Can I say it? Can I? Jack's back, baby!

After the huge success of The Curse of the Black Pearl, the powers that be decided to turn a one-off film into a franchise and make two more films back to back. It's always difficult to make a sequel to a popular original, because people have different expectations. Do more of the same and people complain about it. Try to move things on and people complain about it. While Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest does at times feel slightly like it's lacking the fun and charm of the original, it still boasts plenty of action, a sharp script and some amazing special effects - and now you can relive the adventure with Disney's new Blu-Ray release.

Picking up sometime after the events of the original film, the story begins on the wedding day of Will Turner (Orlando "Legolas" Bloom) and Elizabeth Swann (Keira Knightley). However, movie weddings never seem to go very smoothly, and this one is no different - a new baddy turns up in the form of the smug and self-satisfied Beckett (Tom Hollander) who has a warrant for the arrest of Will, Elizabeth and former commodore James Norrington (Jack Davenport) for aiding and abetting the escape of known criminal (you guessed it) Jack Sparrow (Johnny Depp). I know, I know, that's Captain Jack Sparrow!

Elizabeth is thrown in jail, while Will is sent on a mission to find Jack - for some reason, Beckett wants Jack's compass (you know, the one he always keeps on him that doesn't actually point North) in exchange for a full pardon. Will sets off to find Jack, who has been sailing the high seas but, due to constant pursuit from the navy, hasn't managed to partake in much piracy - and his crew are getting restless. Things go from bad to worse when Will's father, the former pirate Bootstrap Bill, turns up looking distinctly the worst for wear, pasty and clammy (quite literally, with mussels and barnacles all over his face). It turns out that Jack made a deal with Davy Jones himself, selling his soul for Jones to raise the Black Pearl (Sparrow's ship) from the depths and make him captain of it for thirteen years. Well, time is up and Jones is ready to collect on his debt - Bootstrap, who agreed to serve Jones for one hundred years in exchange for the torment of being trapped at the bottom of the ocean and unable to die, puts the black mark on Jack, meaning that Jones' giant octopus monster, the legendary kraken, will seek him wherever he sails.

After a close call with some cannibalistic natives, Jack visits the voodoo priestess Tia Dalma for help. It seems that Davy Jones ripped out his own beating heart and sealed it in a chest that's buried somewhere in the Caribbean. Jack needs to find both the key and the chest if he is to get his hands on Jones' heart and finally have the leverage to escape his fate.

The above summary is actually a very bare bones outline of what turns out to be quite a complex plot that is at some points a little hard to follow. The idea of Jack having to worm his way out of his debt to Davy Jones is a great concept, and Jones himself makes for a charismatic new otherworldly enemy, but the film does at times feel bogged down by the story and loses pace at certain points as a result. However, it does succeed in upping the stakes - last time Jack had a score to settle, but this time his eternal soul is on the line, and due to their past actions, Will and Elizabeth are tied to his fate too. Another problem is that because things are darker and direr this time around, the film doesn't feel quite as charming and fun as the first one, but more dramatic and foreboding. Nevertheless, I quite liked this new direction and that's not to say there aren't some very funny and highly entertaining scenes.

One of the highlights is the entire sequence on the cannibal island - Will and the crew are suspended from a bridge, trapped in two spherical cages made of human bones. They attempt to swing themselves back and forth, climbing up a cliff face before rolling down the hills in a chase sequence that's both tense and funny. Meanwhile, Jack is doing his best to wriggle out of being sacrificed and ends up on the run tied to a pole, which you just know at some point he's going to use to vault over a cliff - he does, and the end result is highly amusing. There aren't as many sword battles in Dead Man's Chest as there were in The Curse of the Black Pearl, but one of the most standout scenes takes place near the end of the film, where Norrington, Will and Jack end up in a three way sword battle, each of them after the key to Jones' chest for their own purposes. This fight goes on for ages, starting in the jungle, moving onto some ruins and then carrying on atop of a giant mill wheel that breaks from its foundations and rolls through the jungle, the three protagonists still battling as it rolls! Jones' fearsome undead crew meanwhile are fended off by Elizabeth (who inevitably escapes from jail and joins up with Jack and the others) and the returning pirate comedy duo Pintel and Ragetti, and they only have one sword between the three of them!

The special effects are state of the art in this film - they're several notches above the skeletal pirates of the original, most particularly in the look of Davy Jones' crew and his barnacle-encrusted ship, the Flying Dutchman. Bill Nighy can just about be recognised under the make-up/CGI effects of Davy Jones, whose face is like that of an octopus, ridden with slimy tentacles. Jones looks truly fantastic and it's impossible to tell where the make-up ends and the CGI begins, while his crew carry on the sea-life theme, his hammerhead shark first mate looking just as impressive. The effects for the kraken are also amazing, and the scenes where it rises from the depth to destroy helpless ships are breathtaking - indeed, when the ship that picks up Will is decimated, it really is a very gripping, action-packed scene where you feel for the innocent crew, who are powerless to stop the kraken's gigantic tentacles and fall one by one as the ship is literally ripped to pieces.

