A question from the first POTC movie: Why did Jack appear to be normal flesh and blood when he was in the Port Royal jail, grabbed around the throat by the skeletal cursed pirate in the moonlight, but was later revealed to be cursed and skeletal himself in the moonlight on Isla del Muerte while fighting with Capt. Barbossa?
P.S. “It’s a silly movie and not supposed to make any sense” is not a helpful answer, thanks.
He didn’t become cursed until he was on the island and grabbed some cursed gold out of the chest
Yeah, Barbossa took the Pearl from him before they found the Isla de la Morte, thus Jack never set eyes on the treasure until the events of the movie, let alone been caught up in the curse.
Exactly. I’ve seen this same question come up before, but I still don’t understand why people get confused about this. It’s pretty well established in the movie that the other pirates had marooned Jack before they got the cursed gold, and it was obvious to me when I saw it that when Jack grabbed a coin from the chest late in the movie he was deliberately zombifying himself.
Which is a bit of a plot device considering Barbossa explained earlier in the film that it took a while for the curse to fully manifest itself.
I think you can fairly easily fanwank that away by saying that the curse was first activated when the pirates took the cursed gold and it took some time for them to notice the effects, but when Jack stole a coin, the curse was in full effect.
Elendil’s Heir: do you have it on DVD? If so, look closely at a scene near the end. Captain Barbossa is about to kill Will Turner. Captain Sparrow shows up unexpectedly in the cave (after having been maroone a second time!) Captain Barbossa says “that’s impossible!” Captain Sparrow explains how he the Dauntless is waiting offshore and it’s too early to kill Will Turner. At one part in the conversation he suggests that Barbossa capture the Dauntless and leave the Black Pearl to Sparrow.
Right after that, he says “wait to lift the curse until you’ve killed Norrington’s men. Every… last… one.” During those words, he picks up a few coins from the chest, drops them back in, but there is a closeup of him palming a coin away. At that point, Jack Sparrow has stolen some of the cursed gold, therefore he is now cursed also. Will Turner has his eyes on Jack’s hands, notices Sparrow hiding a gold coin, and realizes Jack’s plan. Will says “You’ve been planning this since the beginning!”
(I have the DVD, obviously).
We could have a thread with topics like that.
Indiana Jones NOT being immortal just because he drank once from the Holy Grail(yes, people think this)
The robots at the end of AI being robots, not aliens. Yes, people think that too.
The Pirates were probably cursed immediately. They just didn’t realize its effects right away, but they already had them. They just wasn’t until they began to realize they couldn’t sate their living hungers that they discovered they were all undead. Jack didn’t show any signs either until after he was “mortally” wounded by Barbossa. Presumably they all died the slow way from hunger and thirst (which they couldn’t fulfill, being cursed), while Jack died the quick way.
Ah, thanks, I get it now! Just saw the movie and enjoyed it all over again.
The German who kills Mellish with a bayonet is NOT the German they captured and released at the machinegun nest.
Good one. I think I’ll start a thread. 
On further consideration… why wouldn’t Elizabeth Swann have become cursed? She had the Aztec gold coin for eight years.
You never know what’s coming, the stake is not the power, To Serve Man is a cookbook…
I guess because she did not take it from the chest. Jack took one from the chest when he palmed one.
Yes, I guess this means ll the bad pirates(funny term) took gold from the chest individually.
Am I wrong?
I assumed it was because she didn’t steal it directly from the chest. Will had been wearing it as a child, but maybe not turning in the moonlight since it had been given to him and not stolen by him.
Because that was Bootstrap Bill’s coin. He was the one who took it, so he was the one who was cursed.
Doubly cursed, as he then became a member of Davy Jones’s crew.
I’m pretty sure that’s it. Hadn’t the pirates spent a lot of the gold before they realized it was cursed? There was no reference to shopkeepers, tavern wenches, etc., all turning into zombies also, it was just the pirates. And of course Will wasn’t cursed either.
What I couldn’t understand is: how could they make a fully fleshed and entertaining movie out of a carnival ride?
By appropriating a script that was meant for a completely unrelated movie.