Pretty good, but it has its flaws.

Rating: 6/10 (7 September 2006)

Okay, let's start with the story. Jack Sparrow (sorry, *Captain*) has been captain of the Black Pearl for thirteen years (unlucky thirteen, as it were). Originally, he had made a deal with the sea himself, Davy Jones, to raise the ship from the depths of his locker (we don't find out the details of that, yet, but I'm sure they'll be answered in the third movie). The deal was that Jack would be captain for thirteen years only, and then be doomed to servitude on the Flying Dutchman (Davy Jones' ship). Now, his time is up, and Jack gets the ever-familiar 'black spot' on his hand, marking him as pray for the Kraken (Davy Jones' assassination minion of the depths of the sea) if he should defy his deal.
Now for everybody else: Will and Elizabeth are about to get married in the very beginning, but a certain Lord Cutler Beckett of the East India Trading Company has put out arrest warrants for them both (for helping Jack escape the hangman's noose, for which their crime shares the exact same punishment), and one for Jack (for his crimes mentioned in the first movie), and even one for the *former* Commodore James Norrington (his conditions are a bit more fuzzy)! The deal Lord Beckett makes with Will is that, if he gets a certain 'compass' from Captain Jack, then Will and Elizabeth will both be pardoned (Norrington has been nowhere to be found for the past few weeks). Too bad Lord Beckett has a hidden agenda...
Now, that's the beginning, and I'm going to stop there, because I don't want to post any spoilers. So, with this in mind, forgive me for being a bit evasive as I give my analysis: Captain Jack changes quite a bit in this movie. He's much less decisive about what he needs to do with his strategies (and a bit sloppy with them), and his heart seems to always be torn in two (you'll see what I'm talking about during the course of the movie). Overall I see this as a negative impact for the movie, but it may turn positive in the third, showing that he is indeed 'growing'.
Will is actually an improvement, in my honest opinion. He was the classically adorable, lovesick puppy in Curse of the Black Pearl, but much more of an adult in Dead Man's Chest. He seems to have lived more in this movie, and experienced a whole lot (like all of the events of the first movie). Though some may say Orlando Bloom's acting is wooden, I *completely* disagree! I think he portrayed a very 'real' (no other word to describe it) person as Will Turner, without you feeling like you're even watching an actor, but the actual person Will Turner, ups and downs both.
Elizabeth, pardon my English, is a major S-L-U-T in this movie. She mentions toward the beginning how Lord Beckett "robbed her of her wedding night" (the least ladylike thing she could possibly say in front of company). She flirts with nearly every guy she meets in this movie (Jack most certainly included, if you can believe it!), and throws herself at a couple of them (literally). Total downhill spiral from the first movie, making Elizabeth a rich and promiscuous snob (never a good combination for a movie heroine).
Norrington is a MAJOR plus! He pitches the white wig that made him look like an ice cream cone in the first movie, and becomes... well, *piratey*, if you can believe it! His personality has many different sides here, with conflicting desires (including a possible remaining love for Elizabeth?) and motivations. And also--and this is not something to criticize the movie with, but my own heterosexual female opinion--Norrington was incredibly HOT!
The new bad guy, Davy Jones, is another negative. His story is explained (such as how he became an immortal sea-like creature), but his motivations and desires are rather fuzzy. Barbossa from the first movie was a much better villain: you knew that what he was doing was evil, and that Jack needed to defeat him for the movie to be happy, but you understood *why* Barbossa did what he did in Curse of the Black Pearl--to feel like a human being again! (And, be honest, you sympathized with him a bit.) Davy Jones, on the other hand, is much colder than Barbossa (and not in a good way), much crueler, and offers you no outlet for sympathy, making the storyline more one-sided. That's not to say Bill Nighy was bad for the role (he portrayed him very well, actually), but the character himself was a downside.
All in all, with the above story and character analysis, I give this movie 6/10 stars.