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AICN EXCLUSIVE! PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN 3 New Crew Member Designs!
I’ve got a fair bit of PIRATES 3 coverage coming in the next few weeks. A week from today, I’ll be publishing my visit to the editing room, where Jerry Bruckheimer walked me through nearly an hour of the film, and I’ve also got a great interview with Ted Elliott and Terry Rossio working its way through the transcription process right now.
But for today, let’s kick things off with some remarkable new design work done by Aaron McBride and Crash McCreery. They had to expand on the Flying Dutchman crew in this film, and so today, we’ve got a look at the artwork that was part of that process.
Personally, this is why these films intrigue me. When I read the very first drafts of the very first PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN, there was no hint of the supernatural. But ever since I saw that first image of skeletal pirates marching across the ocean floor, I’ve been hooked on the potential of these films. I think Gore Verbinski and his design team have done some amazing, groovy work in bringing the various monsters in these films to icky life, and this time out, there are some really twisted new characters in the mix.
There are notes under some of these designs from McBride, explaining their origin:
“Wyvern Jack - Did some sketches early on to establish how much of him is withered away. Did some portraits to establish detail and experiment with his age. Tried variations where he looked 100 years old and encrusted. But it started moving away from being recognizable as Jack. Eventually settled on a Jack that was very crusty but not so aged.”
“Broondjongen - Final design by Model supervisor Geoff Campbell. His torso splits into open into a clamshell a withered figure contorted inside the clam in a death frieze. Like when a dominant twin will absorb it's sibling in utero and always has vestigial remnants of dead sibling.”
“Jelly - I tried to make his condition look corrosive and translucent. Looked at reference of Ebola where the skin begins to rash and liquify. The human bits you can see underneath the jellyfish membrane start to look like he was regressing back to an embryo. Like he was de-evolving. I looked at reference of chicken embryos developing in eggs. Also made one of Jelly's eyes entirely black and lifeless like he has an eight ball hemorrhage.”
“Manray - Elongated the tail on the back of his head. Almost like when a robber wears a stocking over his face and it pushes and pulls the features of their face flattening and distorting them. Gave him silver eyes and very small pupils to look like psychopath.”
“Piper - I tried not to give him specific eyes. Instead added many coral tubule holes to his face so to resemble many possible eyes like a spider.”
“Finnegan - Gore wanted him to have the coloring of a Rockfish. Very aggressive red spotting to compliment the sharp serrated fins on his body. We gave him a hair lip so he would have a perpetual distorted snarl. “
I’ll be back next week with that editing room visit, and we’ll start to get into some more of the specifics of what you can look forward to when PIRATES 3 sets sail at the end of May.
Drew McWeeny, Los Angeles
Drew McWeeny, Los Angeles
Readers Talkback
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They must yell "Brains!!!"
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If so, why does he appear so whithered? I thought the crew is only slowly absorbed/changed over the years, not all in a rush. Am I wrong?
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Looks cool. Good summer for movies.
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The first one had just a hint at the supernatural, but the second one went into sequel overkill. I hope they can wrangle it back a bit for the third and just work on telling a good story.
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This is just getting disgusting
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I forget this movie is coming out with so many other movies on the way. I haven't seen even a commercial on TV yet.
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Those are some of the most original designs I've ever seen in 39 years on this planet, kudos to the team for such originality. The amount of work on these characters must be astounding. Can't wait to see the final results!
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I hate all this "The Mummy" looking creature bullsheet. I wish they didn't steer so damn far away from pirates.
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They just look like they're poking through the CGI model rather than poking through a hat.
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I mean great job but damn.
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that this was up on their uncle's dentist's dog groomer's boyfriend's blog, and it is therefore "old news"? <p>man, those morons are my favorite flora on the talkback landscape...
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Broondjongen? Damn, that's horrific for a kid's movie.
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... looked a helluva lot more scary/cool than these rejects from a Long John Silver's trash bin. The ghost pirates from South Park are scarier than these cheap beachfront giftshop souvenir figurines. And... Pirates 2 really blew...
