User reviews

The Lost Pirate Kingdom does something commendable. It tries to catch an incredibly interesting period in history; when pirates where all mighty. Emotionally, it does this very well. The stars aligned in such a way that pirates roamed the Caribbean virtually untouched, and it brought forth legend after legend, who are the clear focus of the documentary. It nails the feeling of just how extraordinary this must have been. Unfortunately, that's all it does well.

Functionally this documentary is pretty much flawed. There is too much repetition, the music is on the nose and there is so much focus on the players, that all the interesting background information, the ships, the technology, the navigation, the balance of power, the differences between the sea fairing nations... it's all pretty much completely lost. We get to spend a lot of time with (good) actors, and the (also good) narrator telling us how their characters felt, but we are left wanting. It's so thin on information, it hardly deserves the name 'documentary'.

I watched this after watching the excellent Age of Samurai: Battle for Japan. This is also a flawed documentary, that makes a few historical jumps too many, but far less so than The Lost Pirate Kingdom. I'm giving our pirates a positive 6 stars because I still think it's interesting to get a better feel for this period overall, and I got some new inspiration from it.

An emotionally engaging series sure, just not much of a documentary.

I find the study of piracy to be fascinating. I've read several books, seen plenty of documentaries, and I'm a big fan of the Pirate History Podcast (which I highly recommend). So I was eager to see "The Lost Pirate Kingdom." I just finished it and have to give it a six out of ten.

I give the show high marks for special effects (though they are clearly special effects, but the costs associated with finding, manning, and sailing enough replica vessels would be astronomical), most of the reenactment scenes, and for the overall narrative presented here.

Now, if you are unfamiliar with the explosion of piracy following the War of Spanish Succession, or the pirate haven in Nassau, then this is going to be really fascinating for you. If you know all about that, then there's nothing really new here ... and that's fine. There's only so much information on this subject that is available.

What I didn't like were the following things:

*Too much repetition. This was true both in reusing the dramatized pieces and for the conveying of information. The narrator would say something happened, there'd be a dramatized scene showing it happen, and then a couple of historians would tell you how it happened. This all could have been handled better, but the greatest fault here is that with so much repetition it left too little time, which brings me too....

*Almost no focus on tactics, on vessels, on the geopolitical situation (or at least very little on this one in particular.

*The pacing. I already touched on the way they repeat themselves numerous times, but this really comes home in the final episode. After Blackbeard is killed, the show pretty much wraps up with a montage of "and here's what happened to Anne Bonny ... here's what happened to Charles Vane." The ending felt very rushed. And I, for the life of me can't understand why they didn't make this an 8-episode show. There is plenty of material, plenty of other pirates they could have followed, more details in the life, etc.

*Too much speculation and assumption passed off as fact. For instance, there's no evidence Anne Bonny ever held a knife to Woodes Rogers throat or that Charles Vane gave an inspiring speech moments before his execution. I realize this is a docu-drama, but I prefer more docu and less drama in my history. Speaking of which....

*The history here is hit and miss.

1. Woodes Rogers is a villain? I realize critical theorists are at work here, but come on. Woodes Rogers' life is quite impressive and he shouldn't be vilified. This series portrays him as some rigid puritan trying to ruin the pirates' good time. The historical record is quite different. Rogers established order on New Providence and was quite generous towards the pirates--he had to have been, otherwise he would have been a failure.

2. Again, critical theory at work, but the pirates were not some social justice warriors out to change society. Yeah, they would free slaves ... sometimes, when it suited their purpose. But they were also just as likely to sell those slaves they acquired wherever they could. Yes, there were black pirates ... but then again, there were black freemen in all parts of the British Empire.

3. This series tries to make it seem like the British only started to care about the pirates once a couple of slave ships were captured. No, the situation was much more complex than that. And here is why they should have devoted a little more time to the history ... because the War of Spanish Succession was a devastating conflict that left all of Europe bankrupt. The British, however, were able to pay off their debts due to their global economic empire. It was the disruption of this network--not to the slave trade, but to raw materials headed for European markets--that affected this. While slavery was indeed a key part of the colonial economy, it wasn't as robust as this show makes it out to be. For instance, there were more Europeans enslaved by the Ottomans, and Barbary states than there were Africans enslaved in the Americas. And at least two-thirds of all African slaves went to South America (Spanish and Portuguese colonies), not British colonies. I say all this because the show tries to minimalize a rather complex issue.

4. While they do address Blackbeard's syphilis, they completely forgot to mention that he blockaded Charleston, SC for several days until his demands were met. Pirates of this age seldom had the power to do such a thing. Only the privateers and buccaneers of the earlier eras had ever done something like this (or worse, sack the city).

Anyway, I could go on, but you get the idea.

Long story short -- this is on Netflix, so if you have Netflix and like this topic, give it a watch.

An enjoyable documentary on the age of pirates. Re-enactments felt authentic and paired well with interviews and narration. The narrator had a fun tone that carried well throughout. Interesting information and the whole series had a good flow.

