The Chronicles of Riddick continues the story of Richard B. Riddick (Vin Diesel), a character who first came to our notice in the unexpectedly successful science fiction hit Pitch Black. This tale takes place roughly five years after the events of that movie.
After dropping off Jack (Alexa Davalos) and the Imam (Keith David) at New Mecca, Riddick, still a wanted man, hides out on a remote ice planet and basically tries to keep his head down. However, destiny being what it is, Helion Prime falls in the path of the 10th crusade of a space-faring religious cult called the Necromongers heading towards the promised land they call Underverse. These Necromongers, led by their Lord Marshall (Colm Feore), intend to convert or kill every human life in their pilgrimage across the stars to this Underverse.
If the inhabitants of Helion Prime and the rest of humanity are to survive, a new balance must be found. In normal times, evil would be fought by good but in times like these, well, it must be fought by another kind of evil - Riddick!
Review
Although The Chronicles Of Riddick is the second Riddick movie, it's technically the fourth tale in the series. After the success of Pitch Black we got Dark Fury, the animated short that provides the story of what happened directly after the escape from Pitch Black and setting the scene for the main location of this movie - New Mecca on Helion Prime. However, the writers have backtracked and produced a prequel to flesh out some of Riddick's history in the form of The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape From Butcher Bay, a video game designed for the XBox games console.
Here, the writers have basically taken the Riddick character out of Pitch Black and fleshed it out to become the legendary nemesis of the Necromongers. The actual story of their periodic crusade is a bit strange and I wondered why, if they've reached their promised land, they ever come back to normal space to do it all over again some years later. All that aside, it's a reasonably good tale on it's own and the plot is suitably surreal for a science fiction story and that's as it should be. Even you haven't seen Pitch Black or Dark Fury, you'll soon catch on to the fact that Riddick is one mean dude and the perfect weapon to use against the Necromongers. Setting it on Helion Prime let them bring back the Imam from Pitch Black and the sub-plots on U.V. 6 and Crematoria gives us back Toombs from Dark Fury and Escape From Butcher Bay and Jack, now being played by Alexa Davalos, from Pitch Black.
Vin Diesel is excellent as Riddick and plays the role with even more style and menace than before. He's the tough guy with a soft spot and even though he puts on the seriously macho front, which he can back up if necessary, he'll step in somewhat resignedly to save the day if required. Judi Dench gives a reasonable performance as Aereon the wind Elemental but it's no less than you'd expect from her and she never looks challenged by the role. Basically, she's there because Vin Diesel is a major fan of hers and pushed hard for her to do the part. Keith David returns in the role of the Imam, albeit shorter this time, and he does a good enough job here as well. The character of Jack is here played here by Alexa Davalos in a suitably tougher and more lithe way you'd expect of a girl five years older and prison hardened since they last met.
The bad guys are also well represented. Colm Feore is suitably grim and sadistic as the Lord Marshall with Karl Urban and Thandie Newton playing the scheming and ambitious Vaakos, who are looking to usurp him as soon as they get the chance. Nick Chinlund plays Toombs quite well but his characterization as the sleazy bounty hunter and a long time thorn in Riddick's side seemed a bit over the top to me - still it worked okay here.
The picture is presented in 2.35:1 anamorphic widescreen and is pretty good throughout. Colours and blacks are solid and there's no sign of any compression/transfer artefacts or print damage. All in all, a good quality image and that's as it should be these days. Some of the scenes are shot at an angle, which adds to the surreal quality of the film and the CGI visuals are stunningly well done. There are some amazing alien vistas of U.V. 6, Helion Prime and Crematoria, and the CGI sequences such as the Hell Hounds and the battle between Riddick and the Lord Marshall are very well done. On top of this we also get some amazing costume designs and some great, totally over the top, art-deco sets and props.
The Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack is equally respectable and the soundstage reverberates beautifully to the multitude of battle effects and explosions, etc. The bass gets a good work out as well, especially during the Necromonger ship landings. Dialogue is clear throughout and Graeme Revell's score is suitably atmospheric and rousing when required.
