The Hatay Tank Driver was one of several Hatayan soldiers given to Walter Donovan for his quest to find the Holy Grail in 1938 by the Hatay Sultan. He drove the Mark VII Tank commanded by Colonel Ernst Vogel.
Biography
After the Hatay Sultan and wealthy American industrialist Walter Donovan formed an alliance between Hatayans and Nazis, the Sultan gave Donovan all possible men to help him and the Nazi Party to find the Holy Grail, although he didn't think that the relic existed. The Hatay Tank Driver was selected to help Colonel Ernst Vogel as the driver of his Mark VII Tank. He appeared to be fluent in German, as he understood the orders Vogel gave him in German. When Indiana Jones was hanging off the side of the tank following his first fight with Vogel, the driver tried to kill Jones by scraping him against the side of a mountain.
During this, Henry Jones and a Nazi soldier were fighting over a Luger. The soldier gained the upper hand, and was bashed over the head by Marcus Brody with a shell. The soldier reflexively fired, and the ricocheting bullet hit the driver in the head, killing him. The Hatay Tank Driver's body was subsequently carried over a cliff along with Vogel and the entire tank.
Behind the scenes
The Hatay Tank Driver was portrayed by Peter Pacey in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. The film's original script referred to him as the Turkish Tank Driver.
During the development of the film's original script, written by Jeffrey Boam, the Hatay Tank Driver was originally going to tie a wire rope with a metal hook to one of the gears of the tank in an attempt to kill Indy, which would cause the tank to turn toward a steep cliff. However, this would cause the Hatay Tank Driver to be trapped under the hatch of the Mark VII Tank and therefore die along with Walter Chandler (Walter Donovan in the final film) falling with the Mark VII Tank down the cliff.[1][2]
Despite his pivotal role in the film, neither he nor the Hatay Tank Gunner appear in Rob MacGregor's novelization of the film or the film's comic book adaptation as such. There, the tank's crew are (apparently) all Germans.
The Hatay Tank Driver, along the tank's crew, didn't appear in LEGO Indiana Jones: The Original Adventures. Instead, Ernst Vogel controls the entire tank, because as the Hatay Sultan is absent from the story, any alliance between Germans and Hatayans is made. In the video game's sequel, the Hatay Tank Driver is also absent (and Vogel controls the entire tank again), because the alliance between the Hatayans and the Germans didn't occur, although the Hatay Sultan is a playable character (but he didn't appear in the game's story).
Appearances
- Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (First appearance)