In 2003, Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl was released and became a huge hit. I loved the movie and am eagerly looking forward to seeing the third movie, Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End. I discovered the book, Pirates of the Caribbean: From the Magic Kingdom to the Movies by Jason Surrell and didn't hesitate to pick it up.

The book is an oversize paperback that is about the same size as a magazine. The book was divided into three fairly long chapters and each chapter contained several sections. Before the first chapter, there were two forewords written by two men who are executives with Walt Disney Imagineering and an introduction that provided some general information on the history of the ride. Each chapter began with a two page illustration of concept artwork that was created during the planning of the ride.

The first chapter, Course Heading - Disneyland and the Magic Kingdoms covered how the ride was first developed. The entire creative process was covered with all kinds of details, some more important than others, being included. I’d had no idea before reading this book that it had taken years for the ride to go from the planning stage to actually opening. The chapter covered the extensive planning for the ride and how the concept for it changed before it was finished. Walt Disney had been very involved in the planning and made many decisions on how things would be done or look. Unfortunately he died before the ride was opened to the public. The first chapter also covered the development of the story that the ride would tell and the designing of the characters. This chapter ended by talking about how the ride was included in the other Disney parks around the world. I really enjoyed reading about how the ride was created and thought all that information was very interesting.

Course Heading - The Spanish Main served as a walk through for the ride. It described with a lot of detail what people on the ride would see and experience throughout the course of the ride. It was divided into nineteen sections that corresponded to different parts of the ride. The original ride at Disneyland was described in each section first. If there were differences in that part of the ride at the other parks, they were described. The information was identified by a subtitle naming which park was being discussed within each section. Some of the sections were longer than others and it seemed like some parts of the ride were the same in all of the parks. Throughout the chapter were short paragraphs called Hidden Treasure that pointed out little tidbits about certain things. All of those parts stood out because they were in red text. I really enjoyed the detailed description of the ride since I’ve never been on it.

The last chapter, Course Heading - The Movies, covered how the ride was turned into the extremely successful movie. It was ultimately a long process to get the movie made. Some of the early story ideas were briefly mentioned. Once Jerry Bruckheimer was connected as the producer and Gore Verbinski was hired to direct, the movie started to fall into place. There wasn’t an actual plot summary for Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl, but some of the plot was briefly mentioned. There really weren’t any major spoilers for people who haven’t seen the movie yet. The development of the final script was discussed as well as the casting choices for the main characters. The chapter also covered the filming of the movie and how all the special effects were used to create the look of the cursed crew. The last few pages of the book did talk about how the success of the movie lead to Disney deciding to make two more movies. The second movie was briefly mentioned without any part of the plot being shared. It was also mentioned that some of the characters from the movie were being added to the ride in Disneyland.

I think my favorite part of the book were the pages in the last chapter devoted to how Johnny Depp ended up playing Captain Jack Sparrow. Bruckheimer felt that Depp was perfect for the part right from the start and Verbinski agreed once he was involved. Depp took some convincing and then singed on after Verbinski said Depp could make the character as offbeat as he wanted. The studio was happy about Depp being cast, but they were wanting him to play a more suave and debonair character like he had in Chocolat or Don Juan DeMarco. Executives were stunned when they saw Depp in a make-up test with the beard, hair, and almost every tooth capped in gold. Depp agreed to lose some of the gold caps, but kept the rest of the look. The executives were in for another shock once filming actually started and they saw Depp’s take on the character. One of them did talk to Depp to try to get him to change, saying the movie needed a more traditional hero. Depp wouldn’t change and the executives eventually came around. It was very interesting to read about how Depp came up with his portrayal of Jack.

Surrell presented the information in Pirates of the Caribbean: From the Magic Kingdom to the Movies in a way that wasn’t dull or boring even though there were a lot of facts. The information was arranged chronologically and followed the development process step by step. I thought that all of the information shared was very interesting and I enjoyed learning more about the ride and movie. The book was very well written and kept my interest throughout. Quotes from interviews with the people involved in the creation of the rides and the first movie were included in each section. There were even quotes from Depp that covered some of his thoughts on Jack. The placement of the quotes fit in with the information that was being shared at the time.

Pictures or illustrations of some kind were used extensively throughout the book. At first, there were really just concept sketches of early ideas for the ride. The final versions of certain things ended up being very close to the early sketches while other things were extremely different. As the book progressed, actual pictures of people working on various elements of the ride as well as pictures of some of the actual elements themselves were shared. Several of the pictures included Walt Disney when he was meeting with the creators or the ride. The second chapter included numerous pictures from the actual ride in each of the Disney parks. I really liked being able to see those pictures. The third chapter featured pictures from the first movie. Some looked like they were still pulled straight from the movie. Others looked like they had been taken during the filming. Illustrations for the early concepts on the look of the cursed pirates as well as early costume ideas for the characters were also shared. The look of the costumes didn’t change that much for several characters. Captain Jack’s look in the movie was completely different from the concept sketch, which had him dressed in a more elaborate and polished looking outfit. I can’t imagine Jack looking like that. On the last page of the book, there was one picture from the second movie and a concept sketch of Davey Jones. Those were the only images connected to the second movie in the book.

I really enjoyed reading Pirates of the Caribbean: From the Magic Kingdom to the Movies. The book was packed full of interesting information about the ride and first movie. This is a wonderful book for fans of Pirates of the Caribbean. I originally picked up this book last year. I just saw online that there is an updated version of the book available now. I’m guessing that book would have more information about the second movie and perhaps more about the changes that were made to the ride to incorporate characters from the movie.

Pirates of the Caribbean Reviews
Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl ~ Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest ~ Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End ~ Disney Pirates of the Caribbean: The Visual Guide ~ Bring Me That Horizon: The Making of Pirates of the Caribbean ~

Recommended: Yes