So initially I think everyone was thinking, Pirates of the Caribbean 5?
Isn’t this horse like ridiculously dead at this point?
But after the trailers came out, I at least thought, hey, that actually doesn’t look
that bad.
Yes there’s still a good chance that it’ll be awful, but I’m holding out hope.
And those trailers got me so interested that I went back and watched all 4 of the other
Pirates movies.
So, here we are.
Also, warning, spoilers ahead for all these films, there are timecodes down in the description
if you want.
Alright, let’s get into it.
Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl
So let’s start off with the universally loved on, Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse
of the Black Pearl.
Now this was a movie that I’d wanted to watch for a while, because everyone kept telling
me, the first Pirates is great, the first Pirates is great.
And so I finally got around to it, and yeah, the first Pirates is great.
If you know me you know I love a good romp of a film, and this is precisely that.
First off, the cast is here is pretty great.
Johnny Depp, say what you will about him now, but this was his huge performance that turned
him into what he is today really, which I wouldn’t necessarily say is a good thing,
but looking at this performance alone, it’s great.
It’s funny, it’s charming, it’s super entertaining to watch, and in this first film
it never got grating to me.
Geoffrey Rush as Barbossa, at first I wasn’t sure how I felt
about it, but as the movie progressed I started to really enjoy his performance.
It’s over the top, sure, but it works really well for this kind of movie.
That Kingsman agent who got cut in half, he’s pretty good, as is pretty much the rest of
the cast from Gibbs to those two pirate henchmen.
And as far as Keira Knightley and Orlando Bloom, they’re….good.
In this one they’re the best.
There’s just nothing super special about them, like their romance is pretty good and
they’re chemistry is pretty good and the acting is pretty good, but they aren’t really
super special and they didn’t really stick out to me like they did to a lot of other
people.
I like them in these roles, especially in this first film, and they’re a good way
of seeing the rest of the movie, because if it was on Jack the entire time, yeah, he’d
get annoying, but I just think their characters aren’t super special.
This movie is directed by Gore Verbinski, who, you can say what you will about the quality
of his films, but they all look great.
And this is no exception.
The cinematography and the sets and the costumes and all that are amazing in this.
The visual effects are also great in this, the practical ones and surprisingly the CGI
still holds up today pretty well.
The movie’s action is also great, there are fun set pieces, it’s well choreographed.
The movie has a good plot, it has iconic moments and it’s quotable, the music, which I’ll
come back to quite often here, but the music is phenomenal.
Everyone knows it but it is fantastic, incredible score overall.
And really, on the whole, it’s just a super fun adventure movie.
On a scale of fun adventure movies, it’s below Indiana Jones for me, but it’s above
National Treasure (which by the way, is a movie that I kind of love for some reason).
But it’s just really enjoyable and entertaining and exciting and funny.
As far as what doesn’t work there are some dumb and really cheesy moments, but really,
what do you expect form this kind of movie, that’s kinda the point.
And again, I personally didn’t think the whole Elizabeth and Will plot was that intriguing,
it was a little bit generic to be honest, but really those aren’t major problems.
In conclusion, Curse of the Black Pearl is a bit of a modern adventure classic and it’s
super fun.
Everyone’s seen it by now, but if you haven’t, I’d totally recommend it.
I’ll give the first Pirates a 9.1/10.
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest So after the huge success of the first Pirates
film, doing a sequel that would live up to that hype would be an almost impossible task.
And did they succeed?
Well, not really.
Pirates of the Caribbean isn’t terrible, in fact I don’t think it’s bad.
It’s got a lot of good stuff in it.
Is it as good as the first though, no.
Not by a long shot.
Alright, what’s good about this movie.
The cast again, is pretty great.
Jack Sparrow is a bit less fun than in the first, but he’s still pretty entertaining
and he has moments where he shines.
The returning cast members are as good as they were before, the Will and Elizabeth story
is still...fine, and I really liked Bill Nighy as Davy Jones.
The performance is great and the visual effects on him are fantastic to this day.
Davy Jones as a whole is a good villain and bringing him and the Kraken and this whole
more mystical aspect into this, for the most part I think was an interesting idea for this
series.
It goes a little too far into that territory in the next film, but here, the swashbuckling
with a bit more magic-ish stuff I think works.