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I totally agree with you on everything you said! also, I voted for Bush and I think Lost just keeps getting better and better. and I like to hit my head with a hammer before bedtime.<p>in all seriousness, if you think a monkey skeleton is scarier than a dude with a human body frozen in a death skriek INSIDE HIS TORSO, then you sir, are a grade-A nimrod.
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Awesome designs.
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Is this to be what becomes of Captain Jack Sparrow?
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and stlfilmwire about the "direction" this went and the turn away from pirates. This IS sequel overkill in the worst way and as nice as these monster designs are I'm not looking for this. I want to see a movie about the PIRATES of the CARIBBEAN not the "fish monsters" of the South China Sea or some such crap featuring as many Pirates of the world as they can manage to cram into this bloated trilogy. Still, I'll see it. I'm their bitch and they know it.
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Totally agree with I Dunno about this being very much in the vein of Clive Barker's artwork. I actually said the same thing about the designs for DEAD MAN'S CHEST but they seem to have taken it even further into that direction. Coincidence? Barker's ABARAT books are in the works as a future franchise at Disney...
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Hoping the series can be redeemed. I thought the second flick was poor and am hoping the whole thing doesn't end up a Matrix-like letdown (I'm in the camp that thinks both of those sequels stunk). Not that there's any special depth or significance to this whole business, but surely something besides Star Wars (OT) or Harry Potter can get to three films without feeling like the whole thing's been crushed under the weight of a gargantuan, bloated budget (or Hollywood exec's ego) to the detriment of actual storytelling.
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They all look so nasty! But I guess that's the appeal. My favorite Dutchmen crew member from DMC was the one who had the dangly tentacle things for a mouth. Yuck. And Pirates 3 will own the world.
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Sorry, wrong movie.
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It should have been up LAST MONDAY! :)
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These are concept art, not final renders. These are not meant to be perfect, so stop complaining about how the spines look.
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it's a summer disney blockbuster rated PG-13 for christ sake, not the godfather part 2...the characters returned, did their same schticks, but on a bigger canvas. isn't that the formula for every fun sequel you've ever seen? how could you be let down? I just don't get it. what specifically were you expecting?
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it needed an editor badly.
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was it really confusing? I mean, halfway through, they had the 2 dopey pirates talking on the beach about everyone's motivations. kind of a jokey reference to "are you following this?" but the gaggles of kids didn't seem to be confused by it. I jsut think people are trained to cry "too long, too long!" personally, I don't get how anyone would mind a summer blockbuster being 2 1/2 hours if it's filled with action sequences. why not get more for your 9 bones? (he he , get it? bones? pirates? sigh...)
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is for little kids and gays.
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that it seems like our characters will be encountering. Plenty' o pirates, says I. Plus, it is the supernatural and fantastical and comedy elements that make these movies fun and makes them work. Otherwise we'd probably have wound up with CUTTHROAT ISLAND.
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Your input has been most valuable.
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despite what many of the geek-masses seem to think.
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and much better than that shitty DAGON film Stuart Gordon made.
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Whether you like these movies or not, you have to admire the creative artwork.
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I mean...a damaged state of a main character is a spoiler, right? I didn't know what would happen to Jack exactly. But now I kinda do. SPOILER WARNING next time. Nice images though.
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Who thought u ever hear that as sources of inspiration for a disney movie?
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Looks like the clam dude has a Quatto.
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Seriously that was insanely cool. What surprised me the most though was all the bitching on the first talkbacks. I can't believe how hateful some of you fuckers are. Fuck you.
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With the supernatural garbage gone, it would have had potential...
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The Matrix is to Matrix Reloaded as Curse of the Black Pearl is to Dead Man's Chest. I agree 100%.
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But maybe others are. I'm just saying that in the first film the ghost pirates were jaw dropping to the rest of the characters. They were extraordinary and they had a lot more impact when they were on-screen. In DMC I thought the Flying Dutchman crewmembers were just too over the top and as the world the main characters lived in got more and more "out there" things like the ghost pirates of the first film became "Why in the hell was anybody surprised to see skeletal ghost pirates. Undead pirates are nothing to see here". That's just how I felt and if that makes me a hater then fine I guess that's me just hating my ass off.
