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View Full Version : Pirates of the Caribbean, the real phantom menace



mindbomb
Jul 11th, 2006, 12:18:49 PM
I recently saw Pirates of the Caribbean and realized that it has an eerily familiar theme...cue 20th Century Fox drum roll, followed by text scroll on star field space backdrop: Turmoil has engulfed the British Colonial Empire. There is unrest in outlying trade routes…evil is everywhere...You got me, it’s Star Wars I’m talking about. I must admit that it is going to be awfully difficult to draw comparisons without turning this post into a spoiler but I’ll give it a shot.
I recently discovered that Pirates of the Caribbean is now a trilogy. I will compare it to the only Star Wars trilogy that mattered, the original with Harrison Ford et al.
Watching Pirates, I noticed that Dead Man’s Chest takes off where the original left off. There is a love triangle forming that we are all familiar with. Jack Sparrow played by Johnny Depp assumes the role of devilish rogue Han Solo (Harrison Ford), Orlando Bloom as Will Turner the nancy boy hero modeled after Mark Hamill’s, Luke Skywalker and let us not forget the feisty heroine Elizabeth Swan played by Keira Knightley replacing Princess Leia (Carrie Fisher). The similarities are so close that the only thing that Ms. Knightly’s character didn’t do was call Captain Jack Sparrow a “nerf herder”. Hmmm, Sparrow and Swan? I fully expect that Knightly will wind up with Bloom at the end of it all but, there is this curious battle between light and dark for both Sparrow and Swan. I’m waiting for Darth Vader a.k.a. Davy Jones to pronounce “the force is strong with this one” when he meets Swan.
You have your usual cast of beasties, meanies and other subversive characters that drive the plot. There’s Jack Davenport’s Norrington as Boba Fett and Jack Sparrow’s right hand man Gibbs (Kevin McNally) as Chewbacca. He’s certainly hairy enough to be Chewy. There’s the characters Pintel and Ragetti as R2D2 and C3PO. Finally, while Johnny Depp’s character wasn’t frozen in carbonite at the end of Dead Man’s Chest he wasn’t far off (you’ll see what I mean), setting off another adventure for the final installment. C’mon It’s painstakingly obvious. Does George Lucas know that Disney is ripping off his plot lines?
Somehow though, I don’t think that Dead Man’s Chest will be the only film in the Pirate’s of the Caribbean trilogy that mattered unlike “Empire” was to Star Wars…ouch.

Mitch
Jul 11th, 2006, 12:32:08 PM
Does that look like a message that's been spammed over several boards to anyone else?

Besides, Gorge Lucas didn't invent all of his own plot lines, many are classic elements of dramatic storytelling ina multi-part setting. You could draw parallels between SW and LotR if you wanted, too. Big whoop.

mindbomb
Jul 11th, 2006, 12:43:19 PM
Sorry Mitch, I was just having a bit of fun. Not taking things all that seriously.

Dasquian Belargic
Jul 11th, 2006, 01:05:54 PM
Originally posted by Mitch
Does that look like a message that's been spammed over several boards to anyone else?

Besides, Gorge Lucas didn't invent all of his own plot lines, many are classic elements of dramatic storytelling ina multi-part setting. You could draw parallels between SW and LotR if you wanted, too. Big whoop.

Or SW and The Wizard Of Oz. We had to do that in Film Studies. It was a great way to waste an afternoon.

Droo
Jul 11th, 2006, 03:36:39 PM
Read Joseph Campbell's The Hero with a Thousand Faces. The plot elements and iconography present in Star Wars can be traced back to ancient Greece and beyond. The paradigm is commonly known as The Hero's Journey and the last film to emulate it almost in its entirety was the Matrix trilogy, I believe.

Jedi Master Carr
Jul 11th, 2006, 04:14:48 PM
I agree with Droo, Most adventure stories use elements of The Heroes Journey so it is not surprising there are some parrells.

Jaime Tomahawk
Jul 11th, 2006, 04:25:47 PM
I didnt understand a damn word of the first post.

Droo
Jul 11th, 2006, 04:33:27 PM
Originally posted by Jaime Tomahawk
I didnt understand a damn word of the first post.

To be honest, I didn't read it. I just guessed what the thread was about judging by the responses.

Jedi Master Carr
Jul 11th, 2006, 04:55:52 PM
heh I think he copied that post from somewhere else and it is so jarbled it is hard to read.

Lilaena De'Ville
Jul 11th, 2006, 06:35:30 PM
Sometimes punctuation or different symbols won't transfer well if you copy/paste the wrong font.

I couldn't help but feel that they were off to rescue <strike>Han Solo</strike> Capt Sparrow, from the <strike>carbonite</strike> krakenite.

:D

Estelle Russard
Jul 12th, 2006, 06:51:15 PM
Originally posted by Lilaena De'Ville
I couldn't help but feel that they were off to rescue <strike>Han Solo</strike> Capt Sparrow, from the <strike>carbonite</strike> krakenite.

:D

:lol ok, that was funny.