Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides

[night0205]

I'm not trying to say Pirates 2 & 3 where anything groundbreaking or any great masterpieces. It may sound that way when I try and battle the opposite view of them being horrid. They are nothing more then entertaining eye candy, with goofy pirates and fantasy elements intertwined. They are, in my opinion, the definition of a summer blockbuster. It doesn't make you think, except for the messy plot that confuses you, and isn't anything original. To tell you the truth, Pirates 2 & 3 were just mimicking the 1st one. Taking the same themes, characters, plot points, and putting them in a similar environment. I think they did bring new stuff to the table, but most of the jokes and characters were just trying to steal from the success of the first one. Jack tells similar jokes, everyone else tells the same jokes, dead characters come randomly back to life, and other characters are just thrown in because they were apart of the original. I understand this... but considering that I like what they mirror, I like them for what they are. It's like a TV show full of characters that are put in ridiculously similar situations every episode... all I'm saying is that a couple seasons of it is fun, yeah if they make a habit of going in circles for 7 seasons like house, then I'll have a problem. Because I like the themes, and the characters, and the silly humor, I support these films. I fully believe they are high quality film making, and hope the quality rises... but even if it stays the same, I'll enjoy the next three movies. But my fears of them overdoing it are also there along with many others. I do hope this movie finds new humor to bring to the story instead of just rehashed lines from the first one.

 

[Secret Fawful]

Perhaps this will be the first film series to start getting better at the fourth movie on.

 

[Matt Mortem]

Saying Pirates 2 and 3 had an "epic story" is a misnomer.

They really should have tried to replicate the 1st movie instead of going an "epic story" route. It was such an epic story that they weren't even done writing it when they were filming.

But I guess you meant epic like the forced love triangle, or writing other huge parts of the second story into a quick wrap up in the third. The Kraken, Norrington huge parts of the 2nd and 1st and 2nd respectively, given quick endings in order to forward the script.

Not to mention the whole 3rd movie was them trying to gather a huge pirate army who in the climax just sat there.

This movie wasn't meant to be King Lear. It's a summer blockbuster but don't make it to be some deep, cinema changing epic.

that bugged me so much. WTF was the point of that entire pirates gathering if the main characters were the ones doing everything anyway?

 

[Octoberist]

The ending felt rushed.

 

[Matt Mortem]

it really did. It was kind of like "**** we're running out of film. SOMEBODY STAB SOMEONE"

 

[Erzengel]

I understand the whole well this is just a popcorn movie, but do you know what else were "popcorn movies". Indiana Jones, Jaws and Star Wars.

 

[bullets]

I liked the build up but essentially the pirate army looked like football fans who paint their bodies and go wild in the stands.

Some things were really corny , like appointing Elizabeth to be pirate king , but I liked Beckett's death , so the sequels were a mixed bag for me. I hope they can bring it down a notch .

 

[chaseter]

The 50 foot tall woman that turned into crabs was when I wanted to throw popcorn at my screen. Making the swamp witch that Jack had a past with to the secret goddess of the ocean that had a past with Davey Jones was stupid as ****.

 

[Secret Fawful]

Elizabeth should never have been the Pirate King since she wasn't set up for it as a character. Will was from the beginning when he BECAME a pirate. Did they just forget that? That Will became a pirate in CotBP? Because he did. He became a pirate. Elizabeth didn't have enough development as a pirate to suddenly become the Pirate King. That was so random! Will did have the development and motive to become PK and it would have cemented his new antagonism toward Jack and his proverbial path to the Dark Side so to speak to become PK, and then sell Jack off in exchange for his father or something. I'm not saying that's what he should have done once he became PK but it's a better idea than what happened.

 

[Doctor Jones]

The 50 foot tall woman that turned into crabs was when I wanted to throw popcorn at my screen. Making the swamp witch that Jack had a past with to the secret goddess of the ocean that had a past with Davey Jones was stupid as ****.

This. Once she turned into the 50 foot woman I was done with the movie.

Just so much badness in one film.

 

[GoblinWhirlwind]

Tia Dalma was a b**** through the whole movie. I liked her in DMC, and then from the very start of AWE I was like "What happened?"

She was like Kirsten Dunst getting worse each movie.

