It's ten o'clock at night, and a cool sea breeze slips into the room, making the curtains dance lightly in the air.
Luke is flipping through the script and tomorrow's shooting schedule. When it comes to work, he's always meticulous, striving for perfection.
He wrote the outline for the script himself and has gone over the shooting plan countless times. By now, the details are practically burned into his brain.
In simple terms, the plot of Pirates of the Caribbean 2 goes something like this:
The story picks up where the first movie left off. Luke's character, Turner, and Annie's character, Elizabeth, let Captain Jack Sparrow escape.
Commodore Norrington turns a blind eye to it all.
Turner and Elizabeth are about to tie the knot when the arrival of Lord Beckett, a bigwig from the East India Company, throws everything into chaos.
Lord Beckett wastes no time arresting Turner and Elizabeth, charging them with letting an imperial fugitive, Captain Jack, slip away.
The penalty for this crime? Death.
So, Turner and Elizabeth end up tossed into a jail cell.
But here's the thing—Lord Beckett doesn't actually want them dead. He's just using the threat to force Turner into a deal: track down something for him.
That something? Jack Sparrow's compass.
This isn't just any compass—it's got a magical knack for pointing to whatever your heart desires most.
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Turner has no choice but to strike a deal with Beckett and set off to find Jack Sparrow.
Why does Beckett want the compass? To locate a heart locked inside the "Dead Man's Chest."
That heart belongs to Davy Jones, the most powerful ghost captain on the high seas. Whoever controls that heart controls Davy Jones—and, by extension, the entire ocean.
The whole plot of Pirates of the Caribbean 2 revolves around Turner, Jack Sparrow, and their crew hunting for and fighting over this heart while facing Davy Jones's interference.
The visual effects in this movie are a huge step up from the first Pirates of the Caribbean.
In the first film, the effects were mostly limited to showing the cursed, undead crew of the Black Pearl.
But in the sequel, Disney goes all out with fantasy effects to blow the audience's minds.
First up is the main villain, Davy Jones.
Legend has it there's a ghost ship called the Flying Dutchman that ferries the souls of those lost at sea to the underworld—a Western version of a grim reaper for sailors. Davy Jones is its captain.
Since the legend says anyone who sees Davy Jones dies, there's no record of what he looks like, which gave Disney's art team quite the headache.
In the end, they drew inspiration from Cthulhu, designing Davy Jones with an octopus motif. In the movie, his face is covered in writhing tentacles, one hand is a crab claw, and the other is a mass of tendrils. In 2003, that kind of visual was jaw-dropping for audiences worldwide.
On top of that, the movie features a massive octopus-like creature—the Kraken—and Davy Jones's cursed crew, mutated into a grotesque army of "shrimp soldiers and crab generals."
Visually, Pirates of the Caribbean 2 is a groundbreaking spectacle for its time.
But for Luke, it's a bit of a headache.
In the first movie, he was swinging a sword against human foes. Even the cursed Black Pearl crew were just immortal humans, not superhuman in strength.
Now, in the second film, he's up against a seafood army, a Cthulhu-inspired Davy Jones, and a Kraken that can tear a warship to pieces.
This makes Turner's combat skills a tricky thing to pin down.
How do you handle that?
Boost Turner's fighting ability to take on these fantastical creatures?
Even if the hero can hold his own against ghost sailors, he's not about to hack at a Kraken with a sword, right?
The main character doesn't have supernatural powers, nor should he.
So, while the fight scenes aren't dangerous, they're going to demand a lot more from Luke in terms of choreography.
He needs to design convincing fight moves to sell the audience on Turner's invincible persona: even against monstrous enemies, Turner remains strong and dependable.
"Ah!"
"Oh!"
Suddenly, strange noises drift in from outside the window.
Luke quickly figures it out: the "rent-a-wife" agencies here in Thailand are fast. The film crew placed their orders this morning, and by evening, the women were already at the hotel.
Bob, that guy, is staying in the room next door, and those sounds are coming from him and his company!
It's not that the hotel's soundproofing is bad—Luke and Bob both left their windows open, so the noise is carrying through.
Luke doesn't have much to say about Bob's "fall from grace" lately.
Who's he to judge? Everyone's got their own way of coping with pain.
Bob's been a huge help to him these past couple of years, so Luke just tries to support him as best he can.
But still!
Leaving the window open while you're at it? Come on, man, that's too much!
"Ah!"
"Oh!"
Suddenly, similar sounds come from downstairs—where Depp's staying.
Damn it, those two are getting way too chummy, even picking up the same habits.
With a sigh, Luke walks to the window and says goodbye to the refreshing Phi Phi Island breeze.
After shutting the window, he sits back on his bed and starts fiddling with his gun.
He carefully polishes the gun's body, handling it with the care you'd give a lover's skin.
His movements are deliberate—up and down, sometimes gentle, sometimes firm, sometimes fast, sometimes slow, like he's had years of practice.
What're you thinking? It's a real long gun!
In front of Luke lies a disassembled spear, piece by piece.
The spearhead is forged from fine steel, the shaft partly made of high-quality ash wood and partly from carbon fiber.
This is a custom weapon he had made for Pirates of the Caribbean 2.
A sword, after all, feels a bit too delicate.
Using a sword against the fantastical enemies in this sequel would lack visual punch and risk boring the audience with more of the same.
So, in Pirates of the Caribbean 2, Luke's main weapon will be a spear!
The spear, the king of weapons, carries an undeniable swagger and presence that outshines a sword.
Luke's confident that with his masterful spear skills, he'll deliver a fresh, jaw-dropping experience for the audience.
He's sure this will hold its own against Disney's big-budget effects.
Knock, knock, knock!
A sudden knock at the door interrupts his thoughts.