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The POTC movies are overrated.
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crash is a lovely man and a lovely designer when he sticks to dinosaurs, which is what he knows best. his concepts are entirely too spastic and overblown for what started out as a slaphappy adventure comedy and has somehow turned into 'check out our kuh-razie monsters!'. i'm not saying these designs are bad either - in fact, some of them are fucking great - but it's the responsibility of a good designer to work with the story and the director to make something fitting to the concepts. i realize this sounds like high-falutin arty farty crap but the matrix comparisons are very apt...basically, you stop caring and it's just all about the 'wow' factor. OK maybe nobody but us arty-farty designers care, but i'm statin' my juggfuckling opinion anyhow.
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Yeah, I'd have to agree on that one, though it's a bit of a close call. Revealing to us right off the bat that Wyvern Jack is an art study in "how" Jack will look is a definite story spoiler of sorts -- then again the very fact that we're looking at ANY of the art is a spoiler since curiousity has clearly gotten the better of us all. So I guess we got what we deserved there!<p> Either way, it's a good bet that's simply where Jack simply starts off at the beginning of the film, at which point he gets Depp-ized and we're off to the races. And the Wyvern look makes sense I guess -- After all, last we left him, he was getting munched on by a giant sea serpent and Lord knows what passing through THAT digestive track will do to you! So sure, he at first he'll look bad to stun us all about "what" happened to him...and then as I said before he'll get Depp-ized and off we go.<p>I mean, come on, from the trailer it's pretty obvious that Capt. Jack is in perfectly fine human form for his sword fight atop the rigging, with the ship looping the whirlpool, and THAT'S clearly going to be big, big climactic moment of the entire movie.<p>All in all, I'm really looking forward to this and this art only gets me more excited. They've gone 2 for 2 so far (at least to me), so I'm hoping they go totally balls-out with Part 3 to complete this trilogy with a major bang.
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First off, not saying I hate the franchise. It's good fun with a lot of imaginative aspects. Also not saying the second film was *bad*--just that I didn't enjoy it. I saw it with someone who was absolutely wild about the first film, and really looking forward to #2, but who left bored and underwhelmed with the sequel, as I was. For me, I loved the production design and character design--some brilliant stuff there, very well executed technically. But the story seemed muddled, the dialogue flat, the charisma of the characters muted. The witty interplay of the first film felt much sharper; in the second it felt forced and a bit tired. The jokey parts seemed to want to be funnier than thay actually felt. On the surface, it seemed to deliver everything it was supposed to, but I just couldn't help but feel like it was less than the sum of its parts--too in love with its amazing production design and too complacent with its story. In short, it seemed to forget to try to make me care--it seemed to assume I already did, and felt a bit empty as a result. But I expect I'll see #3 and I hope they get back to the basics of what made the first one so fun--simple, grounded, clever interplay. The shots we've seen look incredible--let's hope they remembered to bring the fun.
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watch them here! http://www.metacafe.com/watch/536532/new_spider_man/3_scenes
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Jack becomes one of Davie Jones Army and we have conceptual designs to prove it! ISNT THIS A FUCKING SPOILER???
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These designs looking fucking horrific. Thanks for adding to the obesity problem guys.
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I love the designwork going into these characters. I like how Manray sort of looks like The Predator. They should work an homage line into Pirates 3 in which someone says to Manray, "You're one ugly motherfucker."
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"I dunno, Dad, that's what you said about the guerrillas in the woods...." "I was RIGHT! He said GOrillas, not GUErrillas! GO! GUE! HUGE difference!"
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going to hell and back basically, but I wonder if this might keep some of the kids away.
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That character is fanastic, he wipes the floor with Barbarosa in my opinion.
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you gits. Never was. Matrix comparisons are not deserved, Matrix 2 adn 3 was a bunch of philosophical and visual distractions that wasn't actually about anything.
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Get this man to work on COUNTRY BEARS 2: ETERNAL HIBERNATION stat!
