Have you ever wondered why a heroine makes the romantic choice she does because you would have chosen someone else? It has happened to me often over the years, but never more adamantly than in the first Pirates of the Caribbean. Seated in the theater, my hands in a popcorn bucket and eyeballs glued to the screen, if I had been lucky enough to be in Elizabeth Swan’s shoes, I would have picked not the romantic Will Turner, but the sarcastic James Norrington.

While he amuses me with his dry humor and looks great in a uniform, if you asked me why, I would say he’s faithful, honorable, and intelligent. I continued to hold this opinion through the sequels even when he went “rogue” in the second film, and his ultimate end broke my heart. He went out a hero saving the woman he loved and redeeming himself and atoning for his mistakes.

Love triangles are common in entertainment, which also loves to make the heroine’s fiancé awful, so it justifies her emotional or physical infidelity (a perfect example of this is Titanic). Pirates actively subverts this trope because Norrington is a decent man. Once he realizes her true feelings for Will, he releases Elizabeth from their engagement—and allows Jack Sparrow a “head start” to escape the noose. He loses only because Elizabeth doesn’t love him. It was a bold choice from the studio and I liked it, because even though I would have chosen him myself, it makes for a far richer story to have the “loser” in the love triangle be a decent and likable human being with feelings.

Elizabeth has a spirited and passionate nature, so it’s not unusual she would pick the more emotional and reactive Will Turner over the stoic and logical Norrington. He is far more reckless (like her) than the more careful Norrington, who does not trust Jack Sparrow and prefers to go in with a plan. Norrington represents the British empire, with his mantra of “keep calm and carry on.” Even when his losses turn him into an angry, bitter drunkard determined to resume his former status, he’s still a likable character. I felt he deserved better than the franchise gave him.

Since the theme of the franchise is piracy, and using underhanded tactics to get what you want, Elizabeth is not your usual heroine. She can be manipulative, calculating, opportunistic, and cruel—such as when she promises to marry Norrington if he will help her save Will Turner. She uses him, much as she uses Jack Sparrow.

Over decades of watching love triangles unfold, I feel sorry for the men who do not get the girl just because they are “dull” and she wants an intense romantic experience. While physical attraction is important, a relationship has to stand on commitment and fidelity just as much as fun and sex. You can tell what Jane Austen thought of turning down the honorable choice in Sense & Sensibility, where the dashing philanderer poet leads Marianne astray from the faithful Charles Brandon until he breaks her heart. Brandon picks up the pieces and proves himself honorable. The story ends with Marianne married to a man the reader knows will never forsake her, a much quieter and longer lasting form of love.

I cannot resent Elizabeth too much because she would not be happy with Norrington. He needs a calmer, more settled wife who does not dream of adventures on the high seas. Elizabeth and Will make a fine match since he’s also an honorable man. But I cannot help wishing, as I usually do with a fine man left on the sidelines, that James Norrington could have his own happy ending.