Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales

Rating: PG-13, for sequences of adventure violence, and some suggestive content

I promised myself after the second “Pirates of the Caribbean” movie, that I would either stop watching or greatly lower my expectations. I was a really big fan of the first movie, The Curse of the Black Pearl, (which if you haven’t watched THAT yet, you totally should before you do anything else or read anything else- THIS CONTAINS SPOILERS) because of the story-line of the golden trio; Captain Jack, Will Turner, and Elizabeth Swan/Turner. So when they trio split up after movie three, I was super bummed that their shared story line ended in an unfulfilling way.

BUT ALAS. Yet another “Pirates of the Caribbean” movie was made and I was drawn back in. Dead Men Tell No Tales continues the story of Will and Elizabeth through their child, Henry Turner. Determined to free his father from the curse of forever being the captain of the Flying Dutchmen, Henry seeks out Captain Jack Sparrow for help. Even our old pal Captain Barbossa and his mischievous monkey, Jack, joins the gang. A new character, the smart and beautiful Carina, joins the group as she has spent all of her life trying to decode the “map no man can read” to find Poseidon’s Trident.

Our heroes are trying to find Poseidon’s Trident which contains all of the curses in the sea and possibly the power to remove them. Unfortunately the villain, Salazar, is also trying to find the Trident to try to break the curse that he and his shipmates endured many years ago. Salazar has an interesting backstory to explain his hatred for Captain Jack, but I will leave that for you to find out.

The plot-line is a little off to me because from my understanding there seem to be a lot of loopholes when comparing it to the other films concerning timelines and magical objects such as Jack’s compass that doesn’t point North (apparently, it can do more than tell you what you want most, but only in this movie does it have an extra meaning/power). It is slightly comparable to the Hermione’s Time Turner “loophole”. You kind of just have to choose to ignore the issue, trust the writer(s), and try to enjoy the story.

I wouldn’t call this the GREATEST MOVIE OF ALL TIME or anything, but it is not terrible and worth a watch. If you felt unsatisfied like me about the sad Will and Elizabeth situation at the end of At the World’s End I would highly recommend watching this for closure. -MC