Strange Tides?

I liked the Pirates of the Caribbean movies. Not everyone did. There's a school of thought -- and one I can sympathize with -- that they got big and bloated by the end of the third one. Okay. Still, I liked them.

They became a defense of escape, whimsy, and fantasy. One of the reasons I go to movies is to see new and marvelous things. And the POTC films never failed to deliver that. Yes, story is what makes or breaks good movies, but I'm often satisfied with imaginative spectacle. There's nothing wrong with that.

There are several rumors floating around about a fourth installment in the POTC series. Tentatively sub-titled On Stranger Tides, Depp will return as the rascal Captain Jack Sparrow and Geoffrey Rush will return as his nemesis Barbarossa. Ian MacShane will appear as the famous Blackbeard -- though it remains to be seen how close this pirate is to the historical figure.

Also in the rumored cast is Penelope Cruz. Oh, and they've hired Astrid Berges-Frisby to play a mermaid named Syrena. There's additional scuttlebutt that Keith Richards will return in a somewhat greater capacity as Sparrow's father -- and that he's trying to cajole Mick Jagger into also appearing in a cameo. I'm no Stones fan, but this amuses me.