Jerry Bruckheimer: Pirates of the Caribbean 5 Won't Have Demonic Monsters

[HardkorSB]

But why? Pirates 3 effectively ended the series, and 4 was naked-yet-successful cash grab.

Because the last 3 big budget movies with Depp in the lead (Dark Shadows, Lone Ranger, Transcendence) have lost money so he needs to do something safe and marketable in order to get back in the game.

 

[Quantupus]

But I thought the supernatural was part of the appeal of Pirates of the Caribbean. Zombies, Davy Jones, sea monsters, end of the world, fountain of youth...it all fits perfectly well if you ask me. Taking that out and just making a straight Pirate movie means what, exactly? Jack is going to go around with a newly restored Pearl, raiding ships and killing the crew of said ships? Because that's about as straight a pirate movie as you can get.

Or did he mean to say they're going to tone down the more fantasy elements, but still keep them in?

I hope they keep them in, but just tone them down. One of the problems Iv'e had with the series is how loaded it's gotten with magical elements.
The first movie handled it best by having only one supernatural thing going on, the cursed treasure that turned a bunch of pirates into zombie pirates. It was nice and focused and was at the center of the story.
Even the second movie was alright, being pretty much all about Davy Jones, The Flying Dutchman, and the Kraken.
The third and forth ones jumped the shark in a big way; The end of the world with little rock crab things and multiple Jack Sparrows, a God that explodes into crabs, voodoo dolls, mermaids, the fountain of youth, Ponce de Leon's corps randomly coming back to life, and Black Beard with a magical ship. It all just feels random.
They need to pick just one supernatural element and make that the center of the story, rather than just throwing magical BS in whenever they feel like it.

 

[Tireseas_v1legacy]

But why? Pirates 3 effectively ended the series, and 4 was naked-yet-successful cash grab.

Because the last 3 big budget movies with Depp in the lead (Dark Shadows, Lone Ranger, Transcendence) have lost money so he needs to do something safe and marketable in order to get back in the game.

That explains Johnny Depp, but what about Jerry Bruckheimer? Why is he greenlighting this?

 

[HardkorSB]

That explains Johnny Depp, but what about Jerry Bruckheimer? Why is he greenlighting this?

Because the last PotC movie made over $1 billion worldwide.
Can't turn away from a gold mine.

 

[Mangod]

I have just one question: ... why?

Why make ANOTHER PotC movie? The series didn't even need a fourth entry, hell, I would have preferred that the first one just remain a stand-alone movie. So why the Keith-Richards-imitating **** are we getting another one?!

 

[CelestDaer]

So, Cutler Beckett was right? "As the map gets filled in, the magic goes out of the world?" Meh, didn't see 4, still don't care to...

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

I have been waiting for this day.

This day arrived four times already.

 

[Therumancer]

The reason why 4 did poorly wasn't necessarily because of an over reliance on the supernatural elements, it was because it was a halfhearted script and obvious cash grab what with waning public interest in the series. That and blatant audience pandering, namely the expanded roles of Depp and Rush. I always felt the best iteration of Captain Jack Sparrow was as the goofy wildcard sidekick with an agenda of his own that could go from a bumbling idiot savant to a world class manipulator in a heartbeat, not the main focus of the movie. He can't carry an entire movie by himself, and the writers had no idea whether to make Jack a proactive hero or an unwilling captive who just wanted to leave. Whatever the case he ends up looking disinterested in everything that's happening around him and sticks around or returns after escaping because REASONS. It's like they wrote a new character to play the straight man to Jack's wildcard but ended up scraping him and merging the two.

Especially seeing as Clint's version was more subtle (in "The Man With No Name" series they never explicitly stated he was a ghost, but all the hints are there... and it is something that can be debated).

I think you're thinking of the Preacher character from Pale Rider or The Stranger from High Plains Drifter. They're entirely separate from The Man with No Name series.

It's the one where he plays Marshal Duncan or something like that and he winds up being betrayed and apparently killed. He spends three movies hunting down the guys who did it, and part of the whole schtick is that he comes riding into town in a heat haze, and disappears the same way. He does various things like paint an entire town red (including the church, especially the church) in the last movie, and the final confrontation makes it kind of clear he's not normal with people basically getting whipped to death off camera (like they did to him) and thrown through doors in record time to the point where it shouldn't have been possible. They wind up asking who he was but at the end he goes past his old grave and makes it sort of clear that he's the guy whose buried there.

The point was that it was supposed to be subtle up until the end, and it's a big topic of debate as to whether he actually survived his presumed murder, or was a ghost, but I believe it was stated several times by the director and Clint Eastwood that the character was basically a ghost. I believe it was also referenced as one of the big inspirations for "The Crow", both the stand alone comics, and some of the scenes in how the first (and by far the best) movie played out.

The point though is that unlike "The Crow" it can be argued either way, as he did some very human things, but at the same time it was also why he was able to do the crazy tough guy stuff, which while stereotypical for cowboy movies, was happening in a more gritty environment where others seemed to be playing by a different set of rules. Basically nobody could outdraw the guy not because they were going for pure cheese but because the guy was literally not human.

I could be wrong by I believe one of the old version of "Boot Hill" (that might be the right western RPG) statted out famous movie gunfighters for comparative purposes, and "The Man With No Name" has a 99 in speed and accuracy or something like that, which is basically impossible to roll or obtain, because he's not mortal. Basically if he draws on you your dead...

 

[Gottesstrafe]

It's the one where he plays Marshal Duncan or something like that and he winds up being betrayed and apparently killed. He spends three movies hunting down the guys who did it, and part of the whole schtick is that he comes riding into town in a heat haze, and disappears the same way. He does various things like paint an entire town red (including the church, especially the church) in the last movie, and the final confrontation makes it kind of clear he's not normal with people basically getting whipped to death off camera (like they did to him) and thrown through doors in record time to the point where it shouldn't have been possible. They wind up asking who he was but at the end he goes past his old grave and makes it sort of clear that he's the guy whose buried there.

The point was that it was supposed to be subtle up until the end, and it's a big topic of debate as to whether he actually survived his presumed murder, or was a ghost, but I believe it was stated several times by the director and Clint Eastwood that the character was basically a ghost. I believe it was also referenced as one of the big inspirations for "The Crow", both the stand alone comics, and some of the scenes in how the first (and by far the best) movie played out.

The point though is that unlike "The Crow" it can be argued either way, as he did some very human things, but at the same time it was also why he was able to do the crazy tough guy stuff, which while stereotypical for cowboy movies, was happening in a more gritty environment where others seemed to be playing by a different set of rules. Basically nobody could outdraw the guy not because they were going for pure cheese but because the guy was literally not human.

I could be wrong by I believe one of the old version of "Boot Hill" (that might be the right western RPG) statted out famous movie gunfighters for comparative purposes, and "The Man With No Name" has a 99 in speed and accuracy or something like that, which is basically impossible to roll or obtain, because he's not mortal. Basically if he draws on you your dead...

Yeah that's High Plains Drifter. The townspeople hired three gunmen to whip the Marshall to death after he discovered that the local mine was on government property and he comes back to get revenge on all of them. Since he wasn't shot and was buried in an unmarked grave it's up in the air whether or not he was really a ghost or just alive and pissed off, but since he's never visibly beat up or shot (unlike in The Man with No Name trilogy) after the fact it remains ambivalent. Since none of the townsfolk are able to recognize him and one of the characters remarks that the dead can't rest without a marker and he disappears after Mordecai carves him one I'm inclined to lean toward the supernatural.