them in relatives; after all, Charlie and Edith could have been orphans for all we know.

   The story is set after Raiders of the Lost Ark (1936) but before The Last Crusade (1938). Various Indy chronologies online place it in 1936, though the story itself contains no explicit date reference - that doesn't get provided in Further Adventures of Indiana Jones until #4, which confirms the series to be thus far set in 1936. However, one part of the initial story where Charlie dies involves a German U-Boat opening fire on a Czechoslovakian ship; Indy notes that the Germans and Czechs are not on good terms with one another, and while this is historically true, to the best of my understanding, open conflict between the countries didn't kick off until 1938. The U-Boat captain rescues Indy and Edith from the sea after sinking the Czech ship because as Indy points out to him, "your country and mine aren't officially at war," but neither were they at war with Czechoslovakia! I'm guessing that the writers of the original story assumed it was taking place a few years later. Mind you, it's also weird that the ship was flying the Czech flag, given Czechoslovakia was a landlocked country; it had a navy in the 1930s, but only to protect the major rivers and lakes in and around their country.

Could Indiana Jones' adventures take place on Earth-616?

    At of the time of writing, this profile is to the best of my knowledge the first Indiana Jones character to be covered on the Marvel Appendix. As such, it seems an apropos time to discuss the possibility of whether Indiana Jones' adventures could be taking place on Earth-616 (the main Marvel comics reality), or whether they happen in another reality. To be clear - I don't believe Lucasfilm or Disney considers the Indy movies to be part of 616, the MCU, or anything even vaguely like that. But in the same way that Tarzan, Doc Savage, Conan, etc. have adventures that were created separate from 616, but have versions of those tales published by Marvel and set within 616, could the same be true for Indy? In the 1970s and 80s Marvel explicitly integrated many licensed characters into 616 - it's hard to deny Doc Savage exists within 616 when he's encountered the Human Torch and the Thing - but they didn't do so with Indy. So absent Indy having met Wolverine (for example), how can we either confirm or refute his presence in 616? In Tarzan's case, confirmation he was in 616 came from one of his enemies also turning up in a Wolverine story. In Sherlock Holmes' case, canonization began with him being referred to as a real person by his great-nephew Clive Reston, albeit not explicitly by name. But I'm not aware of any such clear cut examples to bring Indy into 616.

   Let's consider any evidence that might prevent Indy being 616: His stories wouldn't cause major problems fitting within 616 - Indy encounters magic, godly powers and aliens, all of which exist within the Marvel universe we know. Indy never talks about Marvel characters as being fictional, but then given that the many of his stories are set prior to Marvel as a company existing, that's hardly surprising. Even if Marvel titles had featured as props in an Indy story, that wouldn't prevent it being 616. We know that a version of Marvel Comics exists within 616, publishing tales based on the "real" heroes, and this goes right back to the 1940s, as seen in both The Truth and All-Winners Squad: Band of Heroes. We never see any Marvel characters as real people in Indy stories either, but in the era Indy was active those heroes were few and far between, so his chances of encountering them were limited. The Indiana Jones movies do exist in 616; we've had characters refer to them quite a few times, but that doesn't mean Indy couldn't also be a real person. After all, Rawhide Kid is real in 616, but we've also seen that there are movies based on him within that universe. Does the existence of Indy in the land of literature seen in Fantastic Four: True Story miniseries cause a conflict? Nope, because it also included Frankenstein's Monster and others who are real individuals in 616. So nothing so far either way to outright confirm or outright refute Indiana Jones existing on Earth-616.

    What about items or places, like the major Maguffins of the Indy movies? Both the Holy Grail and the Ark of the Covenant have appeared in 616. The Ark was seen in Bible Tales for Young Folks#4 in a tale set back in Biblical times, Nightstalkers#2 in Hydra's possession in the modern era, Deadpool vs. the Punisher#5 in the possession of the man known as the Bank, and Immortal Hulk#29 in Dario Agger's collection. Timeline-wise, none of those contradict it being entombed for millennia until Indy dug it up in 1936, and then in the US government's warehouse between 1936 and the 1950s, when it appeared in Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. In terms of how the Ark looks in 616 compared to in the Indy movies, it is too indistinct in Bible Tales to really tell, and in Nightstalkers it is similar in general terms but differs in the details; however, in Nightstalkers it does carry the same warning about not looking when it is opened that Indy gives in Raiders, and in Deadpool vs Punisher and Immortal Hulk, the Ark's look matches the Indy version exactly:


Raiders of the Lost Ark comic adaptation version
Bible Tales for Young Folks
Nightstalkers
Deadpool vs Punisher
Immortal Hulk

    The Holy Grail appears in Union Jack I#2-3, Captain Britain and MI-13#2 and Journey Into Mystery#641. In Union Jack it is in a British museum before it is stolen and destroyed by Baroness Blood, but it is also commented that there have been many cups identified as the Grail, and it is unconfirmed whether the one the Baroness got hold of was the genuine article (even though it does have magical powers). In CB&MI13 it's definitely the genuine Grail, and is in Otherworld; it is noted that (perhaps because of the way Otherworld is shaped by belief), it doesn't match exactly how it is described. And in JiM it is again in Otherworld and has changed appearance a little, backing up the comments made in the previous appearance. And in all those cases bar the last, the Grail looks sufficiently like the on in Last Crusade that it could be the same one, and even in the final example it's not so different looking that it couldn't just be put down to a bit of artistic license:


Movie version of the Grail
Last Crusade comic adaptation 
Union Jack Grail
MI-13 Grail
JiM Grail

   So the 616 versions of these two artifacts do mostly resemble how they looked in the Indy movies, though that in itself isn't enough to confirm Indy as himself being in 616. As such, the summary remains the same - there appears to be nothing that either confirms or refutes Indiana Jones existing in 616.

    This profile was completed 12/28/2020, but its publication was delayed as it was intended for the Appendix 20th anniversary 's celebratory event.

Profile by Loki.

CLARIFICATIONS:
Charlie Dunne has no known connections to:

images: (without ads)
The Further Adventures of Indiana Jones#1, p3, pan2 (main image)
The Further Adventures of Indiana Jones#1, p3, pan5 (headshot)
The Further Adventures of Indiana Jones#1, p3, pan6 (death)
Raiders of the Lost Ark#2, p19, pan5 (Ark of the Covenant)
Bible Tales for Young Foks#4, p4, pan7 (Ark of the Covenant)
Nightstalkers#2, p14, pan2 (Ark of the Covenant)
Deadpool vs Punisher#5, p8, pan2 (Ark of the Covenant)
Immortal Hulk#29, p19, p1 (Ark of the Covenant)
Photograph (Holy Grail prop)
Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade#4, p18, pan 2 (Holy Grail)
Union Jack I#3, p27, pan 1 (maybe real, maybe fake Holy Grail)
Captain Britain & MI-13#2, p21, pan 3 (Holy Grail)
Journey Into Mystery#641, p12, pan 3 (Holy Grail)

Appearances:
The Further Adventures of Indiana Jones#1 (January 1983) - John Byrne (writer, layouts), Terry Austin (finishes), Louise Jones (editor)
The Further Adventures of Indiana Jones#2 (February 1983) - Denny O'Neil (writer, credited as Missouri O'Neil), John Byrne (layouts, credited as Chicago Byrne), Terry Austin (inks, credited as Michigan Austin), Louise Jones (editor, credited as Georgia Jones)

First Posted: 09/14/2021
Last updated: 09/11/2021

Any Additions/Corrections? please let me know.

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