 

[ALP]

Yeah I said the same thing. Throwing her into another plot was unnecessary and didn't seem like "we had this planned" type filmmaking.

 

[GoblinWhirlwind]

Yeah, it does seem like more of a "Hey, wouldn't this be cool..." type thing, while they were in the middle of filming.

No, it would not be cool.

 

[night0205]

Giant crab lady, king elizabeth of the pirates and pirate cheerleaders... Yeah the third one was a little rushed :P

 

[Erzengel]

Instead of going the Star Wars or Indiana Jones route, they seemed to try and go the Matrix route in terms of a trilogy.

 

[Infinity9999x]

I felt like it was a majority of problems.

First, I felt they tried to cram far too much into the second and third movies. The first one was a fairly basic throwback to the old school Pirate movies of the past with some clever twists. In the second and third I felt like they tried to go overboard on the clever and had lots of "oh look a TWIST!" moments.

Second, they included too many characters whose arcs had concluded in the first film. Norrington was done. We didn't need to see him again. To be honest, we didn't need to see Elizabeth or Will either. Furthermore, by forcing in some characters that didn't need to be there, they reversed some of the development that had been covered in the first film.
*Norrington was essentially a good man who was a bit pompus and followed strictly rules in the first film. But he was shown to have a sense of honor. At the end, he had put the Will/Elizabeth thing behind him. In the second, he's reverted back to being pissed again, and having no problem attacking Will.
*Jack was shown in the first film to, while looking out for himself, being at heart a good person who would put himself on the line to protect others. In fact, many of his schemes that seemed to be only self-serving turned out to have the others well-being in mind the whole time. And by the end of the first movie, Will and Elizabeth trust Jack. In the second movie, this is all thrown out, apparently just because the writers wanted to cover the same ground again.

Thirdly, and this was discussed a bit earlier, Jack was turned into a parody of his original character. One of the things that helped Jack in the first movie was that he was originally written as a fairly typical sly traditional pirate character. He was written with a good amount of humor, but he had serious moments written in there too. Depp then took that and added his own unique take to the character. And while the quirkiness of Jack is what made him such a great character, one of the reasons it was so great was because it wasn't overdone. He was quirky, and then he could get dark, and then he'd be quirky again.

In the 2nd and 3rd films they went far too overboard on the quirky humor, making Jack almost nothing but comic relief, and the character is more interesting then that.

 

[ALP]

Instead of going the Star Wars or Indiana Jones route, they seemed to try and go the Matrix route in terms of a trilogy.

The new trilogy needs to go the Indiana Jones route. New supporting characters and new adventure each time. No need to be a sprawling epic saga. Jack, Barbosa, and Jack should be the only constantst:

 

[night0205]

Sense they are filming back to back, they will put the 5th and 6th as one long story. That's obvious.

 

[scatterax]

ya, the 2 part movies w/ Cliff hanger endings never seem to work out like i hope. instead of picking up where the last part left off the cliff hanger doesn't ussually get resolved until the 2nd or 3rd act. of the next part.

 

[Deaths Head II]

ya, the 2 part movies w/ Cliff hanger endings never seem to work out like i hope. instead of picking up where the last part left off the cliff hanger doesn't ussually get resolved until the 2nd or 3rd act. of the next part.

For me the problem is the first half usually feels incomplete without a proper conclusion and the second half rarely resolves the plotlines the first half set up in a decent way. Which is why the first part of two parters is usually considered to be better half.

 

[scatterax]

For me the problem is the first half usually feels incomplete without a proper conclusion and the second half rarely resolves the plotlines the first half set up in a decent way. Which is why the first part of two parters is usually considered to be better half.

I'm looking at YOU, matrix!

 

[Eelectro 2]

the matrix sequels were pretty good, given they were preachy and a little over the top at times in part 2, it set up the 2nd part really well.

 

[Octoberist]

You're one of the few, Eelectro 2. One of the few who liked them.

 

[DarkKnight88]

Instead of going the Star Wars or Indiana Jones route, they seemed to try and go the Matrix route in terms of a trilogy.

Uh, they pretty much copied the original Star Wars route in terms of plotting the trilogy. Dead Man's Chest and At World's End are basically Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi in terms of plotting.

 

[Octoberist]

but not as good.