It's an average docu. Not that great editing, and sub par effects. But it does have it's charms. Overall a little slow in it's pacing, and some pointless B plots. But not bad.

6/10: Eh sure

I'm a sucker for anything Pirate related. When I first saw Netflix was working on a Pirate show my head went straight to Black Sails and instantly was excited. Later I learned this was going to be a docu-series so I was slightly disappointed but it was still about Pirates so I was in!

The show has its flaws, there is a lot of repetition but highlights some important events 1716-1718 of piracy and in general is an enjoyable watch.

Enjoyed the show. Well done for a docu-drama except ..... every time someone said Nassau and pronounced it 'nassow' instead of 'nasaw', I wanted to slap them. Wikipedia even shows it correctly .....

Ahoy mateys! Not sure how historically accurate this series is, but it's a really fun one in a niche area of TV, PIRATES! The cinematography is nice and I'm a sucker for narration, I noticed some reviewers didn't quite like it but it's a nice throwback. It presents itself as documentary film with historians presenting their viewpoints along the way. What people don't understand is that even "historical" records of pirates are somewhat based on hearsay and legend, so don't take everything seriously this is meant to entertain first and foremost. In my humble opinion it does exactly this, and does it well, it's light, enjoyable and refreshingly different.

Being a sailor, although for pleasure, I cringe when I see ships with flapping sails do excellent speed. If I try to look past that, this series has good history, decent acting but it is so slooow. Read a book about the history and enjoy Black Sails for the script, acting and action.

The scope of this documentary are roughly two years during the year 1716 - 1718 and then mainly about the pirates that sailed from Nassau. It has a total of 6 episodes of 40 minutes, so I thought that it would had enough time to really flesh out the period. But the way this documentary has been structured means that something has to repeated no less than four times. First - it is told by the narrator, then it is acted out by the actors, then a historian has to comment on it and the next episode is has to be repeated in case you have forgotten. So this documentary is pressed for time. It will mention the war of succession, but will not explain it, it will tell you nothing of the technology, ships, warfare, politics or religion of the time period. It focusses so much on Great Britain that it seems like there are barely any other nations involved. So what you are left with are summaries of acts of famous English pirates. It is competently acted and the special effects have been done well. But as a source of information it feels lacking and shallow.

I don't understand why anybody is comparing this to a fictional show like Black Sails. The narration just contributes to the show as a historical story versus a non fiction story. Whether the whole story is completely accurate or not, it tells the story of how the pirates of the Caribbean legends were born. Besides the obvious gaps in great graphics that are available nowadays, I thought it was really really good

I prefer a pure documentary style. Dramatizations usually consist of subpar acting and dialogue and unfortunately this one is another victim of that. It kills the pace of the documentary. Factoids that can be delivered in 20 seconds are portrayed in uninteresting 3-minute exposition with lousy dialogue.

If you really must have video accompaniment, I prefer short 10-second clips with no dialogue, just enough to show the setting and the costumes of the era.

Fantastic documentary that could bring people into being interested in pirates. Like most people, I couldn't deal with the ridiculously bad over-acting.

This documentary-series is slow, over acted, inconsistent and with a lot of filler time that personally bored me. I thought I was going to see something similar to what Netflix did with the Samurai documentary, which I thought was an interesting and different approach to watching a documentary where the story was told in a very clear way and with novelistic elements that worked well to give it the feel of a TV series.

Listen, if you're going to Netflix for a master's class in the socio-economic climate of the 18th century West Indies you're probably going to have a bad time.

If, on the other hand, you just want to watch a show about pirates, then here you go. Perfectly entertaining for entertainment's sake, and a fair enough introduction to the golden age of piracy in the Caribbean.

The history is not bad. The story is good but the CGI is so horrible. It looks like a cheap production.

Not bad but they sure took a great deal of liberty's with Historical facts. But still enjoyable. It was well acted, narrated, (Derek Jacobi). Nice feel for the era.

I found myself on the fence between a 6 or 7 when assessing Netflix's The Lost Pirate Kingdom. Despite its relentless pace and visually enticing portrayal of pirate life, the series falls short in terms of historical authenticity. Questionable reflections from certain experts and the occasional application of modern concepts on historical aspects raise concerns about accuracy.

The series at times appears like a low-budget CGI bluescreen drama, featuring moments of cringe-worthy acting. However, the redeeming quality lies in the general narrative, which remains faithful to historical events. Despite the flaws, The Lost Pirate Kingdom earns a 7 for offering a surprisingly informative piece on Caribbean pirates, delving deep into their intriguing history.

