Blackbeard

### Inspiration

The notorious pirate of the same name, as well as the character from the novel *On Stranger Tides*
Character from Ben Stahl's novel *Blackbeard's Ghost*

## Character information

### Other names

The pirate of all pirates fear
Mr. Beard
Edward Teach (his real name)

### Personality

Evil, greedy, notorious, murderous, manipulative, mysterious

### Description

Slender man with fair skin, both black hair and beard, and blue eyes wearing clad in pirate clothing

### Occupation

Pirate captain of the Queen Anne's Revenge (in *Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides*)
 Ghost pirate captain (in *Blackbeard's Ghost*)

### Family

Angelica (daughter)
Angelica's mother (wife; presumably deceased) (in *On Stranger Tides*)
Aldetha Teach (10th wife in *Blackbeard's Ghost*)

### Friends

Angelica, Zombie Officers (in *On Stranger Tides*), Steve Walker, Jo Anne Baker, Emily Stowecroft, Daughters of the Buccaneers (in *Blackbeard's Ghost*)

### Enemies

**On Stranger Tides:** Jack Sparrow, Hector Barbossa, Joshamee Gibbs
**Blackbeard's Ghost:** Silky Seymour and his thugs

### Weapons

His sword, pistol, hand grenades, knife, voodoo, black magic
Ghost powers (in *Blackbeard's Ghost*)

### Fate

Turns into nothing but a skeleton and then later fades out of existence (in *Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides*).
Sails with his ghostly crew on his ship into the fog after releasing himself from the curse after performing a good deed (in *Blackbeard's Ghost*).

### Quote

"If I don't kill a man every now and then, they forget who I am."

**Edward Teach**, better known by the name **Blackbeard**, was a notorious pirate named for his long black beard. He was known for his intimidating and cruel nature, and to scare his enemies, he would often light fuses in his beard so that smoke surrounded his face. He appears in different incarnations in several Disney-related products. He is best known for being the main protagonist in Disney's 1968 film, Blackbeard's Ghost: and the main antagonist in Disney's 2011 film, *Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides*, in which his appearance is shown fairly accurately, though supernatural elements are written into his character.

## Background

### Personality

Captain Blackbeard was the pirate that all pirates knew and feared. He was ruthless and malicious. The dark captain sailed the seas and as the years passed, his age began to catch up with him. He seeks the legendary Fountain of Youth and becomes even more serious for his goal when he must deal with Hector Barbossa and Jack Sparrow.

The pirate was known to be cruel to his prisoners, often torturing them mostly for his own selfish amusement. He shows a great love for his daughter and, after his vicious pirate years, he devoted himself into teaching her the ways of a worthy pirate. He taught her swordfighting and various other skills. Still, Blackbeard still saw her as a pawn and was perfectly willing to sacrifice her to get what he wanted.

## Appearances

### *Blackbeard's Ghost*

In the film's history, Blackbeard had 10 wives, Number 10: Aldetha was a witch. Before she died by burning completely at the stake by Blackbeard, she put a curse on him that he will always be on Earth in limbo unless there'll be a spark of human goodness in him.

200 years later, the new track coach for Godolphin, Steve Walker (Dean Jones) came to Blackbeard's Inn (which was originally Blackbeard's ship) for a rest for the night. He came to the Inn's Auction of family heirlooms held by the founders of the Inn and descendants of Blackbeard's Bloody crew known as the Daughters of the Buccaneers to save the Inn from the villainous gambler, Silky Seymour (Joby Baker). After he had his men scare off the auctionees, Walker got involved in the auction and he won and bought, for 200 $, a bedwarmer which belonged to Aldetha.

After Walker accidentally sat on the bed warmer and broke it in half, he found her book of spells and a spell that brings his eyes and ears to one who is bound in limbo. Because he said the magic words of the spell: "Kree, Kruh, Vergo, Gaba, Kalto, Kree", Walker could now see "That's right" Blackbeard's ghost. Although, Blackbeard has been annoying Walker like laying on the bed Walker was going to sleep in, doing crazy things while he was sleeping "like talking in his sleep, snoring, and fighting", he couldn't leave Walker alone and had Walker arrested for speeding and drinking while driving.

Walker wanted to help Blackbeard break the curse and so he got an idea, helping the Daughters of the Buccaneers save the Inn. So, Blackbeard stole money from Professor Baker (Suzanne Pleshette), used for saving the inn to make a bet with Seymour for the Godolphin track team, to help the team win, help Walker and Baker win gambling, and fight off Seymour and his men. After Walker and Baker got the money in time, Blackbeard; whom everyone could now see after Walker had given everyone the spell that allows them to see and hear people who are bound in limbo by telling them to recite it, put the will into the fire and the curse was finally broken. Later, he left Earth and reunited with the spirits of his noble crew.

