REVIEW: Pirates Of The Caribbean: On Stranger Tides

Plus, everyone in these movies are way too mean.

Right, this stops now. I love the original Pirates, and have no problem with this becoming a multi-movie franchise because its a fun world to spend time in and the possibilities are pretty wide-ranging. But believe me Jerry Bruckheimer, I will strike you down with the fury of a thousand men if you don't stop it with the double-crossing, labyrinthine plot bullshit. This would be OK if you hired writers capable of managing it, or if a fundamental level it made any sense at all. But you don't and it doesn't. It's just fucking stupid, with everybody double-crossing everybody all the time for no frickin reason and Oh my god just stop. Stop. Just be a fun, simple movie. Its all the weight Pirates can carry, and everyone hates this shit. It's frustrating to an ungodly level.

With that off my chest, I'm actually here to announce that this Pirates movie is probably the second best of the lot. It's certainly more streamlined then the last two, and it has jettisoned much of the dead weight from the sequels, in which every character from the first movie was accommodated for, no matter how major or minor. The plot is mostly simplified, so instead of being unintelligible, its merely just stupid. It has its strongest villain since Geoffrey Rush in Ian McShane's Blackbeard, and it has at least one or two pretty nifty set-pieces, most notably when a bunch of mutant mermaids attack some lifeboats, after some super creepy singing. But if that's a high point, there's at least ten action sequences that bore and go on forever. As for Johnny Depp's Jack Sparrow, well you can't help but but feel the character has lost some of his spark, what after having carried two shitty movies on his back already. There's something purely entertaining in the performance, but its been strained. I think Rush fares much better here, as his character has been less bled dry. As for the newcomers, McShane fares well and Penelope Cruz is good if a little under-used as Depp's romantic foil.

But there is still too much dead weight here to be as fun as the first one yet, a film that is certainly one of the most entertaining blockbusters of my lifetime. Too much plot, too many twist and angles being played that don't matter and still way too long. I thing the sad thing is this franchise has had to suffer the weight of Ted Elliot and Terry Rossio forcing their need to write a complex mythology on a franchise it doesn't suit. and in many ways that has ruined what could have been a pretty great franchise. As it stands, better but not cured.

Rating: 5/10