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Ok, saw it a second time this afternoon. I'm just going to assume that spoilers are ok.
First of all, the first time I saw it was at a press only screening where each press person could bring one guest. There was applause at the end but it wasn't a normal audience. Unfortunately, this time I still can't judge audience reaction. In the middle of the final kraken encounter the theater fire alarm went off, everybody was forced to stand out in the heat (it was about 100 degrees here today) for about 40 minutes before getting to watch the final 8 minutes of the movie. About half the audience drifted off when the guy said we'd be standing outside for 30+ minutes and the rest watched the final still sweating and with any mood completely broken.
I was wrong about the compass. Indeed it does point to Jack twice while Elizabeth is using it. I don't really read it, though, as a romantic interest so much as a primal lusting for what she thinks Jack Sparrow is (getting to do whatever he wants and yet still fundamentally a decent person, despite his protestations). More that what she most wants is Jack Sparrow's life, not so much to jump his bones. But I guess we'll have to see how it goes in the next movie.
I now don't have any problem with how Will ended up at the island. I had misremembered the sequence of events with the Flying Dutchman. It goes all the way to the island without submerging, sits there for a bit while Jones takes in the situation and then goes under. Presumably Will stayed in his hiding spot and then began swimming to the island when the ship arrived but before it submerged.
It is correct that Jack doesn't want the heart killed since then nobody would be able to control the kraken and he needs Jones to call it off first.
I missed it the first time but Barbossa was at Tia Dalma's place the first time we visit (with Jack and Will, not at the end of the movie). After the monkey is released it runs into the other room and sits on the end of a bed upon which you can see Barbossa's booted feet.
The pendant that Jack steals from Tia Dalma's table is identical to the one on Davy Jones's organ. The one that gets triggered during the key theft, turns out to be a music box, and sooths Davy Jones back to sleep. It was never mentioned as in Jack's possession again so I can see it playing a role in the next movie. Also, I believe these pendants were the same shape as part of the design on the chest. So, if relevant, it would appear that Tia Dalma was in possession of something belonging to Davy Jones, or perhaps the woman he loved (maybe they had matching music box pendants).
Overall, I still enjoyed it. The general commentary seems to be that the characters and jokes were worse this time around. I'll have to watch the first one again but to my memory they are pretty much of the same quality and also same tone. So could it be it isn't so much that they are worse it is just difficult for similar material to be funny the second time around? If somehow the movies had been reversed in release order Curse of the Black Pearl would get much of the criticism directed now at Dead Man's Chest?
While waiting for the movie to start I read the current issue of Entertainment Weekly which contained a strongly negative review of the movie by Lisa Schwartzbaum. She admitted up front that she hated the first one as well, so it isn't a surprise to me at all that her dislike would be even worse this time around.
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