### *Return to Never Land*

Though he doesn't appear in the film, Blackbeard is mentioned when Captain Hook explains his masterplan on how to capture Peter Pan to Mr. Smee. When Hook finishes, he asks Smee who is the most brazen, bold, and brilliant buccaneer that ever sailed the briny blue, to which a very confused Smee replies:"Um, Blackbeard?", causing an annoyed Hook to hit Smee hard over the head with his hook hand.

### *Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides*

At some point before the events of the film, Blackbeard attacked the *Black Pearl* without being provoked, capturing the crew in the ship's own riggings. However, Hector Barbossa escaped by chopping off his left foot. Blackbeard shrunk the ship down with his voodoo magic and placed it in a bottle. At some point, he had been presumed dead, although Barbossa claimed that the stories were effectively exaggerated when meeting Jack Sparrow.

Having received a prophecy that a one-legged man would end his life from the zombie quartermaster, Blackbeard began seeking Jack Sparrow, who was said to have been to the Fountain of Youth, which could save his life. He sent his daughter, Angelica to pose as Jack and recruit more crew-members with the possibility of capturing Jack. His plan was successful; he forced Jack to lead them to the Fountain with the threat of a voodoo doll. He captured a mermaid for her tear as part of the ritual to gain the years of life from another, and badly wounded the missionary she was in love with to get it. At the Fountain of Youth, he met Barbossa, the one-legged man in the prophecy, and fell victim to a stab from Barbossa's poisoned sword. Jack then tricked him into drinking from a chalice without the mermaid's tear in it to save the life of his daughter, who had also been poisoned by the sword. His remains now lay at the Fountain's ruins.

### *Once Upon a Time*

**Black Beard** appeared in Season 3 in the episode "The Jolly Roger" and is played by Charles Mesure. He was announced as an old enemy of Captain Hook.

Through some means, Black Beard comes to possess an item called a wishing star, which can grant a wish, but only if the user has a pure heart. Approached by the King and Queen of Arendelle, they hand over his asking price in exchange for the wishing star.

Black Beard meets a thief named Snow White, who is running away from the Evil Queen, and hopes he can take her as far as possible from the kingdom. She offers some money in exchange for hiding as a stowaway on his ship, but the pirate asks her to pay up more in order to earn his discretion. As she thinks about her next move, Black Beard leaves.

In the Enchanted Forest, Black Beard takes leadership of Hook's former ship, The Jolly Roger, and imprisons Prince Eric on Hangman's Island. When Hook arrives to reclaim the vessel, they have a sword duel. The fight is interrupted by Ariel, who Hook is helping to find Eric, but her beloved is not on the ship. Black Beard offers to relinquish Eric only if Hook gives up on trying to take back the Jolly Roger, but the former pirate captain stiffly refuses. Instead, Hook binds Black Beard's arms and legs and throws him to the sharks. This angers Ariel as Black Beard was her only hope of finding Eric. Unknown to Hook, she rescues Black Beard from death.

Later, Black Beard also regains the Jolly Roger, though the circumstances of this are unknown.

In a scheme, Prince Hans buys Black Beard's compliance with gold to corner Anna and Kristoff. When approached by the twosome, Black Beard agrees, in a fib, to sell them the wishing star for an equal amount of gold in his own weight. When the deal is struck, Prince Hans and his brothers trap Anna and Kristoff. Admitting to the charade, Black Beard then tells Anna how much she resembles her mother; recounting how her naive parents came to him asking for the wishing star, but they failed to realize that the item can only be harnessed by a pure-hearted person. After Prince Hans sentences the pair to death, Black Beard orders a large coffer to be pulled onto the deck. He recalls how a past rival once made him walk the plank, and though death seemed certain, his life was saved by a mermaid. Jokingly, he jibs that the casket will ensure they die without "fin-terference". As Anna is forced into the coffer, she mouths off to Hans in insistence that Elsa will escape from the urn and regain the throne from him, but to her shock, he reveals Ingrid's magic froze Arendelle and everyone in it for thirty years. After the casket is closed, Black Beard calls for his crew to toss it into the sea, which they promptly do.

At an unknown period after this, Elsa and her family return and reclaim the kingdom. As punishment for conspiring against Anna and Kristoff, she shrinks the Jolly Roger into a bottle, leaving Black Beard's fate unclear.

