There is, quite clearly, fun still to be had in the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise. The last 40 minutes of the film, the climactic battle, prove that. In those 40 minutes the audience sees everything that makes the Pirates franchise great — the swashbuckling action, the humor, the noise, the very look of it all, are outstanding. The rest of the film proves overly-long and at times tedious. Even so, the ending somehow manages to salvage what would otherwise have been a disappointing trip to the movies and makes one hope for future installments in the franchise.
This may not be the most fun movie in the series, and it could have been better, but if you remove your brain (or at least the logical portion of it) it proves an enjoyable trip to the movies and an above-average summer blockbuster.
Article comments
1 - Lisa McKay
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2 - Mary K. Williams
Thanks for the review TV&FG - still looking forward to it
3 - Mythophile
Now, now. You're being overly critical. Pirates is supposed to be a fun franchise, not a philosophical movie. This stuff is common in the fantasy genre. Granted some of the logic is stretched and too many characters take actions based on hunches(actually, I would find this in character for pirates). Several scenes are too long. There are, however, no actual plot holes; there are only gaps where things could have been explained more clearly.
Becket ordered Jones to kill the Kraken as a loyalty test, presumably to see if having Jones' heart would have any effect on Jones.
4 - saucyJack
I think that Jack may have lost his immature charm simply because this is the movie where he grows up after his little 'father-son' talk.
Still, they seemed to like to make him jerk-ish in the past two movies.