Disney owes it big time to the Pirates of the Caribbean Franchise as it certainly has brought in $4.52 Billion for the studios at the Worldwide Box Office. That means that each of the five films made more than $900 Million on an average, so that’s certainly great value for money as far as Disney is concerned.
But the final film of the franchise proved that the audience is now done with Johnny Depp’s Jack Sparrow as the movie showed drastically diminished returns. So, instead of bringing in a 6th outing, Disney is now looking to reboot the franchise to give it a new spin.
Here are the Box Office numbers of all the 5 Pirates of the Caribbean films – Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl ($634 Million), Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl ($1.06 Billion), Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End ($963 Million), Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides ($1.04 Billion) and Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales ($794 Million).
Another major reason for the reboot is that all five of these films have not been very successful when it comes to the word of the critics. The Rotten Tomatoes score for every movie just kept coming down with every sequel. So, it is a great coincidence that every movie is sequentially ranked on Rotten Tomatoes:
Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl (2003) – 79% Fresh
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest (2006) – 54% Rotten
Pirates of the Caribbean: At Worlds End (2007) – 44% Rotten
Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides (2011) – 32% Rotten
Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales (2017) – 29% Rotten
Considering the Box Office numbers and the verdict of the critics, we all can agree that the franchise doesn’t have much left to salvage and it has certainly peaked. So, Disney’s call to bring in a reboot is supposedly a right one and we have known for a while that Deadpool writers Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick are being considered by Disney to write the reboot for Pirates of the Caribbean.
We all loved Johnny Depp as Captain Jack Sparrow but these movies were getting kinda repetitive, so a new take upon the franchise may be in the best interest of everyone. The franchise has been pretty profitable so Disney cannot just drop a major money making Goose even though those films were only based upon a theme park ride at Disneyland.
So the new plan is to move forward without Johnny Depp in the lead, and according to the latest report coming from Hybrid News, Disney is aiming to replace Captain Jack Sparrow with a female character named Redd, who is now the star of the Pirated of the Caribbean ride itself.
As some of you may be aware, Redd is a pirate who recently came into the picture as she the place of the controversial “auction scene” in the Pirates of the Caribbean attraction.
Now, this may stir up some backlash from the Jack Sparrow fans, but Hollywood is changing drastically, Men in Black has a woman in black, Marvel is moving towards a more female oriented Universe, DC is looking to make Supergirl as their poster girl, so we could certainly enjoy a female Pirate in the lead for a change. This will not only give us a great unique change, but it will really help to revitalise the franchise overall.
Johnny Depp’s Jack Sparrow has been pretty popular amongst the audience, but we have to be honest that even he won’t be able to bring in a Billion Dollars for the next one. No one doubts his ability to act as he has given us such a range in his career, but the character has been left behind even if you wouldn’t like to admit it.
Even his recent outing in Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindlewald is not doing as well as it could have. So, we have to believe that Jack Sparrow is Johnny Depp’s legacy, but now is the right time to move on and take a different direction.
Hopefully the two Deadpool writers will bring in something great that brings the audience back to the sinking franchise.
