At Wit's End

The weather's been perfect lately. I had a lovely trip to the Alps. I'm working on stuff I'm excited about. My hair has been looking great. But something was...missing. I didn't feel like myself. And then it came to me; I haven't been doing enough hating! Well, my fellow Thats Plentyites, I bet you can guess how I remedied my problem. That's right, I went down to the local theater to see Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End, in its full English glory. Now you may recall my thoughts on the Black Pearl, and I recalled them too. However, I had hopes that my craving for needless big American spending and action would negate the issues I had with the last movie. And that's the story of how I wasted 12 Swiss Francs and 168 minutes.

World's End was more convoluted and tedious than ever. Each complicated action scene was followed by a more complicated action scene which didn't correspond with the last. Don't get me wrong, as confusing as it all was, I wasn't seeing anything new...no feast for the eyes, no fresh stunts to delight. It was one big pirate fight after another slightly bigger pirate fight. I saw ceaseless pirate fighting in the last two movies, what makes them think I paid to see 3 more hours of it? (Although, I did pay to see it, knowing full well what I was in for, so...well played, World's End. Well played indeed). There wasn't much else besides the fighting. Any interest one may have once had in the characters is gone by this movie. Even Elizabeth Swan and whatever Orlando Bloom's character's name is don't seem to care whether they get together or not.

The only new thing the movie offered was about 60 seconds of Keith Richards and his two lines. I say...meh. 60 seconds of Keith's well-worn face does not make a movie, my friends.

I'll admit, Johnny Depp made me giggle once or twice, because, well, he just has that privilege. Poorly done on the screenwriter's part to make him such a secondary character, but I suppose everyone becomes a secondary character when you are trying to write for 7 main characters.

Oh, and btw to those who have seen it, how about that final scene with Calypso? Was that not a total rip-off from the Little Mermaid? Do they think we've forgotten Ursula so soon?

In conclusion, when I think of kids a few years down the road, preparing for a Pirates of the Caribbean Trilogy sleep-over, I wish them luck, because there are not enough Nacho Cheese Doritos or bottles of 99 cent grape soda in the world that can last them the near 500 minute commitment. But I'm not too worried about these hypothetical kids...I suspect there won't be any, because these movies SUCK!

P.S. If you were in the Brethren Court, how pissed would you be when too-big-for-her-pirate-bloomers was named Pirate King? I mean, these are the most bad-ass and awesome pirates in the world and I can tell you for a fact that they would not put up with that shit. I can reluctantly accept the ridiculous action sequences, but the fact that those 9 pirate lords didn't make a 9-way prissy-pants-nonpirate shish kabob out of her is an insult to pirates, and thus, to me.