We recently watched all five Pirates Of The Caribbean and all five Transformers films in order. Both series were massive hits, spanned around the same time period (2003 – 2017) and made about the same total amount at the box office (about 5 billion). Let’s compare the series film-by-film!
The Curse of the Black Pearl vs Transformers
The first Pirates film holds up quite well, although seems weirdly subdued by today’s action-film standards. Johnny Depp is likeable enough as Captain Jack Sparrow, but only at a distance, and I wonder if the series would have served better riffing on the setting rather than the character. The other actors do a good job, and the film does a great job resurrecting the swashbuckling genre for a modern age. The special effects are ancient today, but still look good. Lots of fun even twenty years later.
Transformers is bombastic and frenetic but was such a massive hit that it led directly to the action-over-plot films of today. The robots looks great, even if the transformation sequences are needlessly complicated, but the human actors are superfluous and even at times repulsive (I’m looking at you Shia). The film is also obsessed with shots of the US military, to the point it becomes disturbingly like a recruitment film. A fun watch, but mostly forgettable.
Comparing the two, I’d say that Curse of The Black Pearl is easily the more entertaining.
Dead Mans Chest vs Revenge Of The Fallen
Pirates 2 is where the franchise really took sail. The filmmakers cleverly improved on every aspect of the original and raised the stakes in every way. The character of squidlike Davy Jones is one of the strongest the series ever had, and the decision to make this well-plotted story a two-parter, was a good one. Visually it’s extraordinary, and it still remains the best Pirates film.
By comparison, Transformers 2 is a mess. The characters (and human story) take even more of a backseat to mad robot action to the extent that the scenes with Shia Lebouf or (even worse) Megan Fox are so ridiculous you can almost hear the scriptwriters desperately trying to make their lines relevant. Of course the robots are still great – special mention to Devestator eating a pyramid – but it’s a mostly disposable film that failed to improve on the first.
Compared, Dead Mans Chest is easily the better of the two.
At Worlds End vs Dark Of The Moon
Pirates 3 wrapped up the story of 2, but cleverly introduced a few new twists and characters. The always watchable Geoffrey Rush returns as Barbossa, and a lot of screen time is given to the delightful Naomi Harris as Tia/Calypso. While not as sublime as the previous film, this is still a masterclass in Hollywood action movies and would have been a fitting end to the entire series.
Transformers 3 is where the series descends into madness. Leonard Nimoy plays Sentinel Prime, a villian that quotes Star Trek (I kid you not) as he tries to turn Earth into Cybertron. Shia Lebouf is back as Sam Witwicky, and he’s managed to get himself an even more irritating (and beautiful) girlfriend. It’s all lunacy, but the action scenes are so over the top (a gigantic transforming robot worm tunnels through buildings) it’s strangely watchable. This is where you start accepting that the scripts are trash and turn your mind off and enjoy the pretty images. It’s objectively a terrible film, but I enjoyed it nonetheless.
Once again, comparing the two I’d hand it to At World End.
On Stranger Tides vs Age Of Extinction
Pirates 4 is a misstep for the franchise. This is ‘the mermaid one’ and features the pirate Blackbeard as he (and a mostly new band of heroes) search for the fountain of youth. By this film Captain Jack has become a weird gibbering fool, and contributes so little to the plot I question his inclusion. Blackbeard steals every scene he’s in, so it’s puzzling how underutilized he (and his magical boat) is. This is a Pirates film that occurs almost entirely on land, and raises some difficult questions about the ‘Pirates universe’ that we still don’t have answers for. Still fun, but not as much as previous films.
Transformers 4 is so crazy it’s hard to believe it was made. It’s a bit of a series reboot, and the hero is now Marky Mark. The opening sequence where he finds a dormant Optimus Prime is subdued and works quite well but just when you think the filmmakers have decided to dial back a bit it goes off the rails with a nanomachine-based resurrected Megatron and then further off the rails with dinosaur transformers that could be millions of years old?!? There’s gaping plot holes aplenty, and lots of characters that don’t have any valid role in the film, but those shots of Optimus riding a T-Rex into battle whilst wielding a massive broadsword are cinematic gold. The best Transformers film yet.
For the first time I’d say that Age Of Extinction beats On Stranger Tides for entertainment value.
Dead Men Tell No Tales vs The Last Knight
Pirates 5 tells a tale of an undead pirate on a quest to defeat (guess who?) Captain Jack Sparrow. Of course our heroes devise a plan to prevent this, and it requires them to retrieve Poseidon’s trident?!? Yes apparently the god Poseidon exists in the Pirates universe (and he’s not even the first god in this film series), and you can imagine how bonkers this plot is to fit that in. The special effects are breathtaking and the visuals at times gorgeous, but this film is overly loaded with CGI and in some way feels fundamentally different from the previous ones. Props to the cute new girl, who we learn is Barbossa’s (yes he’s back) daughter, and the way this film ties up a few loose ends from previous films. But once again Depp is a weak link and overall the film fails to recapture past glories.
Transformers 5 is famously insane: this is the one where the filmmakers apparently thought gigantic intelligent transforming robots was too bland so they had to work in the entire Arthurian myth as well. It also weirdly retcons previous films (transformers fought in the World Wars?), has way too many characters, plot holes aplenty and by its end all but destroys the world. There are glimpses of greatness in this film, like the scene where Megatron negotiates the release of his goons, or (as always for this series) whenever Optimus is swinging a sword, but the action scenes overall are just stupidly over the top and the grim ending (and post credits sequel opening) leave a bad taste.
Two weak films then, each arguably the worst of their series. Comparing both, I’d give the slight edge to Dead Men Tell No Tales.
Overall then, by my reckoning in a battle of Pirates vs Robots it seems the Pirates win, and easily, with 4 victories to only 1.
And yet… there is a sixth Transformers film, and to the surprise of everyone it was genuinely great. Yes I speak of Bumblebee, the charming reboot with a story about Bumblebee arriving on Earth. Maybe I was just dazzled by Hailee Steinfeld, but I loved this film and would rate it above every Pirates film!
And there’s also apparently two more Pirates films in some level of development, and a seventh Transformers film (Rise Of The Beasts) has been filmed and is due for release next year. Maybe one day I’ll have to follow up this post with further critique 🙂