Remember when Discovery were making "documentaries" and were scorned for just making tripe just for entertainment where they provided no factual value and just appeared to try and obtain a wow factor? Well Netflix, you've successfully hit that bench-mark... For a bit I kind of enjoyed most of this series. But as the episodes continued, and there were more and more assumptions, rather than facts from so-called "experts", commenting on events that they believed happened at certain points, it just seemed like fantasy fiction... And the authors, doctors and experts quoting, where did you find these muppets? there was literally a bloke who looked like he did cosplay as a pirate (and really needed to trim his moustache), and then this random lady who just said things that crossed her mind, one of her quotes from the last episode set me off the ledge, where Anne Bonnet became a pirate she goes on to say, as though she was there - "For the first time she considered herself to be truly free, she was able to dress how she wanted, she wore men's clothes, and she had her shirt opened, exposing her breasts, proving to the world she didn't need to adhere to the worlds expectations".. -.- ... Netflix, what are you doing... It's like you want people to stop watching...

For those of you who like seafarers / action and at the same time want a historical update of these infamous legends, this series is probably a good start to give you the essential details about the pirates' progress and fall.

I know there are historical facts wrong but who really knows the whole truth?

Since I like historical drama series, I will dust off all the episodes in this lavish series from Netflix. Pirates of the Caribbean and Black Sails were good and this docu-series has its own little style to convey about what life was like for the pirates. So far so good after episode 1.

I felt like watching an episode of BBC Horrible Histories, the acted scenes were hard to take seriously. It's all narrated at the present tense, there are a lot of recaps. It may be good for young adults but I expected better from Netflix.

I know right?

That guy with the long hair and crazy moustache was just weird. I heard he has a doctorate in history and wrote his doctoral thesis on the social history of the golden age of piracy, and that he has written a load of books and articles on the history of piracy, but does that really make him an 'expert'? I think not!

This drama/documentary attempts to touch base on the Golden Age of Piracy in the early 18th century. And that's what it does, it touches base. There really is not much fleshing out of the socio-economic factors of the times. No speak of merchant conditions, naval impressment (would have been fantastic to show), or the origins of buccaneering. Historian Alan Taylor would have been an incredible asset to flesh out context. The minute the producers decided to cover the 'Pirate Republic' then they should have immediately enlisted Marcus Rediker. If Hornigold is considered the 'godfather' of the discussed pirates, then Rediker is the godfather of this 'Pirate Republic' theory as CLEARLY outlined in his 2004 book "Villains of All Nations: Atlantic Pirates in the Golden Age." Historians Brett Rushforth and Christopher Hodson would have been another great addition to flesh out why many of the pirate crews were so skilled in combat and the origins of buccaneering. I had an idea of doing a similar documentary back after reading Rediker's book, but I'm a Historian and not a Hollywood filmmaker so nothing came of it except a very long script. This series, however, is a classic example of Hollywood producers getting a dabble of real history and then just trying to weave out a half-thought story. It can be summed up in the title: "The Lost Pirate Kingdom." A Kingdom, really? Weird because the film talks about how it's a Pirate Republic. Not exactly a kingdom. Put real historians at the helm of your story-telling. The acting, costumes, set design, music, and special effects were all fine. There's so much material to use here and each episode squandered time rehashing what happened before. Have a "Previously on The Lost Pirate Kingdom" and option to skip. There are also tons of historical issues, presentations, interpretations, and stark-mad omissions that could have enriched your story. The build up to Blackbeard left a ton of material out. I don't think I even heard the name Queen Anne's Revenge. Blackbeard blockades Charleston was the boldest act of his career. He did it to get a chest full of medicine for himself AND his crew. When Thatch is ambushed on Maynard's sloop, it's not a one-on-one duel though I'm sure that appeased Hollywood. It was a full battle that raged back on the top deck. What about Thatch's ability to maneuver the inlets of North Carolina like Frying Pan shoals? That's just a brief summary of one character. You other reviewers will have to excuse me if I wholly ignore any review that claims "THIS WAS REALLY GOOD HISTORY." It wasn't. If you're going to make a show on Atlantic pirates, get historians from both sides of the Atlantic, especially the ones who gave you the original theory on a Pirate Republic. In academia, we call this a sad attempt at plagiarism.

Some people crying here like they know more than a bunch of experts who have written many books and have degrees in history. Laughable.

It was enjoyable for the most part. While it was flawed, as there were some scenes of subpar acting and the use of CGI could have been better, it was entertaining and informative overall.

Watching this you would think there was only one violent psychopath in the history of piracy, everybody else was an egalitarian, slave-liberating, libertarian hero of democratic ideals. That pirates were thieves, murderers, rapists and terrorists can be safely ignored.

Pirates weren't heroes, they were violent, self-interested highwaymen, and while there is some underlying truth that was told by this documentary in how they ordered their society it was out of practical necessity, not because they were woke superheroes.

The portrayal of the British effort to combat piracy primarily as a way of protecting the slave trade, as though there wasn't any other legitimate trade happening as well, is similarly disingenuous.

And in the case of Anne Bonny, we get a libertine narrative where she casts off the bonds of patriarchal oppression, a dangerous free woman let loose on the fringes of society, and whom no man can control.

It's all too much, and everybody involved ought to be embarrassed.