AWE, opinions please :) - SPOILERS ALERT!!

[Capt. Sterling]

Well...saw it Thursday night past... the funny bits were funny, the action was good, but sorry, the story line was so butchered that it left me sorely disappointed. The first two were SO much better...either the writers lost their edge or the editor should be sacked... my 12 year old so looked forward to this film and almost cried when we left the theater... Hope there are plans for a fourth film to make up for AWE.

[Morgan Dreadlocke]

Mixed emotions on this one. The loose ends from II be tied enough ta finish the trilogy. I did not be likin' the writin' fer the characters this time around. Gov Swann and Norrington was a cast away like two Star Trek first commercial security geek fatalities. Jack seemed lost fer most of the film servin' only ta be a focus point fer others ta work off of. Bad guys must be off'd properly- Beckett's fate needed ta be far more painful ta balance my scales.

Perhaps consequences of sittin' in the front row, extreme right side, makeup seemed bad. The pirate lord convention looked ta be a bunch 'o Caesar Romero Joker wannabe's. Had expected Mr Richards part ta be a silly spouffy affair He would have been better served ta play one 'o the pirate lords. He fit, they didn't. Sword fightin' was unimpressive. I'll not comment on the final battle as my perch in the corner saw not much more than closeups 'o flyin' splinters.

High points- Barbossa shows why he IS captain!

I'll see it again from a better seat next week an I'll be buyin' the DVD but I could not recommend it ta a nonpiraty friend.

Now git arf yer arse an go see it so's we don't have ta be grovelin' ta Spiderman fans

[PyratePhil]

Caught the 10:30pm show with my son...

I still like #1 best. Don't know if it's because the concept is fresh or the actors are, but that's how it is. I agree with Master Dreadlocke - the sword fighting was uninspired, but the cannon work was excellent.

Jack was Jack, as expected. Keith Richards - wish we could have seen more of him. That was a throwaway role if ever I've seen one. M'lady was fun to watch, but no big surprises. Barbossa is still my main guy. Will fleshed out nicely, too.

Too many switches of allegiance during too short a period - a bit confusing. Calypso - I thought she was going to do something a little more spectacular than a whirlpool, and connected with that the fact that the entire Royal fleet turns tail and runs after one engagement of their lead ship stretches disbelief too far.

All in all, a nice way to end it all but it just seemed to end for lack of wind.

[Christine]

For the fun of it all I watched the first movie tonight. And the more I realize it the first one is really the best. The way it just moves, it flows, no choppy feeling or forced feeling, the characters were fresh, Jack was more clever and not so annoying. The 2nd and 3rd one doesn't have that same feeling. The best way to describe them is the Austin Powers movies. The first one being the best, the way it just flowed nicely, but then the other 2 were just a free for all, all about making jokes and not taking anything seriously. I still really enjoyed the 3rd movie, I had fun with it, but honestly it's mostly because Barbossa is back. I missed him from the first movie and didn't get enough of him in the 2nd. I was glad he still was so awesome for the 3rd one and I got to see more of him. Jack on the other hand is becoming more and more goof-ballish, but what else is new. I just wish 2 and 3 were written as well as the first one was.

[HildeKitten]

HildeKitten, did you stay for the scene after the credits, if so what were your thoughts? I already know what it is and I think it's pretty lame, of course tho Wil/Elizabeth fans will just love it. *gags* I still say the best scene at the end of the credits is in the first movie with the monkey and Barbossa laying on the pile of gold.

(sorry for the late reply Christine, I was tremendously busy for a couple of days so couldn't check the forum earlier).

I alas didn't get to stay for the extra scene (but I'll go back and watch it next week ) because the movie ended at 2am and my fiancé needed to be up for work at 6. It was 2.30 before we were home so I totally understood him not wanting to stay any longer for the extra scene.

I agree with you that the after credit scene from the first one is still the best :)

[HildeKitten]

I'm noticing that the negative reviews are from critics who really are not even pirate fans. So their reviews are pointless, they went in with the attitude they wouldn't like it to begin with.

Review wise I'm noticing a strong anti-trilogy vibe amongst critics. It's almost that you can't be a critic and like sequals and triquels anymore. Frankly, I've never given a damn about reviews, I'll just make up my own mind :)

[HildeKitten]

Now I just need to find that song...

It's on the new CD....

"Yo Ho, all together

hoist the colours high

Heave Ho, theives and beggers

Never shall we die..."

Yet another version of the song to sing at Camarilla games and annoy everyone

[HildeKitten]

Oh Good... I didn't do my usual post movie trip to Wal-Mart to purchase the soundtrack since movies tend to burn ya on songs you like.

Does anyone know of the guitar chords for it?

I bet they'll release it in one of those books with chords for song, piano and guitar soon enough. Disney knows they'll sell.

