Can 'Pirates Of The Caribbean 5' Live Up To Expectation?
Jack Sparrow and his swashbuckling sidekick, The Black Pearl, are back! Undoubtedly drowning in rum and surely with a few new enemies to swish his sword at, Johnny Depp will be hitting our screens in 2017 with Pirates of the Caribbean 5. Walt Disney announced the date of this latest offering, currently titled Dead Men tell No Tales, earlier this week and speculation has gone into overdrive about the potential new plot.
With rumours abound of a cast list including Christoph Waltz, Geoffrey Rush, Jack Davenport and Keith Richards, there is likely to be no shortage of possibilities in the air over the next three years.
Of course, the previous four Pirates of the Caribbean have proved very lucrative for Disney by amassing a gross total of more than $3billion worldwide. The fourth instalment, Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides, passed the $1billion mark all on its own.
But in 2017, this new movie will face strong competition from Fantastic Four 2 and Despicable Me 3 and, while the franchise has proved its commercial worth, critically the sequels have not be rated as highly.
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The original trilogy, Curse of the Black Pearl, Dead Man’s Chest and _At World’s End, _started off very brightly, surprising critics who worried the pirate genre was unsalvageable and with Depp’s Jack Sparrow highly praised.
Curse of the Black Pearl achieved a 79% positive review sample on Rotten Tomatoes and the scene was set for two further fantastic films.
Next page: what went wrong with 'Dead Man's Chest?'
Dead Man’s Chest, however, did not live up to its predecessor with many accusing the movie of purely being a plot device to move the story along from the first film to the third. The reviews were mixed and the film received only a 54% positive rating from Rotten Tomatoes.
The final offering in the three, At World's End, also met with mixed reviews. Critics felt that the plot was too convoluted to follow and it received only 45% positive rating on Rotten Tomatoes.
So the trilogy was complete, but Disney’s thirst for more pirates was not. Four years after Dead Man’s Chest, they released the stand-alone, Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides. The film broke several box office records and stands as the 13th-highest-grossing film worldwide.
But once again, critics were not bowled over. While the acting was praised, the plot was thought to be confusing and incoherent gaining only 33% positivity from Rotten Tomatoes.
It seems inevitable that the Pirates tale number 5 will make money when it hits cinemas. But will be any good to watch or will we need a splash of rum of our own to get us to the end?