‘Pirates of the Caribbean’ rebooted because of worldwide box office

Disney

• The “Pirates of the Caribbean” franchise is reportedly being
  rebooted, according to Deadline.
• While the films after the original have received terrible
  reviews and box office has decreased domestically, the worldwide
  box office has made them hits — meaning it was inevitable that we
  would get more.
• Last year’s fifth movie, “Dead Men Tell No Tales,” made close
  to $800 million worldwide, and before that, “On Stranger Tides”
  grossed over $1 billion.

 

If you thought you had seen the last of the “Pirates of the
Caribbean” films, think again. 

Deadline reported on Tuesday
that Disney is eyeing a reboot of the franchise with “Deadpool”
writers Rhett Reese & Paul
Wernick. Critic reviews have been rotten since the first film,
2003’s “The Curse of the Black Pearl,” and domestic box office
has been lacking for recent films in the series. But the
franchise is still a huge hit worldwide, meaning it was
inevitable that we would get more “Pirates” films.

Read more: How The Rock’s popularity in China
led ‘Skyscraper’ to rebound at the box office

The franchise’s five films have made a combined $4.5 billion,
and a most of that has come from international box office. The
second movie, “Dead Man’s Chest,” made over $1 billion globally
in 2006, as did the fourth film, 2011’s “On Stranger Tides,”
despite a 32% critic score on review-aggregator site Rotten
Tomatoes.

Even last year’s fifth film, “Dead Men Tell No Tales,” still made
nearly $800 million worldwide.

Interest among moviegoers has decreased in North America since
“Dead Man’s Chest.” After that, each film’s domestic box office
has been lower than the last, with “Dead Men Tell No Tales” only
making $170 million in the US when adjusted for inflation. 

Read more: How ‘The Nun’ overcame bad reviews
to be a box-office hit

But the strong global box office has ensured the franchise’s
longevity, as international audiences have become key to the
success of some films that otherwise wouldn’t be hits. The
biggest example besides “Pirates of the Caribbean” is the
“Transformers” series.

Last year’s “Transformers: The Last Knight,” which was also the
fifth film in the series, only made $133 million in the US, but
$605 million worldwide. The fourth film, “Age of Extinction,”
made just $277 million in the US in 2014, but over $1 billion
worldwide. A “Transformers” spin-off, “Bumblebee,” comes to
theaters this year.

To show just how important global box office has been for the
“Pirates of the Caribbean” films, Business Insider made a graph
that includes each films’ domestic and global total.

See the graph below:

Olivia Reaney/Business Insider