There are books like that for various instruments of the first and second book too if I'm not mistaken.

[Caraccioli]

Well! Quite an improvement over the 2nd one. Still not as good as the first one. I liked some, didn't like some, wondered "What?!" about still others. (Note: there are a buttload of spoilers in what follows. Ye have been warned.)

Good

• •The return of some of the minor characters from the first movie. (Murtogg and Mullroy, the officer from CotBP who said, "That's got to be the best pirate I've ever seen.")
  •Jack and his mad friends I'll bet Depp loved that.
  •The stone crabs (it was cute "We've never seen this before.")
  •Firing the monkey (The people behind me saw him sitting in the maw of the cannon and said, "Oh no!" "You just don't get it, do ya', Scott?" I wonder if they understood why the monkey was back later in the movie?)
  •Captain Teague (Someone on the pirate site I used to post on said that if they brought Richards in he would spoil the whole series. Hardly. I would have liked to have seen more of him myself.)
  •Jack's trick swinging around the lines.
  •Ragetti's eye When Barbossa popped it back into his head, I burst out laughing. I think I was the only one in the theatre who thought it was funny.
  •Barbossa and Jack's ongoing rivalry
  •Barbossa's fate (perfect)
  •Jack's fate (perfect)
  •Will's fate (almost perfect)
  •Norrington's fate (less than perfect, but it worked. I, and probably no one else on this earth, would like to see a TV special, The Adventures of Jack Norrington - Between Losing his Commission and Rejoining the B.R.N. I'd write a fan fic, but I've wasted enough time doing things like that in the past.)
  

Bad

• •Calypso ("We need more strong female characters! Quick! Let's add Calypso!") Why bother with this whole mostly pointless, confusing, insipid subplot? So they can battle in a maelstrom? Eh. The stone crabs could have been explained another way and she could have been left where she belonged. (Although she did give Harry Belafonte a medium...ha ha. )
  •The fact that they didn't explain the Pirate Lord's Council in POTC2 ("We need someplace to put Keith Richards! Quick! Let's add a pirate lord's council!" )
  •Having a whole friggin' armada turn tail because two fast ships were heading toward them. C'mon. Superior numbers can nearly always defeat an opponent. See Gremlins and The Birds and a hundred other documentaries on the subject.
  •Elizabeth's fate (A ten year workday? Sheesh.) How would a single woman with a child survive in the disease (and pirate) infested Caribbean? She's a tough girl, but her father's dead and her husband isn't going to be around...But I'm carping about reality...
  •Sir Butler Crockett or whomever's sudden lapse in judgment/courage. Fire the guns, you fool! How hard is this? Here's the man who killed the Kraken and he can't give a simple command under the pressure of two approaching ships?
  •Having the Betler-Cocky ship blow up. That was just silly. (Well, it is a Bruckheimer flick, I guess...)
  •Not enough undead effects. We got Barbossa's arm and an implication that the monkey was undead and people floating in the water in and out of ships, but there definitely should have been more. Or maybe that's just me...
  •Yet another film vilifying business. I forget the statistic, but it's near, if not greater than, half the films put out in the last twenty or thirty years.
  

Ugly (Well, maybe Weird or Huh?)

• •Why on earth would Barbossa want to maroon Ragetti? ("Ye scare me" or something like that is what he said.) Ragetti had the eye!
  •Jack as a Pirate Lord (How would this ever happen? And how could both he and Barbossa be pirate lords? They sailed on the same ship! And of the two of them...)
  •Murtogg and Mullroy turning pirate. Why would they do that? It was neat having them dressed in pirate togs in the same scene with Pintel and Ragetti, but...
  •Why, exactly, couldn't Elizabeth go on the ship with Will, at least while they were above water? Because she wasn't dead? She was on the ship before! I wish they would have explained this better. It was apparently just Will and Bootstrap, so Elizabeth shouldn't have been a huge problem during the "this world" voyages. They could leave her in the nearest port when submerging.
  •More of this "Pirate's were the first great seekers of societal freedom" nonsense. Films have peddled this garbage for decades and it makes all the idealistic teenagers and raving loonies out there who don't actually research piracy think this is the truth. (And, my favorite pirate, the fictional Captain Misson is one of their favorite examples. Ah, you wily old, politically motivated devil, Captain Johnson - you created a monster.)
  

I've read reviews that say the movie is too long the first two hours are dull. As I was leaving the theatre I heard two girls talking, and I quote:

"It was too long. I fell asleep for a few minutes."

"How could you with all that noise?"

