Riddick finds Vin Diesel reprising his role as the galaxy’s favorite bad ass Furyan in round three of the series. The latest film falls far more in line with the trilogy’s first installment, the sleeper sci-fi hit Pitch Black, than the bloated and extremely over ambitious follow-up The Chronicles of Riddick, and strips the character down into a back to the basics slow burn action thriller that will appeal mainly to series’ in-house fans.
When we last saw Riddick, he had violently assumed the throne of the Necromongers, an evil race of inter dimensional soul predators. It’s a complicated scenario from Chronicles and actually has little to do with the latest chapter, so lets move on. We open with our title character buried alive, wounded and stranded on a desolate desert planet teeming with threats from vicious creatures. Even for Riddick, that’s a really bad day.
In the first half hour we learn he’s has been betrayed by the Necromongers, taken off world and left for dead. It’s a sci-fi version of Castaway, with very little dialogue from Diesel as he fights to survive in the savage conditions, tends to his wounds, battles terrifying creatures in the wastelands and even manages to find a companion for himself in the form of an alien canine (we know what to ultimately expect when we get attached to a dog in this sort of film).
Act two introduces two mercenary groups landing on the planet who are hell bent on cashing in on the rich bounty for delivering Riddick’s head in a box. A ragtag team led by Santana (Jordi Malla) gets settled first and boasts some necessary brawn from Diaz, played Dave Batista. The WWE star is playing Drax the Destroyer in Marvel’s upcoming Guardians of the Galaxy, and his supporting turn here should give fans a lot to look forward to. The second more organized merc unit led by Boss Johns (Matt Nable) has BSG fan favorite Katee Sackhoff in tow as Dahl, a no-nonsense eagle eyed sharp shooter. Both groups do their damnedest to track down Riddick and his four legged best friend. In curious move, we find Riddick noticeably absent for a good portion of the film.
Despite his best survival efforts and taking out a few of a pursuant or three, Riddick’s game of cat and mouse goes only so far, and that’s when the film gets its groove on. The third act heavily echoes the formula that made Pitch Black a winner, and easily that is when the film is the most effective. There is a heavy plot throwback to the first film (to bring it all full circle as they say), but I feel the more Riddick keeps to itself as a standalone installment, the better off it is. Plot points from Black just add to the off kilter nature that is prevalent throughout the film.
The last half hour is when the film delivers all the bad assness that you expect from the character, but it’s mostly nothing we haven’t seen before. Riddick the anti-hero is ultimately brutally tested and fights to survive in the darkness, up against seeming impossible odds (how’s about thousands of carnal aliens out to shred you to death with their claws and teeth?) in a solid sci-fi final act.
I was not as taken aback by the Chronicles of Riddick as many other were, by its exponential budget and high concept ascension from Pitch Black. Honestly I found the expansion of the storyline’s scope fascinating, and applauded the necessary balls to take it from A to B. But it was certainly was a complete 360 from the gritty spookiness of the original and managed to leave Riddick lording over an entire race of ancient warrior vampires. Riddick places the Furian back at square one, where only his brutal survival skills can see him through a “bad day,” but acknowledges his fall from grace with the Necromongers via a flashback with Karl Urban as Vaako. To further bury the box office dud that was Chronicles, its storyline is briefly addressed and pushed aside swiftly, only to find the call back to Pitch Black intruding more on the new story in both screen time and implied plot importance.
What does it have going for it you ask? Riddick is a bad ass anti-hero to follow and overall director / screenwriter David Twohy takes Riddick a step back into the perceived right direction, despite its uneven storytelling and absence of its star for a healthy portion of the film. Also as a fan of a tight 90 over a crawling 120 minutes, the film could due with excising some of the running time fat. Fans will enjoy Katee Sackhoff on the bog screen, proving her years on the Galactica as Kara Thrace have served her well playing tough a warrior.
Had Chronicles clicked with audiences, the series would have easily moved forward with the epic Dune-esque scale direction and that would have been that. But that was not the case. Riddick does impress visually given its scaled back budget and makes the most of the extensive CGI backdrops. But Riddick is for Riddick fans, it isn’t going to break in a massive new fan following. Although the series is back on track, unfortunately an uber expensive and imaginative middle chapter has been discarded never to be heard from again.
There are more stories to tell, and fans will welcome them. I would be very surprised if the series could not thrive onwards for years on this smaller scale, but hopefully without such an uneven experience in pacing, plot and tone.
Riddick opens in theaters and IMAX on September 6th.
REVIEW RATING: ★★★★★
Director: David Twohy
Starring: Vid Diesel, Karl Urban, Katee Sackhoff, Dave Batista, Jordi Malla, Matt Nable
Screenwriter: David Twohy
Studio: Universal Pictures
Rated: R
Running Time: 119 minutes
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