One confusing feature of the DVD, for those that haven't already seen the film, is the fact that you are presented with two options on the first menu screen - Convert or Fight. However, both are merely routes to two cosmetically different menu screens with the same options.
This is reputedly only one of three sequels presented to Universal by writer/director David Twohy so there may well be some follow-ups in the works so here's hoping they're as good as this offering.
Extras
Virtual Guide To The Chronicles Of Riddick - A collection of ten short bits of information on some of the film's characters, places and objects. Each is narrated by one of the film's characters and the imagery consists of clips, pre-visualisation animations and artworks but presented in a strangely overlaid, low resolution way. This feature adds a little more depth to the story, although I couldn't help feeling that there could have been so much more, and topics cover the Conquest Icon, Crematoria, Elementals, Helion Prime, Planet U.V., the Lord Marshall, Necromongers, the Necropolis, New Mecca and the Quasi-Deads. They can played individually or all at once and last just over seven and a half minutes in total.
Toombs' Chase Log - A ten-minute long video-diary recorded by Toombs and covering ninety-two day journey chasing the bounty on Riddick. It follows virtually the same style as the chase log on the Pitch Black DVD and I assume that it's another attempt to flesh out the background a little but Coombs' grating accent is a turn off after a few minutes and it just isn't that interesting.
Riddick Insider - Titled as Riddick Facts On Demand this feature, when enabled, presents pop-up information bubbles while playing the movie. These contain a large variety of production and storyline trivia and are actually quite interesting and to some degree help cover the lack of an audio commentary on this DVD. However, I sometimes found them disappearing before I'd finished reading, which was a bit annoying at times. It can be turned on and off at will by turning the second subtitle track on or off.
Visual Effects Revealed - A six-minute short, behind-the-scenes look at a few of the visual effect sequences in the movie. Presented by David Twohy, visual effects supervisor David Chiang and several of the effects technical team, the scenes covered are the visible thermal front effect on Crematoria, the disintegration of the Purifier, Aereon's transparency and the Hellhound interacting with the waterfall. There are so many great effects scenes in the movie, this seems almost like a free sample to what could have been.
Trailers - Trailers for The Chronicles of Riddick: Pitch Black Special Edition, The Chronicles of Riddick: Dark Fury and Van Helsing DVDs. There are also trailers for The Bourne Supremacy and Billy Elliot: The Musical although I can't think why anyone would think the latter of these two would appeal to a Riddick audience.
Riddick's Worlds - Vin Diesel gives us a three-minute whirlwind tour of a few of the movie sets used such as the streets of New Mecca, the surface of Crematoria, the Basilica, the Quasi Grotto and U.V. 6. This is very short and you will feel rushed but it is supported by some 360° interactive views of eight of the sets.
DVD-ROM - Some PC-only features using the somewhat troublesome InterActual Player software, which presents the DVD through a customised Internet Explorer interface. I remember trying it when I reviewed The Bourne Identity and soon had it uninstalled as it caused more problems than it was worth. However, I'm reviewing this DVD on a Mac so can't comment on the content here and probably wouldn't install it even if I had a PC handy as a matter of principle. The owners of Macs and other systems buy DVDs like any other consumer but shouldn't be overlooked just because they are in a minority when compared to Windows users.
Play the XBox Game - Insert the DVD into an XBox game console and you get to play an entire level from The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape From Butcher Bay. An excellent extra value addition to the DVD but only if you have an XBox. Again, I can't comment on the quality of the game here as I've only got a PS2 and have no plans to buy an XBox.
Overall
The Chronicles OF Riddick is an excellent science-fiction tale that should appeal to most fans of that genré and doubly so for fans of Pitch Black and Riddick. The picture and sound quality are reasonably good, although a DTS track would have been a better choice given the material.
Being a single-disc offering, the extras package has obviously had to be severely cut back to fit and suffers much for that decision. I'm hoping there's going to be a later, 2-disc version as there is so much scope in this rich and detailed universe to offer a much larger package of extra material.