I actually didn't notice the time (which I often do in long movies - sometimes even short movies - especially those starring Will Ferrell - but I digress). So it wasn't too long for me. It might get that way on a second viewing, but I don't know that I'll take in a second viewing myself. (I will buy it on DVD, though. I want to see the extras. It'll be the first trilogy that I only own two of the three films. Although I wouldn't have owned Jedi if someone hadn't given it to me.) Nor did I think the first two hours dull. I found them to be far more interesting than the last 40 minutes myself. Mostly because the end didn't make as much sense as I thought it should. But it is a summer movie...

Overall, it's a 4 star on the 5 star Netflix rating scale for me (on which I rely to get movies suggestions.) So I think it's well worth seeing.

End note: If they are going to make a fourth as I've seen hinted around here, they can at last write Will and Elizabeth out of the story. I originally said somewhere when the idea of sequels reared its head (either here or the other site I used to post on) that if they were going to make sequels, they should be about the continuing adventures of Captain Jack anyhow. Now that they've brought Barbossa back in a fairly reasonable fashion, having those two vie for the same prize could be fun.

[Iron Bess]

LIST]Why on earth would Barbossa want to maroon Ragetti? ("Ye scare me" or something like that is what he said.) Ragetti had the eye!

Um, sorry mate, it were Jack that said Regetti scared him and was thinking of leaving him not Barbossa..... so no needs be for you to fret over THAT one!

[Caraccioli]

Oops! *blush* I'm remembering it wrong. It was nearly 2am when I left the theatre. Films like this shouldn't have previews!

[SilasTalbot]

Saw it last night with my wife and some friends. Liked it a lot (for reasons already covered in previous posts), didn't have any trouble with the running time because the story kept me involved.

SHOCKED over Norrington...

Would have liked a little more of Sao Feng...

Loved Captain Teague...and the fact that the "musical pirate" was referred to as the Pirate King...

And I'm wondering if I'm the only person anywhere who went into ecstatic convulsions when Depp worked "res ipsa loquitur..." into his Brethren Court speech. Please, somebody...tell me I'm not that much of a freak...

[Caraccioli]

Depp was clearly having more fun in this movie IMO. It made the movie more fun. If I do go back to see it again, it will be partially to pay more attention to what Johnny is saying. (Captain Jack tends to slur.)

[SilasTalbot]

Depp was clearly having more fun in this movie IMO. It made the movie more fun.

Totally agree with that. He was having way too much fun.

And I forgot to mention how much I loved the one "pirate lord" who, judging by his girth and his voice apparently was...a eunuch.

Snip snip.

[Asukaru]

My boyfriend and I went and saw a showing last night. We both enjoyed it and liked it.

(I know this thread already has a spoilers alert but I'm including one anyways...)

SPOILERS

I love the song that they sing throughout the film, but I think the opening was a bit too much. Having just the boy sing it would have been more touching I think. I wasn't really fond of the mutiple Jacks. I like Jack Sparrow, but I didn't see the point of them after he was rescued. The double crossing every 15 minutes did get a bit tiring - but, eh, they are pirates

I had a feeling that Tia Dalma was the one Davy Jones was in love with. I remember seeing the locket at her shack in DMC and thinking to myself 'I bet it's her'. I did not see the whole Calypso thing coming though.

I think AWE has officially made me a Barbossa fan. He was much more entertaining than Jack (partly because he had more screen time) and it was fun to watch him and Jack battling it out.

Jack and Elizabeth's wedding was great. I also didn't see the point of the whole every ten years thing, she could easily have come on the Dutchman while they were in this world and visited Will then. But I guess she will be able to join him permanently whenever she dies.

I don't think the Green Flash at the very end meant that Will was released from his duties. I think that was just how the Dutchman entered and exited this world.

Over all I was a little let down. There wasn't as much comedy or action as the second one - though the final battle was amazing - and I think the movie got a bit mired down the the pirates against the EITC politics. However I still enjoyed it and I thought it was a good movie despite all that.

Hearing Lee say 'Goodbye, Poppit' brought a tear to my eye. I'm sad to see this trilogy end finally, but I can't wait to see what they do for the new ones. I just hope they don't get caught up and start making Pirate movies just to make Pirate movies - which being Disney, they probably will. I would hate to see the original trilogy be followed by a bunch of direct to DVD sequals.

[Boots MacGee]

Just took my nephew to see POTC3, Other than the little bathroom break (should have got him a smaller soda) I enjoyed it. I really liked Keith Richards hat. I would like to see a less edited version though, hopefully when the DVD comes out.

[El Pirata]

Without a doubt a very fine film. Once again the critics are full of canal water.

[John_Young]

So Cpt Thighbiter had a problem with the loose cannon saying it wasn't believable?

But the skeletal pirates, Davy Jones and his crew, the Pirate Lords and their 9 pieces of 8, Calypso, resurrections, Multiple Jacks, stony crabs, Krakens, and Will Turner having a kid were the logical parts of the trilogy?

