The idea for the series originated from the opening scenes of Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, where George Lucas and Steven Spielberg decided to depict a young Indiana Jones as a backstory element.

River Phoenix was chosen by Lucas to play young Indy in Last Crusade because Harrison Ford felt Phoenix most resembled himself as a young man; Phoenix had previously played the son of Ford's character in The Mosquito Coast.

Both River Phoenix and Harrison Ford were approached to reprise their roles as young and elder Indiana Jones for the series, but both declined since they had no desire to work in television at the time.

Clint Eastwood was offered $10 million to play the elder brother of Indiana Jones in the series but turned down the role.

George Lucas wrote an extensive timeline covering about 70 potential episodes of Indiana Jones's life from 1905 through the events of the feature films, but only around 31 stories were ever filmed before the series ended.

Had the series continued into a third season, Young Indy would have met younger versions of Raiders of the Lost Ark characters Abner Ravenwood and René Belloq, and an episode would even have featured a five-year-old Indy.

While developing the series, Lucas grew interested in crystal skulls and planned a third-season episode featuring Jones and Belloq searching for one; the episode was never made but the idea eventually evolved into the 2008 film Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.

The series was shot on 16mm film instead of the standard 35mm partly to offset the high costs of filming on location around the world.

The 'Old Indy' bookend segments were filmed separately, usually taking about a day to shoot a pair, mostly at Carolco Studios and on location in Wilmington, North Carolina.

Several actors connected to other Indiana Jones films or Star Wars made guest appearances, including Paul Freeman (Belloq in Raiders) as Frederick Selous, Roshan Seth (Chattar Lal in Temple of Doom) as a sheikh, William Hootkins (Major Eaton/Porkins) as Sergei Diaghilev, Wolf Kahler (Colonel Dietrich) as a German diplomat, and Anthony Daniels as a gadget-providing scientist.

Harrison Ford appeared as a 50-year-old Indy in the episode 'Young Indiana Jones and the Mystery of the Blues,' which aired in March 1993, the only episode in which he bookended the story instead of George Hall.

Joel McNeely, who wrote music for many episodes alongside main composer Laurence Rosenthal, won an Emmy in 1993 for his score on the episode 'Scandal of 1920'.

Despite winning 6 of its 18 Emmy Award nominations, the series faced criticism, with The New York Times calling the pilot 'clunky' and Entertainment Weekly's Ken Tucker describing it as 'a beautifully produced show based on a faulty premise'.