Is Last Crusade Anyone Else's Least Favorite

So did you forget about the scene where Indy threatens to kill the Cruciform Sword leader by holding him in front of a boat propeller? When he murders several Nazi thugs when his dad calls him Junior? Nearly strangling Elsa when he sees her at the Nazi rally? Or when he laughs after horrifically killing a Nazi thug by jamming a rod through his wheels? Or what about the entire tank bit where he shoots through an entire line of Nazis and his bloody brawl with the Nazi Colonel? How is Indy not being "edgy" here?

It's too "light-hearted" huh? What about the aforementioned scene where Indy confronts Elsa at the Nazi burning rally? Or the bit where Henry and Indy discuss their strained relationship aboard the zeppelin?  The entire climax in the Grail Temple where Henry's been shot and Indy has to urgently save him? Those scenes are all played VERY seriously.

You seem to completely forget all the comical slapstick bits in Temple of Doom: The opening where Indy stabs a guy with a flaming kekab, Willie asking Indy if he's a lion tamer, the life raft escape, Willie running around screaming at the jungle animals, Willie's comical bits with the elephant, the entire monkey brain/eels/beetles feast, the big guard tossing a hammer and knocking out a bystander, Short Round doing kung-fu on grown adult henchmen and the bit where Willie screams at seeing Mola Ram on the bridge. Most of this stuff is far more cartoonish than anything in Crusade.

The whole point of the opening scene is to show WHY Indy became an archaeologist and how he developed his love of adventure and artifacts. It ties into the main story perfectly.

Sallah and Marcus do have comical scenes, but they are hardly "useless". Sallah was never a serious character to begin with as in Raiders, he comically screams when the Well of Souls is opened and sings when Marion kisses him. He's the same in Crusade and still gets his badass moments (when he tries to get Marcus to run, saves Henry from the tank and tells the remaining Nazis to drop their guns).

Marcus is also pretty much the same as in Raiders. He's still the same colleague of Indy's (when he talks about the Grail and tells Donovan he's meddling with powers he doesn't understand) and here he gets to have more fun with the role. Since the role of Indy's mentor is given to Henry Sr., it makes sense to have Marcus do some new things with the character. Plus, actor Denholm Elliot himself was OK with the humor: Denholm Elliot on Last Crusade

I don't understand why you'd have issues with Sallah and Marcus here, yet give Willie Scott (who's even more of useless comic relief) a pass.

But they're doing something new with them this time. We're getting to see the entire army of them and Hitler himself. Having the leading lady, Elsa in league with the villains is a new feature and having the Nazi henchman (Vogel) being a physical threat to Indy is different from Raiders. Elsa's relationship with both of the Joneses and her own interest in the Grail adds some depth to the story.

But Crystal Skull was still repeating elements from both Raiders and Crusade (relations with Marion, another father-son angle) and the Soviets were just the Nazis again with different costumes.

Crusade does a LOT of things different from Raiders - the father/son relationship, the mythology of the artifacts (the Grail and medieval lore is quite different from the Ark), the female lead working for the villains, the prologue on Indy's origins, the themes, character relationships, tone and Indy's character arc with the Grail. It takes familiar elements and shapes it all into something new.

It's my second favorite. Loved the relationship between him and his father. Donovan and Vogel were not imaginative foes compared with like Mola Ram or Toht but Elsa Schneider was an interesting villainess that held her own. The cold opening made perfect sense to me. Jones' adult life is like a cliffhanger serial so his childhood was basically a Stratemeyer styled boy's own adventure story. The action scenes were consistently entertaining from the circus train chase to the big tank battle. Something else I appreciated that the other movies tend to gloss over were the inventive booby traps whose solution(s) actually hinged upon his expertise and his father's.

It's my second favorite, always has been. Just saw all four of them on the big screen again last summer and it was just as good today as it was the first time I saw all those moons ago in 1989.

I only like the first film.

It's my least, though I do rate all the sequels equally B+
Crusade's weaknesses of lame leading lady & stupid villain are worse than the other 2's lows.

I haven't seen in a while, but I always remember part four being my least favorite.

Yes, by far