Suspension of disbelief.

Would someone answer this... Why on Earth go see potc3 and tell the pirates on duty at the theater that pirates are lame/gay/etc?

[oderlesseye]

Not to Answer that last post...

My wife and Eye joined our crew in garb and had a grand tyme at the theater,

entertaining the guest and ourselves. We collected a small amount of money for a charity, and got free tickets to see the movie to which EYE say was great. I plan on seeing it at least one more tyme on the big sceen before i buy it on dvd.

[the Royaliste]

Well, my first thought was that it was a wee bit disconnected and far fetched. Then I remembered it was Disney, and no factual reference intended,so...I loved it...Last year, as the Tallships traveled the Great Lakes, we never saw Dead Man's Chest in the theater due to the schedules..This year, the fine folks here in Portsmouth comped the ship's and crews, so we finally got to see it BEFORE the DVD release... I was always a Barbossa fan, just for the fact that he be an 'honest' pirate (keepin' to his word and all)..Now, for sure, Geoffry Rush did a bang up job, getting a ROYALISTE Thumbs Up!....

[Caraccioli]

My thought on suspension of disbelief...

I will suspend my disbelief as long as

1) The concepts presented within a given movie adhere to the rules they set down within that film.

2) There aren't plot holes large enough to sail the Armada through.

At some point, suspending disbelief becomes nigh impossible; they do something so absurd that you find your engineering mind thinking "that would never happen" (think of the Mission Impossible movies for example), but that may just be me. Still, this movie wasn't too bad for such stuff. In fact, I liked it overall (see previous post). It's not quite as good as the first one, but sequels rarely are - all that baggage, I guess.

It is curious that they wound up trimming this and the last film at the last minute when both contained scenes and even storylines that really had no importance to the main thrust of the film. I think it may be just because Gore Verbinski just likes cool-looking things (the mostly pointless Singapore Set - they could have got the map from Sao Feng's ship) and Ted and Terry like to incorporate stuff from other pirate movies (the mostly pointless Pelagosti storyline that caused all the nonsensical trouble a year or so ago). But I've a friend who says he likes movies that either show ordinary people doing extraordinary things or extraordinary people doing ordinary things. (Extraordinary people doing extraordinary things isn't notable in his opinion - I wonder where that leaves Superman?) So maybe there's something to headhunter huts that are supposed to look like skulls and mushrooms growing out of people's ears from sitting in dirty bathwater too long.

[Capn_Enigma]

Caraccioli: To that I say a wholehearted and thorough AYE!

[The Doctor]

I ran an interesting test, showing the full trilogy to my family over a 4 day period. They LOVED it. Everything made sense to them, and they had the time of their lives. Some will pick nits and hope to despoil a fine finale, and others will embrace it as a satisfying finish to an ad hoc trilogy.

Two hooks up, be my final say on the matter.

[Ransom]

Saw the movie Friday afternoon, and here are my thoughts, for what they are worth.

Overall, I liked it, but thought it another example of special effects taking over the story line. I found a few of the effects a bit hoaky - the two "sling-shot" escapes by Jack, the last one having him land on a yard arm and fight Davey Jones while trying to hold on to the chest? The other, the parachute escape of Jack and Elizabeth at the end of the movie.

The mini-me Jacks got tiresome after the first gag.

I also didn't understand why Elizabeth couldn't stay on the Flying Dutchman with Will, since she'd been sailing on it already. Sorry, but as romantic as it may sound, ten years between one night stands is a bit of a streach.

Two ships blow the flagship of the BEIC out of the water and a whole fleet turns tail and runs? NOT.

I liked very much the meeting of the pirate lords, and the fact that the pieces of eight were just bits of junk, not coins. To my surprise, I enjoyed Keith Richards as keeper of the code.

In my opinion, the big winner overall was Barbossa. He got his life back, his crew back, and his ship back. Jack ended up back where he'd started in the first movie - in a one-man boat. I felt very bad that Norrington was killed off. Loved his character in the second movie.

And yes, the hint that the forth movie will be the search for the Fountain of Youth was pretty blatant, but I look forward to another duel between Barbossa and Jack.

Most inspirational scene - when all the pirate bretheran hoisted their colors. LOVED that one. ( I think Billy Bones made a few of those flags - nice job!)

And for something completely different:

At Wall Mart I picked up a copy of a fun book called Piratepedia. And whose picture is inside, but the Pub's very own Cascobel! (See page 94). Very kewl.

[The Doctor]

Did anyone catch, as my blessed niece Nicole did, that this was a fantastic example of "Theatre of the Absurd"?! A full circle of the story, reaching back to the beginning? Ted and Terry pulled off a magnificent gag, and I salute them for it. Huzzah!!!!