Sometime later, Black Beard comes to possess another magic bean, which he stores in his pirate's hat. He returns to the Enchanted Forest again, and while he is in the midst of a card game with other pirates, Hook saunters up to offer a bag of jewels as payment for a bean. Black Beard scoffs at the jewels that he presumes Hook stole from someone, and even when the latter confirms they're Agrabahn gems, he laughs at Hook for going as far as sailing the seas in a desert of all places. Hook brings up the fact Black Beard has been without a ship since losing the Jolly Roger in Arendelle, a sore reminder that angers Black Beard, who tries to challenge Hook to a duel. Rather than that, Hook offers up the Jolly Roger to him if he bests him in a card game. Black Beard is intrigued by Hook's willingness to risk losing the ship himself, which the latter claims is only a risk if he loses. Accepting the deal, Black Beard nods to one of pirate mates, who promptly grabs the pirate seated next to him and hurls him to the floor, in order to make room for Hook to sit at the table. After Hook has lost in the game, he leads Black Beard outside, confessing that the ship is actually in Storybrooke and if he wants his prize, he'll have to forfeit the bean to him now. Black Beard gives him the bean, but instead of waiting for Hook to return with the ship, he opts to go with him into the portal. Because of Gideon's magic preventing Hook from going home, the two pirates end up in Neverland, where a band of vicious Lost Boys chase after them, prompting Black Beard and Hook to run for their lives. They find a rowboat by the shoreline, however, Black Beard knocks out Hook before hurrying to the boat and rowing into the sea. Upon waking up, Hook furiously shouts over at Black Beard for betraying him, while the latter makes no apologies for his actions after all the times Hook has backstabbed him. As Black Beard continues rowing further away, he yells that, if Hook survives, he still owes him a ship.

### *Kingdom Keepers I: Disney After Dark*

One of The Overtakers from *Pirates of the Caribbean* identifies himself as Blackbeard.

## Disney Parks

### Pirates of the Caribbean

In the ride, Pirates of the Caribbean, Blackbeard was implied to be the captain of the ride's central pirate ship The Wicked Wench before being replaced in 2006 by Barbossa. The captain of the Wench was heavily based on the real life Blackbeard in that he had a long braided black beard, decorative ribbons tied into his facial hair, a leather baldric which held multiple pistols, and in original concept art his facial features were drawn very similarly to historic illustrations of Edward Teach. In the ride Blackbeard (voiced by Paul Frees) would be seen on his galleon the Wicked Wench as he shouted insults and threats to the Spanish soldiers in the seaside fortress he was attacking.

### 1

Ah, but they do tell tales. So says I, Blackbeard.

### 2

Blackbeard (from the film series) appearing during the mist waterfall scene

In 2011, Blackbeard was once again added to the ride in Walt Disney World (this time portrayed by Ian McShane) where his face would be be projected onto a waterfall guests pass through. Ultimately this effect would be removed from all but the Florida variation of the attraction where his face would alternate with that of Davy Jones.

At some date unknown in November 2013, Blackbeard (the character portrayed by Ian McShane) was removed from the mist waterfall scene in the attraction with Davy Jones now only appearing in the ride until 2018 when the mist waterfall scene was replaced with the original 1967 narration, making him only appear in the ride found in Magic Kingdom.

In 2017, the mist waterfall scene showing either images of Blackbeard or Davy Jones during the scene when the boats are going up a large hill leading to the fort in the Disneyland Paris attraction was added on July 24, 2017 as part of the attraction's reopening when Disney announced that the Paris version would have characters from the film in June 2017.

## Trivia

* Blackbeard is inspired of the famous English pirate Template:WikipediaLink.
	+ Jack Sparrow's comment about his being dead and Blackbeard's reply in their first meeting was a reference to how Blackbeard had died in real life: he had been sliced 20 times by Lt. Robert Maynard, shot five or six times, decapitated, and had his decapitated body sink to the ocean floor while his head was suspended from the bowsprit of Lt. Maynard's sloop (so the reward could be collected).
	+ In the film the sequence of Peter Pan, *Return to Never Land*it is mentioned by Mr. Smee, saying that Blackbeard is better than Captain Hook leaving him furious to be your enemy.
* Blackbeard is the first and currently only character to have appeared in *The Pirates* franchise to make an appearance on *Once Upon a Time*.
* Before Ian McShane was cast as Blackbeard in *Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides*, Javier Bardem and Benicio del Toro were considered for the role (Bardem was later cast as Captain Salazar in the following film, *Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales*).
* In *Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides*, Blackbeard's quote "*If I don't kill a man every now and then, they forget who I am*" was inspired quote from the historic Blackbeard which he reportedly said after accidentally shooting his former sailing master Israel Hands in the knee while attempting to murder the man beside him during a game of cards.
* In early script drafts for *Atlantis: The Lost Empire*, Milo Thatch was to have been a descendant of Blackbeard, with his explorers' spirit said to have run in the family.