It's not the PITCH BLACK rehash the trailers indicate (mostly).

I liked it. I didn't love it. I'm a big fan of the character though and want to see more. I hope it's successful enough to keep the story going.

Ultimately, this film is a lot like Pitch Black, which doesn't allow the film to feel very fresh, however, the supporting acting is better here. And Vin Diesel definitely delivered an R rated film this time, which will make fans happy.
The biggest strengths are obviously the Riddick character, the look of the film being much more like Pitch Black, and Katee aka Starbuck

B+

RIDDICK

The first time I saw this was at a screening but I had taken a couple allergy pills so I was drowsy as hell. I was very tired throughout the film and could barely keep my eyes open so that probably muted my enthusiasm. In fact, yesterday I was gonna watch This is the End again instead of watching it in Liemax a 2nd time. Okay, I decided to watch it again with full awareness this time and I really enjoyed it. I guess I've forgotten the Riddick character because I remember nothing from the first two other than that lady getting pulled back into the darkness in the first film. Judi Dench in the 2nd, I think. This film made me want to watch those films again. I need to find time to do that this weekend. Anyway, I thought Diesel was fantastic, the supporting players were interesting and had their own personalities. I loved the blonde in the film. Shute, put her in another action film. Put her in FF8 or something. I'm looking forward to seeing more of Bautista in GotG. That Spanish dude was real good too. The action is limited but for what was in the film was good. I liked what did take place. When it was all said and done I was hoping for something after the credits. Alas, there was nothing. I'm down for a 4th if Diesel ever does one.

Grade - A

Considering the muted reception of the prior mega-budget entry in the Richard B. Riddick franchise almost a decade ago, the existence of this more modestly scaled third film is improbable, but I am glad it does exist. A clear personal project for the creative team, including star and co-producer Vin Diesel and writer/director David Twohy (an undervalued genre craftsman in general), it is a clever and well-crafted B movie which delivers what it promises: masculine action, creature-feature suspense and violence, and other guilty-pleasure charms. The first 30 minutes are a near revelation: the story opens with our title hero betrayed by the religious army which crowned him king at the end of the second film and stranded on a hostile alien planet, bruised and bloodied and on the menu. The largely dialogue free sequences focused on him surviving, adapting to the cruel environment, and embracing once again his most beastly impulses are a hypnotic example of visual storytelling and may also represent the franchise purging itself of the second-rate space-opera pretenses which led it astray. Once two separate teams of bounty-hunting mercenaries come to the planet, the experience becomes more conventional on the whole (the final sequences in particular hew very closely to the Aliens/Tremors style template of Pitch Black), but never uninteresting: several sequences large and small are staged with a certain playful wit, including an anxious comic gem involving the potential boobytrapping of a safe, and the desert-planet imagery, with its fantastical reptilian wildlife and burnt-orange vistas, is often awe-inspiring despite a comparatively low budget.

B+

Oh, and it is fairly neat how the first act is so intensely focused on Riddick in every conceivable way, but then he becomes an enigmatic, threatening man in the shadows as the focus shifts to the feuding bounty hunters during the second act. A bit of a gamble, perhaps, since Diesel is such a huge star now and because Riddick is established as an ultimately noble character, however nasty on the surface, but it plays well.

I was confused by one scene. Was Dahl (Katee Sackhoff) raped by Molina, did they have consensual sex, or did nothing happen?

Isn't it implied she beat him up again (off-screen)?

On another note, I dig how the actor playing Boss Johns is three years older than Cole Hauser. His performance is solid, but perhaps they should have newly conceived the character as Johns' brother if they were going to cast an actor in his early forties instead of a Clint Eastwood/Sam Shepard type.

That was my reading of it but then I thought maybe he took off the key thing for sex or something which is why he was hesitant in opening the locker, besides Riddick being a badass or whatever. It was just a weird scene.

Riddick never took the key off his neck. He was just baiting them to remove the lock.

And yeah, she kicked his ass.

I love the key scene: the way he is 99.5 percent certain the key never left him, but the unnerving remaining half of a percent begins to expand in his mind, and he cannot help but question himself until the situation reaches an absolute fever pitch over largely nothing. It is such a simple scenario, but becomes very suspenseful and more than a bit hilarious, too.

I second David wrt the Jeremiah Johnson/Darwin-like first 30 minutes. Pure bliss.

How dos Riddick keep his head shaved?

3/4.

Same way he shaved his head in PITCH BLACK.

It's solid, but a bit underwhelming. I really dug the first 30 minutes, because Riddick is a complete badass, but when it switches to the mercs it sort of stalls out and becomes less involving. I honestly didn't care for any of them and I was surprised at how much Riddick was thrown to the sidelines.

Now I admit the stuff with the key was pretty funny and the movie was ALOT more humorous than I was expecting, but it goes on far too long IMO. The monsters also aren't that interesting eventhough the mix of practical and cgi effects are handeled well.

Overall it ain't no Pitch Black, but it will do for now.

The monsters are a bit deflating because the best scene with them is the cave fight during the first act. None of the monster centric action near the end is as intense and brutal.

Dug it.

15 out of 5.

Oh I definitely agree. Plus I was hoping there would be some kind of EPIC fight with that big fucker he had fought in that cave earlier, but it never happened which kind of sucked.

The monsters were honestly weak here and they should have taken full advantage of the R-rating and put in more crazy/gory kills in that third act.

riddickulous

Big fan of this series. I just purchased/rewatched Riddick today. The unrated version has some extra scenes in it leading up to the betrayal that strands him on that planet (including more Karl Urban), and a scene at the end setting up a future movie. It's impression actually improved on second viewing, though I'd still give it a solid B+. I love how they are in no rush to tell this story and it just draws you in. This character is awesome. The first part of this movie before the mercs land is probably my favorite sequence in any 2013 movie. I also love Riddick finally getting to the lead merc while still chained up. Plus, considering the budget, this movie looks great.

B+

Starbuck definitely got raped.

To clarify that, I know Katee Sackhoff isn't an amazing actress, but she can nail the "I really wanna kill this guy" look. She didn't have that on her face before the rape scene, it was there every time after.

The movie was OK. Pitch Black and Chronicles were much better. C.

Riddick

It's better than The Chronicles of Riddick, and on par with Pitch Black. Vin Diesel isn't a great actor, but he can play Riddick perfectly, and very good at doing so (it's probably the only role I like him in and it's the only role where he's not playing Vin Diesel). Apart from a few weird dialogue choices, on the whole it was good. It could have been gorier. I liked the first half and second half transition. We saw him hunt and survive in two totally different scenarios, and the film could have been a standalone.

The ending was a bit sloppy. They saved him and then they had a lovely little mid-flight chat because, you know, they're BFF. Puhhlease. Apart from that, the film was good.

Jordi Mollà was ace as the dirtbag bounty hunter (that's actually a pussy), and his death is one of the best things in the film. Katee Sackhoff does he best TV acting possible, and it kind of pays off. She has a testosterone-filled sexiness about her. Dave Batista is just a muscle-for-hire punk. David Twohy can be proud of the trilogy he has created.

B+