Pirates of the Caribbean

Template:Two other usesthis movie is very good

Pirates of the Caribbean is a multi-billion dollar Walt Disney franchise encompassing a theme park ride, a series of highly successful films and spinoff novels as well as numerous video games and other publications. As of August 2006, Pirates of the Caribbean attractions can be found at four Disney theme parks and their related films have grossed more than US$1.6 billion worldwide.

Theme park origins

File:PA190094.JPG

A skeleton at the helm of a ship

Pirates of the Caribbean was envisioned in the late 1950s as a walk-through wax museum at Disneyland that would have featured depictions of real pirates from history in static scenes. Instead, Disney Imagineers utilized the technological breakthroughs achieved in the company's four pavilions at the 1964-65 World's Fair to transform the attraction into a rollicking boat ride through vivid environments filled with fictional Audio-Animatronic pirates sacking a Caribbean seaport. Its theme song, Yo Ho (A Pirate's Life for Me), sets a lighthearted tone for what were seen as violent criminals. The last Disney theme park attraction designed with input from Walt Disney, it opened in its original form in New Orleans Square at Disneyland on March 18, 1967. Since then, it has been replicated in different forms at three subsequent Disney theme parks — Magic Kingdom at Walt Disney World Resort (December 15, 1973), Tokyo Disneyland (April 15, 1983) and Disneyland Paris (April 12, 1992).

When rumors about a possible film inspired by the attraction first surfaced in 2002, it was speculated that the move was a cynical ploy by Disney to promote one of its theme park rides. Additionally, some were concerned^{[weasel words]} that pirate films such as Cutthroat Island and films based on Disney attractions such as The Country Bears had not done well at the box office. Nevertheless, Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl, starring Johnny Depp as Captain Jack Sparrow, opened on July 9, 2003 and eventually grossed US $653 million worldwide, becoming one of the top twenty-five global box office earners of all time.

In 2006, to promote the release of the second film Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest, and to bring the attraction up-to-date, audio-animatronic likenesses of Captain Jack Sparrow and Captain Barbossa were added to the Disneyland and Magic Kingdom versions, along with new special effects, though the basic ride remains the same.

The success of the first film led to the production of two additional films with the same core cast. Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest opened in July 2006 and quickly broke several records, including that for the quickest $US100 million box office gross.^[1] Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End, the final film of the trilogy, was produced concurrently with Dead Man's Chest and is set to be released on May 25, 2007.

Video games

File:Amk pirates.jpg

Adventures in the Magic Kingdom

Capcom's Adventures in the Magic Kingdom features a Pirates of the Caribbean stage where the player must save six villagers from the pirates.

Originally entitled Sea Dogs II, Pirates of the Caribbean was released in 2003 by Bethesda Softworks to coincide with the release of Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl. Although it had no relation to the film or its characters, it was the first of several games to be inspired by the attraction.

The newest video game is Pirates of the Caribbean: The Legend of Jack Sparrow by Bethesda Softworks, with players assuming the role of Captain Jack Sparrow (voiced by Johnny Depp). The game is set prior to the first movie, as players explore the stories that made Captain Jack Sparrow a legend.

Disney later moved to develop Pirates of the Caribbean Multiplayer Mobile for mobile phones and a massively multiplayer online role playing game entitled Pirates of the Caribbean Online, which is currently in BETA testing and will have its release in Spring 2007.

Pirates of the Caribbean was also featured in Square Enix's Kingdom Hearts II, The level takes place during the movie, with movie characters such as Jack Sparrow, Elizabeth Swann, Will Turner, and Captain Barbossa, It follows much of the same story line but is modified to fit Kingdom Hearts II Another Video game was Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest. This was released for such consoles + handhelds as Nintendo DS, Sony PSP (Playstation Portable), Game Boy Advance (Nintendo) and others. This game was based on the Johnny Depp (Captain Jack Sparrow) film "Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest."

Another Video game was Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl for Game Boy Advance (Nintendo) and a few others. This game was based on Johnny Depp's (Captain Jack Sparrow) misadventures.

Adaptations

Several additional works have been inspired by the original attraction:

A computer game (by Akella), loosely connected to the plot of Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl.
Port Royal, a world based on the Pirates of the Caribbean films, appears in the Square Enix video game Kingdom Hearts II.
In 2000, Pirates of the Caribbean: Battle for Buccaneer Gold, opened at DisneyQuest at Florida's Walt Disney World Resort. The attraction allows up to five players to board a virtual pirate ship and attempt to sink other ships with water cannons.
Ron Gilbert often has said that the Monkey Island computer game series was inspired by the Pirates of the Caribbean attraction (and vice versa he believes, upon seeing the new movie), although he has said that he mainly got his inspiration from Tim Powers' book On Stranger Tides. Within both the film and the Monkey Island 2: LeChuck's Revenge adventure game is a key-carrying dog named Walt, whose name is a nod to Walt Disney.
A Pirates of the Caribbean special edition of Monopoly is manufactured by USAopoly.
Pirates of the Caribbean was the name of a team participating in the 2005-2006 Volvo Ocean Race. Their boat was named the "Black Pearl." ^[2]