Yes, like it or not, audiences can expect a new film in the “Pirates of the Caribbean” series. You can’t be surprised at the news, considering the franchise has earned more than $4.5 billion worldwide, over its five films. Even if the last one was a critical and commercial disappointment, Disney is just too business-savvy to leave money on the table. Therefore, it makes total sense why’d they want to reboot the series with “Deadpool” writers Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick. And it also makes sense, thanks to a new Forbes report, why they want to do it without Johnny Depp.
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You see, the latest ‘Pirates’ film, ‘Dead Men Tell No Tales’ wasn’t a complete financial disaster. At the end of the day, the fifth film in the franchise earned almost $800 million worldwide. However, when you take into consideration the reported budget of over $230 million, combined with the advertising costs, and you can see why Disney wasn’t pleased with a film that should have earned more than $1 billion. So, without even writing the script, the Mouse House decided that they will move forward without Depp at the lead, not just because of creative reasons, but mainly because of financial reasons.
According to Forbes, Depp’s cost-per-film for the ‘Pirates’ franchise is reported to be north of $90 million. You read that right, ninety-million-dollars. At that price tag, it would be financial suicide for Disney to hire Depp for a new installment in the series.
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Think about what $90 million can get you. For only $10 million more, you can fund the entire production budget of “Venom,” which outgrossed the ‘Dead Men.’ If you add only $20 million, you can make another “Deadpool 2,” which earned over $740 million last year. For 1 Johnny Depp, Universal could have made 9 “Halloween” reboots, Warner Bros. could make almost 3 “A Star is Born” remakes, and Fox could have produced “Bohemian Rhapsody” twice.
Does the lack of Depp mean ‘Pirates’ is doomed? Of course not, if anything, it’s a strong case for making the reboot. However, that doesn’t mean that Rhett and Wernick are guaranteed to knock it out of the park, either. But just to be safe, we totally understand why Disney isn’t willing to fork over that $90 million for Johnny Depp.