#the Jolly Roger

[yellowbugifs]

170/365 days of regina mills

[oautincorrectquotes]

Hook: have you heard of murphy’s law?

Charming: yes

Hook: have you heard of Cole’s law?

Charming: I have not.

Hook: it is thinly sliced cabbage

Charming: you remember I’m armed right?

[not-wholly-unheroic]

A Comparative Analysis of Hook’s Ship and Cabin in Popular Media Portrayals

Part 4: Peter Pan (2003)

P.J. Hogan’s 2003 film is full of life and color, and Isaacs’ Hook is likewise a colorful character who, though grounded in reality, most definitely has a flair for the dramatic and a taste for the finer things in life.

Like the other Hooks we have seen thus far, Isaacs’ Jolly Roger appears to be the large stereotypical pirate ship that all children think of, despite the impracticality of a slower vessel in actual piracy. (By this point, I think we should just assume that all Hooks go for form over function when it comes to their choice of ship.) It’s a gorgeous ship, and I do wish we got more close-ups of the outside of this particular Roger so we could see more of what’s going on with all the decorative work on the outside of the cabin and the figurehead, etc. One thing, though, that stands out about this ship is that the mainsail itself has a giant skull and crossed swords on it. This would be completely impractical for any actual ship, as the enemy would see them coming and know they were pirates right off the bat…lending credence to the idea that this ship (and this Hook) may be deeply shaped by the children’s imagination. Then again…what else should we expect of a pirate ship whose name itself is the Jolly Roger?

The shots we get of the inside of Isaacs Hook’s cabin reveal the living space of a man who is accustomed to a decadent lifestyle but not so over-the-top as to be entirely unrealistic. While his beautifully decorated harpsichord is the centerpiece of the room, we also notice that he has several tables, a couch, and a globe.

This is about all we can tell from the in-film shots of the cabin, but some promotional material and a pirate-themed hotel that purchased a few set pieces from the film and set up their own room to mimic Hook’s can give us a few ideas about what the rest of the cabin might look like. (Big shout-out to @annabellioncourt for providing several of these bonus material images!)

In the one promotional photo, there is what looks like a lute, perhaps, in the background. I also love the little detail of the skull and crossbones on the candle stand…and his li’l stripey socks.

Here we can see the full-sized bed with a gun and what looks like it might be an Eton crest over it. (Note that if you pay close attention in Hook’s intro scene in the film, you will actually see that the tattoo on his left arm is an Eton crest as well.)

Isaacs Hook also has a self-portrait in his cabin, it seems…which interestingly has a date on the frame of 1742. This is about the most specific we get with ANY Hook as far as time period goes. This is after the Golden Age of Piracy had really already come to an end, though it’s technically possible he might still have been “Blackbeard’s bosun” depending on his age, as Blackbeard’s career ended in 1718 in a battle off Ocracoke Island, NC. Isaacs himself was around 40 years old when the filming was done, so if we want to assume Hook was around the same age when he came to Neverland and the portrait was done shortly before then, he would have been around 16 at the time of Blackbeard’s downfall. A bit young but…it’s possible if he started his career at sea early. Cabin boys usually started out around age 12 but could be as young as 8-ish on occasion. However…this wouldn’t really track with Hook being an Eton student. Assuming he actually graduated, he would have been at the school until he turned 18. So while Isaacs Hook may have very well been a sailor or even more specially a pirate prior to Neverland…he likely wasn’t a peer of Blackbeard or the other more well-known pirates of the early 1700s.

One last thing that is interesting to me is that in addition to the more standard weapons/tools like chains, guns, and boarding axes that we see in some shots, this version of Hook keeps what looks like an entire small cabinet of various tinctures and powders. At least the one of them which he removes is poison, but one wonders….are they all different kinds of poison? Or are some, perhaps, medicinal in nature or for recreational use?

As a whole, Isaacs’ Hook is, I think, perhaps one of the most realistic portrayals of the character. While there are some highly fanciful aspects to his ship—like the giant skull on the mainsail—much of his personal space has the lavish furnishings one might expect of someone with an aristocratic background without feeling too entirely impractical. Add to that a concrete date on the portrait, and I’d say this Hook is more grounded in reality than nearly any of the others we’ve encountered so far.

[chernobog13]

Superman and Lois meet the Pirates of the Caribbean.

[stone-cold-groove]

Popular Science Magazine - October 1926.