One of the best things about the film is that almost all of the characters from the original return for the sequel. Governor Swann (Jonathan Pryce) doesn't have many scenes, but he courageously rescues Elizabeth from jail, putting his life on the line to save his beloved daughter. It's also fun to see Norrington reduced to a filthy bum after his failure to recapture Jack, and while it seems like he's given up on life, he has his own motivations for joining Jack's crew. Kevin McNally and David Baillie return as first mate Gibbs and mute Cotton, with his blue and yellow parrot, as does the midget pirate Marty (Martin Klebba), but best of all is the return of Pintel (Lee Arenberg) and Ragetti (Mackenzie "The Office" Crook), who are now free of the curse and back to being regular mortals, but are still just as scummy, self-serving and comical as ever. Even Barbossa's undead monkey (if you watched to the end of the credits in Black Pearl you'll know that he stole another piece of cursed gold from the Aztec chest!) and the jailhouse dog with the keys come back, and the scenes they feature in are a lot of fun.

Despite not featuring quite as prominently as before, Johnny Depp once again steals the show with his sublime portrayal as the scoundrel Captain Jack Sparrow, who as usual plays his cards close to his chest, manipulating all those around him to the point that you're never quite sure what his ultimate game plan is and just who he's willing to really betray to survive. All of his lines are also very witty and intelligently scripted, making for plenty of laughs and some razor-sharp dialogue. As the crew are splintered quite a lot throughout the film, there are a number of scenes that don't feature Jack, and these are never quite as good as those where Jack is the focus, but the rest of the cast do a great job in their roles. Orlando Bloom and Keira Knightley portray their characters as older, wiser and more able to handle themselves in a fight than before - Will takes huge risks to secure the key while he's trapped aboard the Flying Dutchman, and Elizabeth it seems is willing to do whatever it takes to survive - there's a surprising twist at the end that will shock you for sure, yet does seem a bit out of character. Bill Nighy does a wonderful job too and somehow manages to give real personality and menace to Davy Jones, despite being underneath so much make-up and CGI.

Once again, Gore Verbinski never fails to impress - every scene is masterfully directed, an accomplishment that's all the more impressive considering the huge scale and ambitious scope of many of them, as well as the heavy CGI elements, such as the scenes on the Flying Dutchmen and those where the kraken surfaces to claim its victims. The battle and chase sequences are also fast-paced and totally compelling to watch, making for great entertainment. Every angle is carefully chosen and every scene benefits from Verbinski's vision and style.

The high-definition Blu-Ray disc presentation enhances the visuals and sound just as impressively as it does with the first film - more so even, as the special effects are that much more flawless and impressive than in The Curse of the Black Pearl. Veteran composer Hans Zimmer takes over for the orchestrations in Dead Man's Chest and the result is a rousing score that never fails to amplify and enhance the atmosphere, be it comic, touching, or tense, of what is happening on-screen.

With the Blu-Ray disk for the first film giving a lot of coverage on real-life pirates, Dead Man's Chest doesn't repeat this, instead focusing mainly upon the film itself. Disc One is home to the audio commentaries again, as well as a fun interactive game called Liar's Dice (which features in the film) where you go up against Pintel and Marty in a game of bluffing and guessing. It's filmed with the pirates talking at the camera, adding to the fun of playing against them, and it runs together very smoothly for a fun bit of throwaway entertainment. Disc Two meanwhile houses hours of special features, covering such topics as how the story was conceived and put together, the making of the film, a look at Davy Jones, an examination of Jack Sparrow's costume, creating the kraken, footage from the film premiere, location pieces, snippets on the training of Bloom, Knightley and Davenport for sword fights, image galleries, stills, Jerry Bruckheimer's photos from the set, a blooper reel, various theatrical and teaser trailers - and more! Most of this footage makes for interesting viewing and certainly gives you a great insight into just how much effort was put into the film and just what an ambitious project it was.

Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest is a great movie. Sure, its story does meander a little at times, and yes, the darker and more complex plot, as well as the increased jeopardy, does make it a little less light-hearted than the original. However, all the actors are on top form, the fight and action sequences are even bigger than before and just as much fun, the direction is just as accomplished and the special effects are flawless, plus there are plenty of laughs to be had, especially whenever Jack Sparrow is around.

"THAT'S CAPTAIN JACK SPARROW!"

Okay, okay, whenever Captain Jack Sparrow is around! With a cliffhanger ending and a story that's split across two films, I think that Dead Man's Chest will be enjoyed more when paired up with At World's End, the final film of the trilogy, and it's definitely one that grows on you with repeat viewings. So give it a go - if nothing else, you'll almost certainly want to head out to the cinema to see how it ends - but hurry, because it probably won't be showing for too much longer!

Reviewed by Geoff Holland for AceGamez (All Rights Reserved).