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depp looks amazing like that
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Triumph poops' speculation as to Wyvern Jack's condition is largely correct. It isn't permanent is all I'll say, but what I will say is.... Sparrow experiences quite a hellish time at that point in the film. *_*
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Wyvern Jack was seen in the trailer! I don't think concept art of something you've already seen in the trailer counts as a spoiler. Sure, you may not have seen the trailer yet, or noticed Jack even if you had, (I didn't the first couple of times) but the fact that the image is in the trailer means that you are intended to already know beforehand. Therefore this isn't a spoiler. The point of a trailer is to give you a little bit of an idea of what the movie's going to be and to tease you with things you want to know more about, like Wyvern Jack.
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is pretty frickin' sweet. However the movie turns out
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what is a trailer but a glorified spoiler reel. seeing that design made me realise the script that was floating around the net a few moons ago is... not quite accurate. In that version Jack was taken to what appeared to be a vast desert where crabs?? carried the remains of the Black Pearl on their backs, mucho weird.
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It's not a finished model, dumb ass. It's a concept render. But yes, now we all know that the classes you took at Westwood College hav finally paid off.
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>>In that version Jack was taken to what appeared to be a vast desert where crabs?? carried the remains of the Black Pearl on their backs, mucho weird. There are still elements of that particular scenario that's in the final film, but yes, there have been changes made to the overall script, as Rossio and Elliot have been saying all along. A lot of the Wyvern Jack and desert sequences dwell on a psychological mentality showcasing. You'll see. :)
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Bah, that posted reply didn't quite space out right. Here it is again: There are still elements of that particular scenario that's in the final film, but yes, there have been changes made to the overall script, as Rossio and Elliot have been saying all along. A lot of the Wyvern Jack and desert sequences dwell on a psychological mentality showcasing. You'll see. :)
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Combined with the revolutionary eco-terroist of Atlantis stuff and the cooler-than-cool Black Manta villain, an Aquaman movie could indeed be cool. Lots of CGI underwater fantasy and less land-based generic world action would be esepcially nice. Why DC is so lame about their Super heroes I don't know. Green Lantern and Wonder Woman would make great movies, yet they aren't getting it done and are even considering a JLA movie while Marvel makes lame but apparently profitable movies from Ghostrider. Even bad movie interpretations like Fatnastic Four are coming out, what does that say about DC's ability when they can't even manage that except for the two super heroes who already had movies? ************************ Oh yeah, Pirates 3, coolness.
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really really terrible movie that jumped all over the place and was literally pointless.
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I want to see what he looks like in 3. Stages 1-3 were in DMC. Stages 4-5 are in WE. How messed up is he going to look? I think Wyvern Jack is in the prview. It's near the end. You see him open his eyes.
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Go watch it with the kids.
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when I saw that image of Jack above, it actually made me a little sad to see him in that state. :)
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pants, but I see it more as Conan underwater than Eco-Terrorist stuff. Bring on the Attack of the Lobstermen!
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if you use the word "literally" DIRECTLY before using an idiom, then no wonder a PG-13 movie was too hard for you to follow.<p>hopefully they'll make Bad Boys 3 for you soon enough, brainaic...
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I should have written...
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clearly deliberate non?
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the plot was simple, but in terms of the narrative it didn't really gel or flow and the story was pretty poor anyhow. Bad Boys 2 on the other hand was stomach-churning and headache-inducing...I think it's got to be one of the most violent films I've ever seen...it made me feel dirty....down there.
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As a character designer myself I have to say these are astounding. The imagination and work that went into these are beyond what I've seen many of my peers do. Seriously, these two guys have a rare talent that is seriously lacking in Hollywood. To any directors reading this, hire these guys for your next sc-fi or fantasy movie.
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especially like the "Jelly" design
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Just a guess, Mori, but I -think- showing Jack as a Davy Jones crewmen -might- be just a smidge of a spoiler. I'm just sayin'.
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What are these designer guys thinking/smoking? The designs look like torture/burn victims. Why don't they just go all the way and put a penis headed seamonster in there too? And btw, there's nothing original about the designs. Nothing at all. This is a family movie. You, know, the kind parents take their kids too on saturday for a good time. We don't need the rotting body inside the clamshell guy, nor the fucking jellyfish motherfucker with the melting head, jeez, you wanna give the kids a good time or do you wanna traumatize them? No wonder kids are so fucked up today, if horrible shit like this passes for kids entertainment. Now i know why that dude is called GORE verbinski. I think we're lucky he's not called Snuff Verbinski. I think these designer guys secretly want to work on a hellraiser movie.