The directing and cinematography are once again great, the visual effects are like I
mentioned amazing, the action is good again (especially those swordfights), and the music
of course is awesome.
Basically everything the first film did well on the technical side is done well here again.
And really on the whole, the best I can say for this is that it’s entertaining enough.
It’s got some fun moments, some creative ideas, some good action scenes, some jokes
that land, it’s a fine watch.
It’s just definitely not as special or as engaging as the first film.
Now as far as the bad here, well really, it is kind of in the shadow of that first movie.
Which, movies should be judged on their own and not have to be compared to other movies,
but it IS a sequel, and the first half of this movie especially is filled to the brim
with references to that first film, so it’s not like they’re trying to make you forget
about it.
It’s less fun than that film, it’s less funny too, it just overall feels like it has
less energy.
The goofy comic relief characters from the first film were….good the first time, and
here they’re barely fine, they’re not that funny.
The movie’s plot is also dumb and the film is way too long as a result.
LIke the first one had dumb moments, but this one is so unnecessarily complicated with betrayal
after betrayal after betrayal after twist after betrayal, and it starts to get very
repetitive and convoluted.
This is also more cartoony than the first, which is saying something because the first
one was quite cartoony, but this one is like a straight up cartoon.
I mean just look at this, sure it’s cool I guess, but it does remove tension when the
physics are so on and off.
Overall, Dead Man’s Chest is a pretty meh sequel.
It’s not terrible, but it’s not anything super special.
There are some great moments, but really after sitting it for a week I found that I really
couldn’t remember much about it.
It’s fine though, especially if you enjoyed the first, there are worse ways to kill two
and a half hours.
I’ll give Pirates 2 a 6.8/10.
Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End So now we’ve come to the epic conclusion….of
the original trilogy.
Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End.
After sitting through the second film and then going pretty much immediately into this
one, I was thinking, this is probably gonna be a whole bunch of the same.
And guess what?
It’s exactly that.
Firstly, what’s good here.
Once again, the music’s great and the cinematography and direction by Gore Verbinski still is pretty
fantastic.
The sets and visual effects are pretty flawless for the most part, the CGI still holds up
today.
There’s also some good and somewhat creative action, although once again it is just straight
up cartoon unbelievable at points, but hey, most of it is still pretty cool.
This movie also takes something of a more weird, mystical turn than the others.
Like the first two, especially the second, had elements of that, but this one just goes
for it all out.
And in some ways I kinda liked that.
Because it commits fully to it, some of these really weird ideas end up being kind of entertaining.
But then sometimes they play it a little too far or they drag out the bit too much and
it gets less interesting and more just stupid.
And especially by the third or so time when those Jack Sparrow hallucinations showed up
it started to feel like it was just there to bloat out this insane runtime.
The cast is also still pretty solid here, especially Geoffrey Rush and Bill Nighy.
And even though he’s starting to run low on charisma and likeability, Johnny Depp as
Jack Sparrow still has quite a few pretty great moments.
Something I’ve wanted to mention that I like about all of these first three movies
is that they’re surprisingly dark.
Like going into these I was under the impression that these were largely for kids, but there
is some pretty messed up stuff in these movies, which I liked.
This movie also has a few funny moments and cool ideas, and that final battle is pretty
cool.
It’s nothing super new, it’s mainly more sword fights and such, but it’s still quite
entertaining as are most of the action scenes here.
Now, what doesn’t work here is pretty much everything that didn’t work about the last
film, if not slightly worse.
These two movies really could blend together for me, they’re quite interchangeable, which
I think is one of the main problems.
They’re just kind of eh, and nothing really sticks out about them to me and makes them
individually special.
In this film, there are too many characters and too many plotlines going at once.
There are so many different things going on in this plot that it doesn't really flow and
amounts to very little in the end.
Once again this plot is needlessly convoluted, again with more backstabs and betrayals and
motivations and debts and whatnot that at this point are getting tedious.
All of this again leads this movie to being way too long.
This movie also lacks the great sense of fun that the first film had and even parts of
the second.
There are some chuckle worthy moments but there’s also some really dumb humor that
doesn’t work.
The Will and Elizabeth stuff continues here, just like before, it’s fine, just not anything
I’m super invested in.
