Craig Mazin Hints New ‘Pirates of the Caribbean’ Movie Is “Too Weird”, Confirms He Pitched It With Ted Elliot
In a new profile story on him by the Los Angeles Times, Craig Mazin confirmed that he’s circling a new installment of Pirates of the Caribbean movie with the writer of the original trilogy, Ted Elliot. Variety had first reported the news in October 2019, but nothing had come of the project since then. Now, we may know a little bit more.
Right next to the line revealing the information inside the story, Mazin is quoted saying the following about an unnamed project: “We pitched it and thought there’s no way they’re buying it, it’s too weird. And they did! And then he wrote a fantastic script and the strike happened and everyone’s waiting around.” It’s unknown for now if he’s referring to Pirates of the Caribbean or some other title, but the writing seems to be on the wall.
We know Disney is pursuing a reboot of the franchise and moving past Johnny Depp, but after several attempts, they still haven’t quite figured out what to do. The LA Times story never explicitly says Mazin co-wrote the script, just that he’s “circling” the project — meaning he was probably involved at the pitching level and will probably punch up the script once it’s done. Among other reasons, he doesn’t have a lot of time, as he’s currently adapting The Last of Us Part II into at least two seasons of television for HBO. The script for the season 2 premiere was submitted to the network just before the strike hit, and the whole second season has been mapped out.
And of course, the “too weird” part is reminiscent of the original Pirates of the Caribbean sequels, which went to really weird places after the success of the first one. Elliott co-wrote them with Terry Rossio. Since then, two more sequels were made, with Dead Men Tell No Tales teasing the return of Davey Jones, Keira Knightley’s Elizabeth Swan, and Orlando Bloom’s Will Turner. But plans for that sixth film were scrapped, with Disney going over several different iterations of their next installment. According to reports, Deadpool writers Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick were attached for some time to do a new film, but left the project in early 2019. Mazin and Elliot then pitched a story, and it looks like the latter has been hard at work putting it on print since then. And somewhere else in the universe, the studio also considered a new installment led by Margot Robbie and written by Christina Hodson, which the actress revealed to Vanity Fair late last year was dead in the water.
Regardless of that, it’s clear that Mazin’s priorities are with The Last of Us, which has an even bigger challenge ahead: adapting the second game, which not only is twice the size of the first, but it’s also much more intricate and the story is much more polarizing. Craig Mazin also teased recently that, pre-strike, they were either really close to or had already cast the role of Abby, who has a significant part to play in the second game, and as such, the second and third seasons.
Miguel Fernández is a Spanish student that has movies as his second passion in life. His favorite movie of all time is The Lord of the Rings, but he is also a huge Star Wars fan. However, fantasy movies are not his only cup of tea, as authors like Scorsese, Fincher, Kubrick or Hitchcock have been an obsession for him since he started to understand the language of filmmaking. He is that guy who will watch a black and white movie, just because it is in black and white.
