Geoffrey Rush was the only good thing about the third Pirates of the Carribean movie, and it looks as though he'll be reprising his role as Barbossa. Also, Ian McShane will be playing Blackbeard.

The reason Pirates of the Carribean was so good while its sequel were lackluster was because Johnny Depp was such a surprise as Jack Sparrow. I always thought that this was largely due to the fact that the script was hardly written around him; he took the role and made it his own. In the sequels, the screenplay revolved around the character's popularity and concerned itself with setting up jokes for him. He was so funny in the first because the quirky, almost-creepy humor came out of left field. It wasn't nearly as funny when everything was an obvious build-up to it.

Hopefully the screenplay for the new movie creates large enough roles for both Rush and McShane that Depp can play off of them instead of having the whole movie revolving around him and falling on its face as a result.

The lack of Orlando Bloom and Keira Knightley is also an improvement.