Beating a Dead Horsification Continues: Pirates 5 in Writing Stage

Everyone I've talked about Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides has had the same reaction:

"They're doing another one?!"

It should be noted that wasn't said in an excited tone; more like fatigue, boredom and great sense of "Just give it up already, will ya!?!" I even saw that reaction when seeing the Pirates 4 trailer in theaters. But in a way, you can't blame Disney and producer Jerry Bruckheimer; for this one at least. Pirates 3 did earn a hair shy of a $1 billion theatrically. All they're doing is reacting to the last movie and since audience approval or disapproval speaks in dollar signs, they're not wrong per say.

Speaking to USA Today which at CinemaCon, Bruckheimer says work is underway for a fifth Pirates go-around:

"The audience told us what they loved about it is that it was fresh, it was new, it was a whole new story. So that will carry over into the next one, too, to give it something fresh and different. As long as the audience embraces this one, we'll certainly try to make another one. It's really up to Johnny. He loves the character."

That's funny because Curse of the Black Pearl was envisioned as a stand-alone story too. Once the money poured in, and they found a cash-cow in Johnny Depp's Jack Sparrow character, they decided to suddenly turn the whole damn thing into a trilogy. Also ironic considering the original plan, according to them, was for Pirates 4 to be the start of a new trilogy and now they're saying it won’t be?

Sounds to me like they're aware of audience fatigue too and readying themselves in case this under-performs, which I for one think it will big time. Find it telling they're not rolling this out for Memorial Day. Is The Hangover Part II that big a threat for ticket sells?