Discussion Characters / PiratesofTheCaribbean

I don't think The Hero has to be the main protagonist.

But still, Elizabeth is not the protagonist. She is the tritagonist. The movies take place from her POV, but they are not actually about her. Will is the protagonist as the story actually is about him. Jack is the dueteragonist as he's the actually The Hero and the most notable character, but is only the secondary focus of the story. I don't know where the idea that Elizabeth is the protagonist came from, but it's got to go.

I actually found this on the Pirates wikia.

• Screenwriters Ted Elliott and Terry Rossio had never been shy about their belief that Elizabeth is the protagonist of the overarching story of the Pirates trilogy, stating that it's always been her story. However, many have considered Johnny Depp's Captain Jack Sparrow as the main character upon the success of the film series as well as his popularity. In an interview for At World's End, producer Jerry Bruckheimer stated that Elizabeth is a character who has an enormous arc. "She starts out as a kind of spoiled rich governor's daughter and, through the course of the story, becomes a woman who bucks convention and becomes as fierce and competitive a fighter as Will and Captain Jack."

So it seems that two of the screenwriters say that Elizabeth is the protagonist, but what of everyone else? While the producer's words would make seem that she is the protagonist, all he says is that she has a major character arc. I still insist that Elizabeth is a tritagonist. I will make the changes tonight.

That is interesting but is Word of God, and we base our troping more on the story portrayal than on Word of God.

Because they tend to be nothing but bait for edit wars in settings where they're not explicitly used.