Oh, yeah...I almost forgot.

I went and saw the new Pirates of the Carribean over the weekend.

Now, I loved the original PotC. I went into it expecting, "OK, whatever, movie about pirates," and came out thinking, "Holy crap! Cool movie about pirates!" It's not that it's a particularly great movie in any sort of legitimate cinema sense of the word. It is, however, really well done, and probably the most fun and one of the best popcorn, escapism films I've seen. ANd it's got cool pirates. Hell, the alst movie about pirates I saw was "The Pirate Movie." And those pirates weren't cool, they were singing.

So, I went into the new PotC with pretty high expectations. Apparently so did everyone else as it made a ridiculous $120 million I think in it's first weekend. And the verdict? It was pretty good, wasn't as good as the first, but it was excellent in one respect.

With the exception of a very few, and very obvious, films, we all know that sequels aren't as good as the original. Especially in the age of the blockbuster movie. And here's why, in my opinion. The sequel has to be bigger, which means bigger action or laughs or scares (depending on what type of film it is), than the original film. But at the same time, sequels often deal with some, if not all, of the same characters. We already know these characters, they've already been introduced. We know their personalities. The've already had a complete story arc (if the writing was good) in the first film. The writers and producers don't need to introduce them again. As such, the character development for recurring characters in a sequel is rarely as strong. Which, to use the exampke of an action movie, gives us a whole lot of action, but not a lot of character. Not the best combination.

At first it felt like the new PotC was going to fall into this trap, and to be honest it doesn't totally escape it. Pretty much the entire cast from the first film returns, and as far as the three main characters go: Orlando Bloom's character is basically the same. Kiera Knightley's character gets a slight bit of new, and darker, characterization. Johnny Depp's Jack Sparrow actually show a more cowardly and unlikeable side than his loveable buffoonery of the first film.

The story? It's pretty good. It deals with Davy Jones as the main villain, who commands a ship of ha;f undead men who, rather than perish at sea, elect to serve on Jones' ship for 100 years, thereby forestalling their death. (Side effects may include: turning into gruesome sea creatures.) Well, in a bit of non-sensical plotting, Sparrow owes Davy Jones his soul because Jones gave him the Black Pearl (his ship from the first movie) to captain for 13 years. (This being non-sensical, becaus the the rules of this film universe don't specify that Jones gets souls for giving up ships, only for "rescuing" drowning sailors.) The action is pushed forward by this fact, and also by the chase by various parties to get Jack's non-working compass, (seen in the first film.) Actually the compass does work, just not how you think.

Here's where the movie is good. It references the first film well, such as in cases of the compass, or how Jack originally got to captain the Black Pearl. In one of the returning characters, it tells of what happened to Commodore Norrington from the first film. Things like strengthened the film. But even better, PotC 2 and 3 were filmed at the same time. So in case you didn't know, yes it's a trilogy. And this film is probably the best example I've seen of a second film in a trilogy setting up the third. I will warn you, the film does sort of just end, albeit it with a twist, cliffhanger ending. But based on what's set up in this film, you know exactly what the 3rd film is going to be about, but you don't know how it's going to play out. The plot of the third film is pretty much outlined in the last few minutes of this one, but there are a lot of strings left dangling as to just how it's all going to happen. Think of it as a cliff-hanger season finale on TV. And just like TV, we now have to wait to see how it all resolves. I know I'll be there next May.