In this one they also try to add more drama to it with more love triangle-y stuff with
Jack Sparrow, I think they were trying to set that up, and it really doesn’t add to
the movie.
Those parts could've been cut down a bit and reduced this runtime.
Also despite what I said before, yes, Jack Sparrow has some moments, but at this point
the whole bit is getting kind of old.
The emotional moments don’t hit and the stupid moments in this movie are really stupid.
Again, the others had stupid moments, but this one goes all out on those.
Especially during that final battle, when Barbossa is marrying Will and Elizabeth in
the middle of this massive fight, even for a Pirates movie that is total nonsense.
I know some people love this stuff, including my friend and podcast co host Freddy, he’s
just all over this, and that’s fine, but personally it doesn’t work as well for me.
In conclusion, Pirates 3 is a fine movie.
It’s not as good as the original, but I’d say it’s just about as good as the second.
The main problem with it is that it’s just kind of eh.
The first one is so memorable, so many awesome moments, these two movies just blend together
for me.
I saw them less than a month ago and if you showed me a short scene from one of them I
probably couldn’t tell you which movie it’s from.
There’s some good action, some great effects, some good performances, but there’s also
an unnecessarily complicated story with some really stupid moments.
I’ll give Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End a 6.5/10.
Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides So now we’ve finally come to the fourth
film in the series, and I believe the most expensive movie of all time...somehow, Pirates
4: On Stranger Tides.
From what I’ve seen online, pretty much everyone hates this movie.
I’m sure this has some fans, but most of what I’ve seen is “I loved the first three,
and the fourth one blows.”
So, do I agree?
Ehhh in some ways yeah.
Firstly what’s good about this.
For one, it is mercifully shorter than the others.
Thank you God for that, if I had had to sit through another 2 and half hour to three hour
one, I’d be dead right now.
The music is also still great, some of the performances, old and new, are still pretty
good, I liked Ian McShane as Blackbeard, and with it being the most expensive movie of
all time there is some pretty good action, some really great sets, and some great visual
effects.
Look, there are a few fun moments, but that’s about it.
The rest of the movie is really just a bland mess.
Alright, Johnny Depp as Jack Sparrow, at this point, it’s gotten kind of old.
It’s not terrible, but it just totally lacks the fun and charm of the original and even
the sequels and has just devolved into slapstick and catchphrases for the most part.
Which is pretty close to what he was originally but there was more to it back then.
There was more energy to it and it felt like more effort was being put in.
This I think is maybe the goofiest and silliest Pirates movie.
The others are plenty goofy, but just from the very first scene you can tell that this
is just really cartoonish, and not in a particularly fun way.
For this movie they switched Gore Verbinski for Rob Marshall, and while the movie looks
good, it does lack the really beautiful visuals of the other 3.
The action, while pretty solid, also isn’t as good as it was before.
But all the most amazing visuals and thrilling action scenes in the world couldn’t saved
this, because again, while it looks nice, the story and script are just really subpar.
The movie isn’t really captivating at all, I found myself wanting to do something else
or look at my phone for most of the film.
The pacing is kinda weird where it slows down considerably at some points and then’ll
just zoom through some stuff, and the movie also isn’t particularly funny.
THere are a few chuckle worthy moments, but for the most part the jokes fall flat in this
one.
Also, in this film they got rid of Will and Elizabeth, or rather Will and Elizabeth got
away from this franchise as I’m assuming they didn’t wanna return.
So they tried to replace them with this Hunger Games guy and this mermaid.
And look, I’m not saying the Will Elizabeth love story was beautiful and engrossing and
the best movie romance ever, but at least it was kind of believable and interesting,
for most of it.
This one just feels like a very pale attempt to imitate that, and it’s rushed and not
developed at all, which makes that whole subplot really drag.
At the end of the day, this is the worst Pirates movie.
It’s not horrible, there are much worse franchises, and there are….some fun moments.
But it’s just lacking really any of the charm and fun of the first Pirates, and it’s
just so bland.
I know a lot of people hate this movie, I don’t, I just think it’s very….nothing.
It’s competently put together on the technical side, but as a film it really made me feel
nothing.
I’ll give Pirates 4 a 4.7/10.
So those were my thoughts on the 4 Pirates films.
What do you think of these?
Let me know all of your thoughts down below in the comments.
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Thanks for watching and I’ll see ya next time.