Here Thar Be Pirate Tropes (Minor spoilers)

Rating: 6/10 (6 June 2011)

Minor spoilers ahead!
After what was a suitable wrapped up trilogy, one kind of has to wonder what more the Pirates series could bring to the table. One got the feeling that the ending of the third film didn't really lend itself to a sequel, despite the notion of Barbossa and Jack competing for the Fountain of Youth.
So exactly does this film bring to the table? Pretty much every pirate theme that the past three movies didn't have time to cover, all shoehorned into a fast, but somewhat lacking film. Some of the references are eye-rolling obligatory, ships in bottles, pegged legs, voodoo zombies, and cross dressing pirates to name just a few on a long list. Points for an unexpected Monty Python nod.
Geoffrey Rush and Johnny Depp are the chief returners from the franchise, and immediately steal whatever scene they are in, which are always entertaining, especially when the two are in the same scene. But this also serves as a sad reminder that the original cast of the trilogy are what drove it, and the absence of the crew is sorely felt. What we get instead is a more or less forgettable bundle of misfits without the built up charm of the original Black Pearly crew, who I suppose all conveniently got hanged. Damian O'Hare returns as Gillete, the ever ignorable...I'm not even sure what his job was. Kevin McNally returns as the everlovable Gibbs, but is easily pushed aside, and not really put to much use, as the movie makes not attempt to tell any background lore. Penelope Cruize is amusing as the fiery, vivacious Anne Bonne, even if the history geek in me rebels against the utter inaccurate name drop. Ian McShane however has a rough time portraying the infamous Blackbeard. Following deliciously despicable acts of Lord Beckette and Davey Jones, Black Beard just doesn't seem all that threatening or even hate-able.
This fourth plot stands simple, solid, and direct: England and Spain are competing to arrive at the Fountain of Youth, which subsequently is the target of Blackbeard. Jack, as per usual, is mixed up in the entire mess. There's some Moby Dick type subplots between Blackbeard and Barbossa, and an utterly irrelevant romance between a mermaid and holy man who seems far too eager to get into the mermaid's shell to be so pious as he claims to be, and a lot of other fluff. In short, anything that doesn't immediately involve Geoffry or Johnny immediately drags. The scriptwriter seemed to have realized this even as he struggled to make a cohesive story because the larger majority of the screen time is given to these two.
Wrapped up, this movie pretty much makes no references to the original three. Watch it before, during, or after. If the budget hadn't been so big, you'd expect this to go direct to DVD. A mediocre, but still enjoyable installment, but a washed up shadow of what made the first three work so well.