While the franchise started losing its appeal as time passed, Disney still found massive success with its Pirates of the Caribbean movies.
Johnny Depp deserves a huge amount of the credit for that, but Amber Heard's allegations of domestic violence and a series of messy court battles led to Disney scrapping plans for a sixth movie. Depp's Hollywood career was put on hold - he's since mounted an attempted comeback - and the studio went back to the drawing board with the franchise.
It's unclear exactly who is developing the next iteration, though the expectation has been that the spotlight will shift to a new group of pirates in place of the iconic Captain Jack Sparrow.
There have been rumblings about Margot Robbie leading a reboot for at least the past few years. Ayo Edebiri, Austin Butler, and Hailee Steinfeld, meanwhile, are among those who have supposedly been eyed to take centre stage in place of Depp.
Well, according to The DisInsider (via ActioNewz.com), they've heard that Depp will return for the next Pirates of the Caribbean movie. Walt Disney Studios is said to be gearing up to begin production, and while there's no set timeline on that, this next instalment is likely to see Sparrow make his long-awaited return.
This news will be welcomed by many fans and a new instalment of the Pirates of the Caribbean franchise without Depp and Captain Jack would be a hard sell. His return, on the other hand, is bound to increase interest.
"Hurt. Blinding hurt. It was like somebody hit me in the back of the head with a 2x4," Depp previously said of Disney's decision to fire him from the role. "Captain Jack Sparrow was a character I built from the ground up and was something that I, of course, put a lot of [myself] into the character."
"And also having worked on these films with these people and added much of myself, much of my own re-writing of the dialogue and scenes and jokes."
"I didn't quite understand how, after that long relationship and quite a successful relationship certainly for Disney, that suddenly I was guilty until proven innocent," the actor continued. "There was a very deep and distinct feeling of having been betrayed by the people that I had been working with, the people I had worked hard for, people I had delivered a character to that they initially despised."
The original series followed the adventures of Captain Jack Sparrow (Johnny Depp), with Hector Barbossa (Geoffrey Rush), Will Turner (Orlando Bloom), Elizabeth Swann (Keira Knightley), and Joshamee Gibbs (Kevin McNally).
The franchise kicked off in 2003 with Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl, a movie that grossed $654 million worldwide. After the first instalment's success, Disney forged ahead with two sequels, including 2006's Dead Man's Chest and At World's End in 2007. In 2011, we got On Stranger Tides, though Dead Men Tell No Tales ended things on something of a bum note in 2017.
Would you like to see Depp back as Captain Jack in the next Pirates of the Caribbean movie?