Last 40 minutes go full cartoon
Spoilers
I thought the movie had established a certain level of heightened reality (as most do) in the first hour that I could deal with. There's treasure out there somewhere, and everybody wants it. Everyone is kinda bad, even the good guys are back stabbing thieves. The bad guy has hired some security people, and at least one thief of his own. There's a pair of artifacts and a journal which are the keys to unlocking the mystery, both literally and figuratively.
Okay, got it. It's real life, but more treasurey/thievey. Cool.
Starting somewhere about Chloe's double/triplecross and Braddock's killing Banderas... And then culminating with Braddock getting a flying pirate ship hilariously dropped on her head- it just went (and not in a good way) full cartoon.
Or, possibly... Full videogame?
I finished the first 3 games and played a good chunk of the 4th.
I remember the ShangriLa ending of the 3rd one best, but I think it's fairly representative of the game endings all getting a little more fantastical at the end. For sure, it's built into the genre. Act 1 is home, Act 2 is the big world, and what secrets it's been keeping, and Act 3 is... ShangriLa. Whether it's Indiana Jones, National Treasure, Tomb Raider, or Uncharted, they all follow this pattern to degrees.
But, and maybe I'm just too 40, flying galleons? And not just flying them, but swinging them around, crashing them into each other, etc?
That would be half cartoon, but somehow the bad guys also got more ridiculous and became end game bosses?
And the protagonists take 500 year old swords to fight dozens of gun toting thugs? Drake puts on his iconic holsters, fires two wild shots, and that's enough guns for one movie, thanks... We've got swords. Which wouldn't be too bad, I guess, were the games not 40% gunplay.
I think I've already forgotten other over the top things at the end.
I was enjoying the tone and reality of the first hour. I was totally taken out of it by the shift in both in the last third. But I think my 12 year old loved it.