At World's End opens with scores of suspected pirates being rounded up by Lord Beckett's men and being hung. Elizabeth (Kiera Knightley) and Will (Orlando Bloom) team up with Captain Barbossa (Geoffrey Rush) to enlist the help of Pirate Lord Sao Feng (Chow Yun-Fat) to rescue Jack from the locker. Their little meeting is interrupted by a band of Lord Beckett's goons and the groups flee. Those who survive ban together to go save Jack.
In the meantime, Jack, along with dozens of copies of himself, is slowing going insane in the locker. His ship is stuck in the middle of a desert with not a smidget of breeze to help him along. Once the crew finally rescues him, they find out that Lord Beckett is controlling Davy Jones and the crew of the Flying Dutchmen and the only way they can be stopped is by the goddess Calypso. The plan is to gather the Brethern Court, the nine Pirate Lords, so that they can be convinced to release Calypso from her human bonds.
While it sounds as though At World's End takes a little trip to crazy town, its actually a really engaging plot, well several plots actually. Although I admit I hated Tia Dalma (Naomie Harris) in Dead Man's Chest, although she was integral to the plot because she brought Barbossa back from the dead, I found her much more endearing in At World's End and, strangely enough, far more human.
The introduction of Keith Richards as Jack Sparrow's father is a great boon to the film and something fans have really been waiting for since he was the original inspiration of Jack Sparrow's character, after all. He is quite the scene-stealer, but that can be said for Barbossa and Jack as well. All of the characters in At World's End play off of each other effortlessly and really come together to create a truly engaging fantasy/action story. It's also really nice to finally see Lord Beckett and Davy Jones get their much needed come-uppance.
There are tons of special features to be found here and fans will surely be pleased. Everything from the standard bloopers and deleted scenes is here, to featurettes on music and set creation and more. There's a Blu-ray exclusive interactive feature hosted by Jerry Bruckheimer called Enter the Maelstrom which is composed of a number of featurettes within the main featurette. Pop-up video style icons highlight different choices so you can explore certain parts of the set in far more detail. Of special interest is the featurette on Keith Richards. It's awesome to see Johnny Depp and Gore Verbinski reduced to blushing schoolboys around the rock icon. Good stuff indeed. Also very cool is the featurette called Hoist the Colors where it describes how the main pirate shanty was written. Verbinski and Hans Zimmer literally collaborated on I-chat with Gore on his guitair and Hans on his PC. Fascinating.
Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End is must-see for fans of the first two installments. It's definitely worth the purchase, especially considering the myriad of special goodies. If you have a Blu-ray player or PS3, I recommend the extra few bucks for the high def version since its simply splendid to see the fight scenes on high def.
