Avast, land lubbers — are ye wantin’ to use simple mathematical operations to make yerself a fourquel about pirates? Then ye’ve come to the right place! Ye’ll be needin’ two silver chalices, a mermaid’s tear, and the following movies:
1. Begin with a hefty dose of Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End. Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides hews pretty closely to the formula established by its predecessors. Jack Sparrow and Barbossa butting heads? Check! Elaborately choreographed chase scenes, followed by elaborately choreographed fight scenes? Check! A quest for/journey to a magical object/place that has mysterious properties and powers relating to death and life? Check! Eyeliner thick enough that even a raccoon might think it’s a bit much? Check and mate! Plus, like At World’s End, the newest Pirate tale features a brief appearance by Keith Richards as Captain Jack’s father, Captain Teague.
2. But Pirates 4 also doesn’t have a few things that were present in Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl, the franchise’s very first film — namely, Orlando Bloom as Will Turner and Keira Knightley as Elizabeth Swann. Also, as the previous paragraph might indicate, the new movie is missing the spark of originality and unpredictability that made Black Pearl such an unexpected delight. Even though that’s sort of the way sequels work –to say nothing of fourquels — it’s worth mentioning all the same.
3. Pirates 4 does, however, add one new thing to the franchise’s mythology: mermaids! (Okay, and “zombified” pirate crew members, but they don’t play enough of a role in the story to warrant adding Shaun of the Dead to the equation.) Like Madison, the sexy sea creature played by Daryl Hannah in Splash, the mermaids in the Pirates universe trade their tails for legs when they’re out of the water. And, also like Madison, they’re not averse to engaging in some interspecies romance — or to convincing their human boy-toys to forgo land forever. Yo-ho, yo-ho, a merman’s life for me!
This movie sucks!
You know something, YOU SUCK.
It’s also missing wit, charm, humour and a director ho knows anything at all about shooting action. The sword fights are weak and there’s no high seas ship to ship battles to enjoy. Like “the Last Airbender” it seems everything worth seeingt happens OFF screen and we just get dull verbal accounts of them.
Ditcing Will and Elizabeth is fine if you replace them with something else. This film did not.
A~ Huge dissapointment.
Also does anyone else think the movie looked really cheap?
The only good Pirates movie is the first one, the Curse of the Black Pearl… all the other ones are horrible!
Agreed. It’s a shame they had to take such a cool character and fun idea… and then ruin it with so many boring subplots, dull characters, and ridiculous amounts of CGI.
And it astounds me that so many people seem to have no problem with that either. Whatever happened to “less is more”??
The first one was a masterpiece. The second one was pretty much a transition to the third, which I honestly liked. The third one seemed to have enough ideas to stretch it over a trilogy. With a few trimming, it could’ve been perfect. I personally liked the first three, I’m just hoping the fourth one (and upcoming fifth) won’t destroy it.
saw on stranger tides last saturday, i found it lacking, all throughout the movie i was waiting for something to happen or surprise me or even make me smile, it just wasn’t there. at worlds end was better than on stranger tides, but that’s just my opinion
When has a fourth movie in a series even been good (answer: very rarely). What a useless movie. I hope it flops.
I just saw “On Stranger Tides” today and I loved it! I admit there are parts that were horribly predictable and it seemed as though Depp was playing everyone, going from being selfish and trying to save himself to being completely selfless and trying to protect other people, in seconds. Why is everyone one against the mermaid subplot!? Romance has always been apart of pirates and I balieve, that with Elizabeth and Will gone had they not added the mermaid subplot it simply would have felt as though something was missing.
Great article. I can¡¯t wait to hear more about your research tool. If it is as good as your other products, then you will have another winner. Your article pretty much summed up what I have been seeing too. Great to see some hard data.