The HIDDEN Stories of Pirates of the Caribbean

Pirates of the Caribbean and I go way back. Waaay waaaaaay back. And by that I mean 1998. This ride has thrilled and mystified myself and countless others for over 50 years. Funny thing is, there's a lot about the ride that isn't explained. Today, I'm going to try to explain at least SOME of it. At least. We'll see.

Video Credits ▶

[spidermaninky]

Ignoring all of the more recent Jack Sparrow additions, I've always assumed that the curse was specifically that they were frozen in their current activity forever, unable to move. The curse didn't kill them, directly, but being unable to move, they eventually starved to death and turned to skeletons, still bound together by the curse. This would explain why, for example, a pirate appears to have died while holding a bottle upright and drinking from it, and would even explain why the bottle continues to pour rum - it, too, was cursed and is frozen in its current activity (draining) forever. Anyway, that's the best I could come up with from the available pieces of information.

[jrios]

Do I ever get tired of videos from Offhand about anything related to New Orleans Square? Nope! I love these videos, especially when you have Walt Disney talking about the attractions!

[simpcat]

There’s just something so intriguing about the cave scene. I like to think of it as the harsh reality of being a pirate, as most pirates will end up dead with either nothing or a treasure they can’t even use. While the rest of the ride is the “fantasy” that we like to imagine pirates were really like, the cave scene is about people throwing they’re lives away for greed. It’s so spooky and almost saddening, which is why I think it’s the highlight of the ride for me personally.

[jays]

One of the remaining crowning jewels of the Disney Parks. Current Disney could never dream of pulling this off.

[brianfurderer]

The “You do believe in pirates?” question from Walt is in reference to an earlier part of the show when they were talking to Marc Davis about The Haunted Mansion. Julie said the she didn’t believe in ghosts. The question is Walt joking with her a little.

[cypher]

offhand talking about pirates of the caribbean and haunted mansion will never not be the highlight of my day

[amandacopeland]

In the video when Walt asks the woman if she believes in Pirates it is a continuation of another conversation earlier in the video. Before showing her models of Pirates, he had shown her early models of the Haunted Mansion. He had asked her if she believed in ghosts, and she said no. So it was a joke. Sorry to be all, "Well, actually" about this, but I just wanted you know. Plus, the video had a lot of Haunted Mansion content before, which I think you might like.

[elliottpartridge]

The Walt intros are such a time capsule.

[drew_xviii]

I gotta say, the cave scene has always been my favorite part since I was very little and visiting Disneyland through my childhood, the smell of the water, the cool air, the calming almost haunting music, and the slow relaxing journey through a room of skeletons really felt fun for my macabre loving little brain.

Of course, all back when Disneyland wasn’t as expensive, currently 20 years old and that location even recently when I went gave me waves of nostalgia, even if the new Star Wars land is my absolute favorite land, Pirates and Haunted Mansion will always be nostalgic and relaxing rides that captured my imagination

[NinthShinigami]

Dallin as a Disney YouTuber does two things best:

Videos on Haunted Mansion and videos on Pirates

[abbysc]

I worked at Pirates on my DCP in 2019, but watching this I realize that the WDW version is so much more truncated than Disneyland’s. I would love to see the original!

[thewantingmoon]

Sea of Thieves also added a lot of lore to the pirates of the caribbean ride through the pirates life tall tales, where the fort is part of jacks memory in the sea of the damned which is how these dead pirates also come back to life, i would definitely dive into that side too as the story has been said to be canonical by disney itself, and considering a major story chapter is the events of the ride, that really supports it further too

[TheGreatBooster]

The caves are easily my favorite part of the ride. The atmosphere, the visual storytelling, the sheer amount of detail and the music all come together to create this realm of adventure and mystery. It helps give this pirate attraction a bit of a ghost story angle, especially with the travel through time your boat takes not once, but twice.

The caves also serve the purpose of being a narrative linchpin: prior to the movie additions kinda throwing a lot of the narrative cohesion into question (and I could go on about how so many of those changes don't make sense with the beats, but I digress), what you're seeing is the ultimate fate of the pirates we will later see ransacking the town, and what that ill-gotten loot did to them. I still remember a time when they had pirates in the arsenal scene trying to haul a bag of treasure up the lift hill, and then seeing skeletons along the sides of the lift while "Dead men tell no tales" echoed around again; it's a reminder, a bookend, a callback to those caves. Made a lot more sense then having Jack get the treasure first...

[FindingTheForce]

You said it best … “it’s mostly just world building with some beads of story.”

[KassMcCormack]

As a redhead who is also descended from Anne Bonny herself, the auction scene will always be my favorite because in the original I got a nice little ego boost and in the new version I get to see a character that drew inspiration from my family's past which is actually really freaking cool!

[madyalvarez]

As a historian, pirates sometimes traveled in fleets. It’s possible Red is the captain of her own ship but not the fleet. :-)

[Tokyozillaaaa]

The scenic caves are always my favorite, they really immerse you before the exciting parts happen. A lot of passion goes into these videos so i'm happy to see another take of POTC/HM by offhand.

[LL-blhd]

My favorite scene is the battle at sea! As a kid it always felt so real to me! It really felt like I was looking up at a dark sky and I could have sworn I saw cannonballs whizzing past our boat!

[Tryingtohaveityall]

The best rides ever - you nailed it - Pirates and Mansion. I still miss the Redhead.

[JowlOfFruit]

I envy Shanghai for their pirates ride but I hope Disneyland’s stays the same!! I don’t want it to change as this ride is so good, alongside Haunted Mansion!! They’re so incredibly built, and iconic!!