Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides

This entry in the Pirates series is only very mildly diverting... weak and undeveloped one-note characters, unfunny jokes, pointless action and a plot that's both convoluted and boring. As well, I'm getting tired of Johnny Depp's CAPTAIN Jack Sparrow shtick... he's really just going through the motions by now. Add to this the bloodless swordfights, the very un-sexy naked mermaids and Penelope Cruz (I would have thought this was an impossible trick, but somehow the director manages it...) and you are left with an uninteresting two-hour-plus slog. I saw this one in 3-D as well... The 3-D effects have very little purpose in the movie, for all they are pretty well done (see How To Train Your Dragon for really worthwhile 3-D) The most important thing the 3-D does in this movie is to make it DARK. Much of the movie is set at night, and the polarized glasses make it almost too dark to see. However even the daylight shots... even the ones in tropical sunshine, look gloomy and muted. For much of the movie I took off the glasses and simply endured the blurriness, rather than strain my eyes in the poor light. I strongly recommend avoiding 3-D showings until movie makers and theatres can do 3-D right.