Beware, Matey … Dead Men Tell No Tales

Dead men tell no tales … dead men tell no tales. If you’ve ridden Pirates of the Caribbean at Walt Disney World, you’re certainly familiar with that phrase. Perhaps you’re also familiar with the Pirates movie franchise. We hope so because on May 26, Dead Men Tell No Tales has rewards for those that have been faithful followers of the preceding movies.

Walt Disney World is known for a number of iconic attractions including Pirates of the Caribbean. The attraction spawned a movie that in turn inspired updates to the attraction. The original movie, The Curse of the Black Pearl, was so well-received that a sequel came three years later, followed by another, and then a fourth film. Now comes Dead Men Tell No Tales, the fifth movie in the Pirates franchise.

Dead Men Tell No Tales wastes no time in giving faithful Pirates fans a nice call-back to prior movies. We won’t spoil it for you, though truth be told it’s an open secret at this point in time. Suffice it to say that the audience in our screening responded extremely well to cameo appearances. The cameo also serves to set our story in motion. Our main characters all share the same objective of finding the Trident of Poseidon, but have different motives. At the center of this search is of course Jack Sparrow. Jack reluctantly teams with Henry, a sailor in the Royal Navy, and Carina, an astronomer mistaken for a witch.

As expected, there’s plenty of swashbuckling that plays out en route to the Trident. Jack escapes time and again seemingly by happenstance, but mostly through his ability to simply talk his way out of a predicament.

Johnny Depp does such an amazing job portraying Jack that it’s hard to imagine this series with anyone else in the lead. And perhaps we now have even more opportunities to have Johnny Depp-led Pirates of the Caribbean movies. Dead Men Tell No Tales makes use of cutting-edge CGI to give us a young Jack Sparrow via a flashback. This kind of technology has been featured recently in Captain America: Civil War and Star Wars: Rogue One. It opens up additional possibilities for the Pirates franchise moving forward. Could we potentially explore more of Jack’s past in future movies?

Dead Men Tell No Tales certainly relies on stories of the past in order to tell its story. It’s a welcome perspective for a franchise that is now five films deep and thus has established some beloved characters. It rewards loyal fans of the franchise and generally provides some nice wholesome fun for the entire family. Note that there are some double-entendre jokes and simulated fight scenes but nothing too in-your-face. So bring all the pirates in your family to find out if it’s true that … dead men tell no tales … dead men tell no tales …

P.S. Stay until the very end for a post-credit scene!

An IT professional by day and a theme park addict all day, Ricardo Escobar is proud to call Orlando his home, one of the world’s top vacation destinations.  Ricardo applies his passion for attractions by sharing the latest and greatest in family entertainment for modernmami™ readers. Follow Ricardo on his adventures and connect with him via Twitter and Instagram.

Disclosure: We were provided a complimentary advance screening of the film to facilitate this post. All thoughts and opinions are our own.