Why Tom Sawyer Should (maybe not) Audition for the Next Pirates of the Caribbean

In May 2017, the fifth installment of the Pirates of the Caribbean will grace the screens of movie theaters around the world. The rough and tough adventure world of Cap'n Jack Sparrow will not fail to entertain and excite. Adventure? Excitement? If you ask me, there isn't a better film for Tom Sawyer to make his acting debut. Then he doesn't have to waste people's time by locking them up against their will and withhold critical knowledge for them simply because it is "it's the RIGHT way—and it's the regular way. And there ain't no OTHER way, that ever [he] heard of" (Clemens 35.56). News flash Tom, just because you like it doesn't make it regular or humane. A movie could give him the sense of adventure, but in reality take away any real life consequences from his actions. I bet he would really enjoy using green screens and would be fascinated that the computer can do the imagining for him. The only problem is that he may ruin this great movie franchise just like he ruined the end of Huckleberry Finn; too often Tom is thinking about himself and if he ruins a perfectly great series just for his own adventure I will not be very happy. If people were to stop thinking only about themselves all of the time, then maybe we would live in a better society. We can't forget that manipulating other for our own gain has negative consequences. At the same time we cannot allow ourselves to be controlled and stand up for ourselves, just as I will stand up for a boycott against Pirates of the Caribbean if they allow Tom Sawyer to enter in the plot without purpose and ruin the ending, forever diminishing the work as a whole.

The Australian Huckleberry Finn

Just because Nemo is a clown fish doesn't mean that his story is all laughs and giggles; his entire journey is spent looking for freedom, whether it be from his oppressive father who won't let him leave the anemone (pap much?) or from the fish tank in order to avoid being given to a ruthless, new, brace-faced owner (I'm looking at you Miss Watson). Fish were not meant to be kept in tanks, just as slaves were not meant to be treated as property and have their own freedoms taken away from them. In the movie, the juxtaposition of Marlin's journey through the ocean, the pinnacle of sea creature freedom, alongside Nemo's captivity in the tank shows just how truly wrong it is to suppress an individual. The fish in the tank go crazy, they are uneducated, entertained by bubbles, and lack the wholesome life that the other fish are able to live out in the ocean. They do not hold their own destiny outside of the little box they are trapped in. Their origin stories are all but forgotten, and most of them have never been to the ocean at all; it is something spoken of in their folklore. Just as Phillis Wheatley wrote in her letter to Rev. Samson Occum, freedom "is impatient of oppression. Both in Huckleberry Finn and Finding Nemo, when faced with the oppression of being treated as property and traded away to a new owner where their life will be miserable, the best option is to escape. But being free means more than just escaping the tank: at the end of the movie the fish in the tank escape in plastic bags to the harbor, but are unable to escape their baggage. The result is a bunch of fish floating around in their own bubbles. Just because Jim is able to escape Miss Watson does not mean he is free to walk about until he has help from the abolitionists in the north. True freedom will never be able to be achieved without help from the suppressor to the suppressed. There needs to be a break in the cycle.