Pirates of the Caribbean

<span class="SFPTagline"> From SCIFIPEDIA </span>

This article is about the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise. See Pirates of the Caribbean (disambiguation) for other uses.

Pirates of the Caribbean is a Disney franchise that originated as a ride at Disney theme parks and has spun off into movies and video games.

1 Theme Park Ride
2 Films
3 Games
4 External Links

Theme Park Ride

Main article: Pirates of the Caribbean (theme park ride)

The original concept for the theme park attraction came in the early 60s inspired by drawings from Disney animator Marc Davis. The initial concept envisioned the attraction as a walk through pirate wax museum centered around New Orleans Square. The exhibit would focus on pirates, vampires and voodoo in Crescent City. The Attraction opened at Disneyland on March 18, 1967 and proved a great success. The concept was reimagined for Walt Disney World in Florida and opened at the Magic Kingdom on December 15, 1973. Pirates of the Caribbean was the last attraction Walt Disney personally oversaw.

In 2000, Pirates of the Caribbean: Battle for Bucaneer Gold opened at DisneyQuest, Walt Disney World Resort in Florida.

Films

Despite the failure of similar films such as Cutthroat Island the first film Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl drew a quality cast, which undoubtedly contributed to its great success. The film starred Johnny Depp as Captain Jack Sparrow, Geoffrey Rush as Barbossa, Orlando Bloom fresh off the success of the Lord of the Rings films and Keira Knightley who came to international fame in the romantic comedy Bend it Like Beckham. The film opened in theaters on July 9, 2003 and topped 45 million in the US in its opening weekend. It went on to earn over $305 million in US theatres and over $653 million worldwide.

Given the success of the first film, a sequel was to be expected and director Gore Verbinski and writers Ted Elliot and Terry Rossio went to work on Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest . The main cast of the first film reprised their roles, with the addition of Bill Nighy as Davy Jones and Stellan Skarsgård as Bootstrap Bill. The film premiered at Disneyland on June 24, 2006, and opened in US theaters on July 6. The film doubled the weekend total of its predecessor and has earned a worldwide total of over $1 billion.

A third film, Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End is the last of the series. It was produced alongside Dead Man's Chest and opened in theaters on May 25, 2007.