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where you going? where you been?
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He hasn't seen the completed movie yet and hasn't written the review yet but somehow I already know that he will love this movie. No, I have not been sent back from the future, I like many others happen to know the formula for this site. Editing room access = positive review. Works like a charm. Go ahead, prove me wrong.
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The first one is too long, the second one is way too long. This one seems like a disaster waiting to happen.
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Urchin man and the guy with half his head on the wall were in Dead Man's chest. So...how is that news? o_O Also that floating dead guy with the dreads: Zombie Capt. Jack?
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Seriously, all you little morons whining about how this will traumatize kids are wrong. Kids love to see this shit. I know I would have. I think to an extent, even children are tired of seeing "safe" kid-friendly garbage in movies. They want to get a reaction. But whatever, if you're a parent, and you're worried about corrupting your faggy little kid... don't take him. Get off the fucking computer, though.
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Oh. Wrong ocean.
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How the hell does the fact that you think these designs are too intense for kids (the movies are PG-13, by the way) equate to them being unoriginal???
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That's "hare lip," Bud.
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Ai! Ai! Arrrgh!
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Give over, you PC dickheads. Kids do love this shit, as Norm said. I saw DMC in Amsterdam when it opened and kids were gleeful when the Flying Dutchman crew rolled up. Kids love monsters -- I know I did. My favourite films when I was little were Alien/Aliens and Predator and Total Recall, all full of freakish characters! Kids like being scared and I'm sorry but after a patchy start with Curse, the POTC trilogy has picked up a real head of creative steam. I'd like to see a couple more films on this scale that have such an exciting and fun level of imagination and wit to them! So shut up and enjoy the ride when World's End hits because it will be the film of the summer for its entertainment value alone
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not in a good way. Kinda like the megatron design. No clear lines - just a random mush up of fishy elements. And layered on so heavily as to prevent any emotion coming through. Oh well, hope this is good - had a lot of fun with CotBP, but was bored stupid by DMC.
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If you look at sea creatures, the way they are designed (by God himself) are quite busy as well. No these designs are imaginative, unlike Megatron, whose design was an utter failure due to the little thought that was put into the character's history. No, this WILL be THE movie of the summer right here folks. Make no bones about it, pun intended.
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<P>... um, I'll prove you wrong. Happily. Will you admit you're wrong? Of course not. <P>Here's an editing room visit to TOMB RAIDER, a film I was really looking forward to: <P>http://tinyurl.com/3bk2ua <P>And here's my review of the final film, about six weeks later. http://tinyurl.com/2wv9v3 <P>But I'm sure your "formula" is accurate. Right? Douchebag.
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I hope these two wonderfully freaky new characters are put front and center during scenes involving the Dutchman crew. I'd hate to see these designs get lost as background characters only to be briefly glimpsed here and there.
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what the hay kind of character designer are you that you think 'God himself' designed 'sea creatures'? i just watched that featurette...and it just reinforced my thought that this whole enterprise has gotten spastic and overblown.
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It's because you can't last that long without texting some douche on your phone, listening to a sci-fi podcast or taking a shit. If there isn't a loud bang for two minutes you want to walk out. Cunts.
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Jack doesn't become part of the CREW. He becomes the CAPTAIN.
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TheRealMoriarty, I was referring to Harry's reviews, so I guess I'll admit I was wrong right off the bat - we can usually count on you specifically to be fair and even handed. Still, I am pretty honoured that you would even deign to respond and call me a 'douchebag'. I mean, obvs I love this site or I wouldn't have read often enough to be able to assess that positive reviews can be telegraphed long before the movies are released for a great majority of the films covered in depth before the prints are out. Not a slam, just an observation. Maybe I struck a chord to invoke such a response? Hey, keep up the good work; either way I hope this site never goes away. -jer
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