[thaida-quintus-amat]

[stardreamer28]

attempt at the jolly roger? the details are hard to do on this paper but I did my best

[awestruck-atrophy]

IM LIKE 95% SURE THAT THE JOLLY ROGER IN PETER PAN & WENDY IS JUST THE BLACK PEARL FROM POTC DID THEY REALLY THINK THEY COULD REUSE THE BOAT AND WE WOULDNT NOTICE

[martianbugsbunny]

I vibe with Killian Jones because I, too, get one good look at a ship and fall madly in intense-emotional-attachment with it for the rest of my life

[piraterefrigerator]

Am I the only one that noticed that Killian and his ship are EXCEPTIONALLY clean for pirates?

[justmilah]

...omg. So the Lady Washington has a gift shop. One of the items for sail sale is this piece of beauty right here. 

It’s a cat on the Jolly Roger.

I want this so hard.

[oautincorrectquotes]

Hook: Hello, can i get a glass of rum?

Cashier: Sir, this is a McDonald's.

Hook: Oh, terribly sorry.

Hook: Can i get a McRum?

[not-wholly-unheroic]

A Comparative Analysis of Hook's Ship and Cabin in Popular Media Portrayals

They say a man's home is his castle, and that is perhaps more true for Captain James Hook than most. Amid all the wildness and chaos of Neverland, the ship (and particularly the captain's cabin) is the one space where Hook exerts any real control over his environment, and upon close inspection, it reveals a great deal about who he is, what motivates him, his time period, and perhaps even whether or not any given "Hook" is intended to be "real" or a figure of the children's imagination. In this series of posts, I will be examining the Jolly Roger in five of the most well-known adaptations of Peter Pan: Disney's 1953 animated classic, Fox's Peter Pan & the Pirates (1990), Spielberg's Hook (1991), P.J. Hogan's Peter Pan (2003), and Disney's recent live-action remake, Peter Pan & Wendy (2023).

Part 1: Disney’s 1953 Animated Film

The Jolly Roger herself in the ‘53 film appears to be a Spanish galleon. This type of ship, though perhaps the “stereotypical” pirate ship that immediately comes to mind when we think of pirates in film, would have been highly impractical for any actual pirate. A good pirate ship needed to be sleek and fast, whereas galleons were great for carrying a lot of goods but unfortunately also very slow…and a large target for an enemy attack. Still, Hook has a tendency to prefer aesthetic beauty over function, so perhaps we can merely chalk this part up to the captain’s personal tastes.

On the other hand, Disney Hook has a ship that pretty blatantly screams “pirate” to anyone who might see it coming between the skull and crossbones you can see carved into the woodwork and the skull figurehead…which is definitely something that would seem more at home in a child’s imagined version of a pirate ship than any actual vessel.

For all the fancy, over-the-top outward style of the Jolly Roger in the ‘53 film, Hook’s cabin is surprisingly modest. His bed, which can be seen in the background during the “sick scene” post-Skull Rock, is the standard sort you might expect on a ship—a small bunk built into the side of the ship for practical reasons. There are, of course, chests of treasure (less practical/realistic) too, but aside from that, the cabin space seems nice but not excessive. We can see a sword lying against one of the treasure chests as well as a gun rack near the door over what looks like a large globe. (We see a closer, brighter version of this gun rack a few scenes later as the captain is switching out his usual hook for a golden one.)

There appear to be some nice silver plates in the background of the image with Smee, and there are a few other frivolities that Hook allows himself, such as the piano, a small table with fruit and wine set out, and several nice rugs on the cabin floor. But his desk appears to be rather small and simple, cluttered only with maps of Neverland, pens and an inkwell, some useful measuring tools, a few books, and what would appear to be a jeweled set of binoculars.

Overall, Disney’s Hook does a nice job of balancing the luxurious and fanciful with the more practical and mundane in his personal space. It might be a stretch to imagine this Jolly Roger in the real-life Golden Age of Piracy, but it’s not totally out of place. Thus, Disney’s Hook straddles that line between reality and fiction that leaves us wondering—as Wendy and her parents do at the end of the film as they watch a cloud formation that looks remarkably like a ship pass in front of the moon—whether it was all a dream or perhaps there is more to it.

[chernobog13]

Superman arrives in time to rescue Lois and Jimmy from some modern day pirates.

[franeridart]

someone else might call it faith