Thread:Uskok/@comment-27295021-20180325125431/@comment-996391-20180402120704

Ninclow wrote: Sorry if you find me to have stepped over some kind of line, chief. I guess I just got caught up in the thrill of an interesting discussion here for a moment. ^^'

No worries, everything's fine. I was absent for a few days and I completely forgot about our discussion. The company I'm working for sent me to a new workplace in another city and I didn't have access to the internet.

Ninclow wrote: An understandable sentiment, my friend, but to be honest, I'm am fairly certain this is were creative freedom comes into play. While Jim's father indeed died in his home in the book, in most of the film adaptions, including some of those from Disney, Jim's father is not mentioned at all, and it is easy to imagine some people being hired to write the POTC movie(s) who only ever watched the movie and mistakingly believe the "mystery" of Jim's father to be supposed to be sort of ambigious and deciding to get creative. In the latest Disney-made adaption of the story I can think of, Treasure Planet, Jim's father just left and never came back. What if the creators of the second instalement of the POTC franchise watched that and thoguht it was faithful to the book when you remove all the alien and futuristic elements of the animated movie. And ultimately, it matters little, i at all:

Just because it contradicts the canon of the original story, doesn't mean POTC can't have its own, seperate canon in which Mercer killed Jim's father, but the rest of the events of the book is more or less completely consistent with the original story. POTC is its own universe, after all, and Disney have been involved in the adaptation of Treasure Island before. It is not unthinkable for the creators to decide the two co-existed as part of the POTC canon. On Stranger Tides, Edward Teach is killed by Blackbeard, but that contradicts "real life canon", so does that mean Edward Teach in the story aren't the 'historical' Blackbeard, but a random pirate with a different? Of course it isn't. Blackbeard is Blackbeard, this is just an intepretation of him unique to the POTC canon, and the same goes for Captain Hawkins.

But that's the thing. All those adaptations are exactly that - the official adaptations of Treasure Island. The book was never adapted for Pirates of the Caribbean, and as far as I know, Disney has no plans to adapt it any time soon, if ever. Hawkins is the only link between Pirates of the Caribbean and Treasure Island, and that link is too weak to prove that the world of Pirates of the Caribbean and the world of Treasure Island are one and the same.

Ninclow wrote: How can you possibly take a word/name out of context and just decide what the creators (which, at least in the case of Rowling and Harry Potter is basically the Word of God) and just "decide" that what they claim to be part of their own universe isn't canon? It isn't a "supposed" backstory, it is an udentified man. A "oh, and that guy we didn't name in that scene was the father of Jim Hawkins, by the way" scenario. Also, why would he be mentioned in any official tie-in material? He was a side character who was isignificant to the tale the movie was spinning, so his appearance was just in passing, but that don't mean it didn't happen.

We take the Word of God with extreme caution on this Wiki. Why? Because the past experiences have forced us to be very cautious with non-printed sources. The explanations given by the creators can often contradict the official material, and one creator can even give the info that contradicts what the other creator said. The lack of coordination among the film crew is nothing new in this franchise. For example, the Pirates fans have argued about Will Turner's fate in At World's End for years. You know why? Because every official POTC material said that the captain of the Flying Dutchman must sail the seas for eternity. However, when Terry Rossio used the original Flying Dutchman opera as a proof that Will, in his opinion, was free after ten years of service, he made us all scratch our heads in confusion. On one hand we had the official materials which said one thing, and on the other we had one of the writers who was using an out-of-universe source to say another thing. Fortunately, Dead Men Tell No Tales cleared the confusion once and for all. And you know which explanation prevailed? The printed one.

I don't know why was Captain Hawkins officially named in the novelization. As you say, he was an insignificant side character, but the fact is that he was mentioned, and we can't ignore that. But the supposed backstory belongs to the Behind the scenes section, for the time being.

Ninclow wrote: Was Teague on the Wicked Wench? That slipped me by, where was he at, didn't see him. Also, the Price of Freedom is approved as official part of the lore. Which means that prior to shooting Dead Men Tell No Tales, someone should have paid attention to their own canon beforehand. Had Jack been on any other ship, it would have fit nicely into the "helping pirates out of obligation" part of Jack's early life. And - yeah, pretty sure Jack would know the name of the ship he was serving on. It stood in big, big letters. Also, not knowig the name of the ship is kind of like you and I not knowing the name of our work places.

Yes, Teague was on the Wicked Wench. Look here. And yes, someone should have paid attention to their own canon beforehand. But they didn't. Disney doesn't have any continuity coordinator for Pirates of the Caribbean. The Pirates franchise desperately needs its own Leland Chee, someone who would constantly look over the writers' shoulder and tell him what fits the canon and what doesn't. Unfortunately, it doesn't have him. That's why some materials suffer from plot holes and continuity contradictions.

Yes, it would seem weird that Jack doesn't know the name of the ship he's serving on. But that also belongs to one of the many continuity problems. Teague met Barbossa in The Price of Freedom but he didn't recognize him a few years later in Legends of the Brethren Court: Wild Waters. Jack and Davy Jones met in the Jack Sparrow book series, but in The Price of Freedom they both act like they've never seen each other before. The Trident of Poseidon ended up in the hands of the merfolk in Jack Sparrow: Bold New Horizons but it was hidden in Poseidon's Tomb in Dead Men Tell No Tales. As you can see, in a franchise this big, continuity issues are inevitable.

Ninclow wrote: Teague hired him?

Sorry, I meant if Jack was seemingly in command of the Wicked Wench in Dead Men Tell No Tales, how did he become an ordinary deckhand under Teague's command on the Troudbadour? That's another problem that can be explained only through our theories, and will probably never be officially explained.