One of the things I love about the og POTC trilogy is how you can catch so many details you never noticed before on every subsequent rewatch. Any time I think I've picked up on everything I'm proven wrong, and I think it's especially true for the 2nd and 3rd movies. So here's a collection of more things I noticed on my most recent rewatch of AWE:
-AWE has always been my favorite of the first 3 films, and I think a strong case can be made for it actually being the best one, although most people usually give that designation to COTB. There's several reasons for this, but I think the most important one is that it takes the story beyond its adventure roots and does something truly profound with it. This is a pirate movie that is not actually about pirates. It's instead about the human drive to fight for and defend our freedom, filtered through the lens of a fantasy adventure involving pirates. The entire film is packed with references to this theme right from the opening scene. This alone I think makes it timeless as opposed to a product of its time, because there is no day and age where that theme will not be relevant.
-There is a fascinating parallel between Beckett and Elizabeth that especially sticks out in this movie. We know Beckett has read up on pirate lore just as much as Elizabeth has, and they both have decent working knowledge of it despite initially being outsiders to that world. The difference between them, though, is how they use that knowledge. Beckett seeks to use it so that he can control and obliterate the pirates, while Elizabeth, despite her repeated insistence that she's "had it with pirates," ultimately uses it to understand them and integrate into their way of life. Beckett becomes their number one adversary, while Elizabeth literally becomes their king and leader.
-I consider the deleted scene where Weatherby Swann tries to stab Davy's heart canon; I don't think it should have been cut out of the film. It adds so much context to why Beckett had him killed, and it fleshes out Norrington's character more in a way that I think was needed before his death. It's very obvious by the end of that scene that Norrington, despite having lived his life following orders (as Beckett himself points out), harbors great disdain for Beckett and his methods. Norrington's flaw in this film is at first assuming that the system he has dedicated his life to serving still upholds the honorable ideals and and values he believes in. This is the scene where we see doubt start to creep in about what he's really serving. There is a part of him that is beginning to realize that his ideals and the people/institution he works for no longer align, which then sets up his eventual turn later on in the film.
-Which leads me to his death. Yes, I hate it because I love him and he's my favorite character. But I also kind of love it because of what it implies. Norrington has spent his life doing what Beckett says he always does: obey. But prior to his death and following the revelation about Weatherby's murder, his "obey without question" mentality finally breaks. When he sets Elizabeth and the pirates free, he is disobeying direct orders for the first time. This is because he's realized that following orders does not always equal doing the right thing, especially when those giving the orders are doing so out of selfishness, pride, and cruelty meant to control the lives of others and take away their freedom. He finally recognizes that doing the right thing sometimes requires rebelling against the established order rather than adhering to it, and when he stabs Davy rather than accept his offer to serve on the Dutchman, that's his final act of rebellion. While I do think there may have been a way to let him live while still giving him this character development (lord knows there's plenty of fanfics to prove this, including my own lol) I love the fact that when he dies, he dies a free man. He is neither a slave to Beckett's greed nor a slave to Davy's cruelty. He's arguably not even a slave to death, because he greets it with humble acceptance rather than fear.
-When Barbossa is giving his speech to the Brethren Court, the camera focuses on Elizabeth during the bit about taming the seas with "the sweat of our brows and the strength of our backs." She later borrows this phrase for her "Hoist the Colors" speech prior to the final battle, and the camera then focuses on Barbossa while she's saying it.
-Jack choosing to sacrifice his shot at immortality to save Will's life has always been one of my favorite parts of the movie. One of the things I realized about it this time is that it connects back to yet another deleted bit where he tells Beckett "people aren't cargo, mate" during their first confrontation. If you know the lore, this is, of course, referencing how Jack freed a slave ship in the past, which Beckett punished him for by branding him a pirate. Jack has always valued his own freedom, but beyond that I think he just values freedom in general. His backstory is proof of that. I think that thanks to his past experiences, in that moment before he has Will stab Davy's heart, he's reminded that while immortality would technically buy him the freedom he wants for himself, personal freedom isn't worth it if it comes at the expense of innocent people's lives.
-I've noticed this before, but I have to point out again how much I love the foreshadowing of Will becoming Captain of the Dutchman, and the parallel between him and Elizabeth and Davy and Calypso. The camera almost always focuses on him when the heart is being mentioned, and Tia Dalma is usually hovering in the background like she knows what his fate is going going to be. The camera also focuses often on Will and Elizabeth together when Davy and Calypso are mentioned, further establishing the parallel. Although they go through a rough patch where they doubt their trust in one another, they're eventually able to rebuild it in a way their predecessors never could. They come together as one while Davy and Calypso tore each other apart. They embody loyalty while Davy and Calypso embody betrayal.
Anyway I'm running out of space but I've said it before and I'll say it again: the writing in the first 3 films was more brilliant than we give it credit for and I think that brilliance really shines in the 3rd one.
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