Although all the Margot Robbie’s Pirates of the Caribbean reboot fell through despite her A-list status seems to bode badly for the future of the series, which stalled due to numerous issues.

Original star Johnny Depp was seemingly dropped by the franchise, although no sequels have been made without his involvement in the years since. Now, it is not clear whether Johnny Depp’s Jack Sparrow will appear in Pirates of the Caribbean 6 or if the series will continue with an all-new cast and a rebooted timeline. Regardless of which approach the creators choose, Depp's involvement has never been the main issue facing the series. A glance back at the Pirates of the Caribbean sequels proves that the biggest problem with the franchise dates back far further.

The Pirates of the Caribbean Sequels Had Too Much Spectacle And Not Enough Adventure

Later Pirates of the Caribbean Movies Confused Chaos With Tension

While all the Pirates of the Caribbean sequels have their own unique issues, there is one major overarching problem that binds them together. Every Pirates of the Caribbean movie after The Curse Of The Black Pearl mistook an epic scale for a thrilling story, resulting in movies that felt huge but empty. The Curse Of The Black Pearl was hardly an inexpensive movie, but many of its most beloved moments were small, subtle details, like Depp’s campy flourishes as Sparrow or the antics of ing characters like Pintel and Raghetti.

2006’s Dead Man’s Chest was painfully overlong, but even its lengthy runtime didn’t give the movie time to adequately explain every faction involved in its needlessly convoluted story.

In contrast, everything about the Pirates of the Caribbean sequels was bigger, more expensive, and more expansive in of scope. 2006’s Dead Man’s Chest was painfully overlong, but even its lengthy runtime didn’t give the movie time to adequately explain every faction involved in its needlessly convoluted story. 2007’s At World’s End was an epic, surprisingly sad ending to the original trilogy, but the movie pulled too far in too many directions and never had a solid throughline as a result.

The messiness and excessive ambition of the sequels only became more pronounced with 2011’s On Stranger Tides, which became one of the most expensive movies ever made during its production. The budget ballooned as On Stranger Tides added more new characters, more returning characters, more set pieces, and more constant chaos. This, ironically, resulted in a sequel that felt profoundly lacking in heart, focus, and a clear, comprehensible story with self-evident stakes. 2017’s Dead Men Tell No Tales only exacerbated these issues.

Pirates of the Caribbean 6 Needs To Capture The Spirit Of The Curse Of The Black Pearl

The Original Pirates of the Caribbean Movie’s Surprising Simplicity Elevated The Blockbuster

What made The Curse Of The Black Pearl so special was its standalone story, its well-drawn characters, and the decision to limit Depp’s Sparrow to a scene-stealing ing presence. The more viewers got to see Sparrow, the less chaotic he felt and the more predictable his persona became. Similarly, the longer the original trilogy dragged out and deepened its plot, the clearer it became that the series didn’t benefit from complex double and triple crosses.

Similarly, Elizabeth and Jack’s shared return at the end of Dead Men Tell No Tales should have been triumphant, but the moment instead fell flat.

While Will getting a subplot in At World’s End might have seemed like a necessity to the movie’s creators, this distraction instead just served to highlight how thinly conceived his character was. Similarly, Elizabeth and Jack’s shared return at the end of Dead Men Tell No Tales should have been triumphant, but the moment instead fell flat. Their story had long been forgotten thanks to the sheer volume of characters, villains, heroes, incidents, locations, and other ephemera crammed into the intervening sequels.

Pirates of the Caribbean’s Poor Rotten Tomatoes Streak Is A Reminder That It Needs Correction

The Franchise Failed To Impress Critics As The Series Continued

One need only look at the Johnny Depp’s Pirates of the Caribbean 6 return would save the series, but this analysis ignores the fact that Depp played the main role in both On Stranger Tides and Dead Men Tell No Tales.

Those sequels were the two worst-received in the series, not solely because of Depp’s performance, but because of the franchise’s overall reliance on sheer spectacle instead of good storytelling. Pirates of the Caribbean 6 must feel more like The Curse of the Black Pearl or the already troubled series will run the risk of sliding into total irrelevance. Pirates of the Caribbean 6 has only one chance to save the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise, so the sequel must not repeat the biggest mistake shared by all its predecessors.

Source: Rotten Tomatoes