A new Pirates of the Caribbean film is long overdue. The beloved film franchise, based on Walt Disney’s theme park attraction of the same name, launched with 2003’s The Curse of the Black Pearl starring Johnny Depp, Orlando Bloom, and Kiera Knightley. The Oscar-nominated movie was followed by four more films: 2006’s Dead Man’s Chest, 2007’s At World’s End, 2011’s On Stranger Tides, and 2017’s Dead Men Tell No Tales. In total, the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise has grossed over $4.5 billion worldwide at the box office and is the 14th highest-grossing film series ever.
A sixth film has been in development since 2017, but plans were stalled due in part to Johnny’s defamation trial against his ex-wife, Amber Heard. A female-led spinoff movie with Margot Robbie as the lead star was in the works at Disney, but the actress revealed that the project was canceled. So, we’ve rounded up everything you need to know about the reboot film and Johnny’s future in the franchise below.
The reboot film was first announced in June 2020. Jerry Bruckheimer, who produced all the Pirates movies so far, confirmed in an interview with The Sunday Times in May 2022 that they were still working on the screenplay for the reboot. Jerry never shared the official title or plot details, but he did confirm that they were “talking” to Margot about the plans.
During a March 2024 interview with Comicbook.com, Jerry confirmed that the reboot is still happening but with a new cast. When asked when audiences can see it, he replied, “It’s hard to tell. You don’t know.”
“With Top Gun, you have an actor who is iconic and brilliant. And how many movies he does before he does Top Gun, I can’t tell you,” Jerry said about Tom Cruise. “But we’re gonna reboot Pirates, so that is easier to put together because you don’t have to wait for certain actors.”
In June 2025, Orlando teased that some original cast members from the films might return to the sixth film, he told Game Rant.
Johnny’s future in the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise was threatened when his ex-wife, Amber Heard, accused him of domestic abuse in an op-ed published by the Washington Post in December 2018. At the time, Johnny was set to star in the sixth film with Joachim Ronning directing, and Ted Elliott and Craig Mazin as screenwriters. But Johnny wasn’t offered many jobs, he was forced to resign from the Fantastic Beasts franchise at Warner Bros behest, and eventually, Disney cut ties with him on the film. During the defamation trial, which began April 11, Johnny’s agent Jack Whigham claimed that the actor was set to earn over $22 million for Pirates of the Caribbean 6 until Disney abruptly went “in a different direction” after Amber’s article was published.
