Excellent. I think this story arc will be a great one. I definitely enjoy the mythology.

I think its a shame that they are kind of missing the point. Most people, while liking the character of Riddick, enjoyed Pitch Black for what it was, an enjoyable creature feature.

I wish they would go back to that rather than the Dune ripoff.

Finally! All these years and we finally get some good news on the rest of the trilogy. I am so excited and hyped up. I love everything Riddick from anime and movies to the games.
Just as he stated, I have always seen the Chronicles Of Riddick as a sci fi LOTR and it really is that, epic.

Chronicles of Riddick is NOT a Dune ripoff! Sure, it has a similarly gothic-influenced aesthetic, but the only other parallel is that of a prophetic interstellar savior. For that matter STAR WARS would be a ripoff of Dune. Space opera is space opera. I'm just glad to see more OF it!

ANYTHING VIN DIESEL WANTS TO STAR IN,I'M UP FOR; THE GUY IS HOT!!!!

WHAT !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I'm definitely ready for some more Riddick. The 1st two movies were a good watch. I just hope they don't release them in the heart of summer movie season (maybe November or spring).

I just hope they continue off Riddick where he just assumed leader position of that army (forgot what they were called) and go from there. After he was undoing that invasion I always wondered what he planned next.

I just hope they get back the original cast and not leave those roles empty.... Judi Dench, Thandie Newton, and Carl Urban.

I'm really curious to see what Karl Urban's character (forgot his name too, it's been awhile since I seen it.) does towards Riddick since he was going to assume leadership before Riddick beat him to it.

Instead of remaking every movie made they should do sequels instead, since apparently they are running out of ideas.

Squirrel, if you're reading, the villains in Chronicles of Riddick were the Necromongers (Death Dealers/Death Promoters). I liked Pitch Black but I am not sure how I feel about Chronicles of Riddick. However, I hope they really are making a sequel and Vin Diesel isn't pulling our collective legs.

What he meant to say is that he considers Pitch Black to be The Hobbit of the series...and the Riddick films as being what The Lord of The Rings is to The Hobbit.

That said, The Chronicles of Riddick needs a special edition...one with an extensive new edit of the film and some new shots, effects, and whole scenes to replace much of what was wrong with The Chronicles of Riddick. Specifically, aside from the opening prologue, the prison escape scene, and the final where we see Riddick fall into the Necromonger throne chair...most of the scenes where lacking, and the effects were strangely poor for such an expensive film. I would cut out much of the planetary assualt scenes, and a great wealth of the Necromonger footage. The bulk of the film's focus should have been on Riddick and what he does when not in the hands of his pursuers. If you recall the original Star Wars (?), we didn't see much of Vader or the Empire...no, largely, they stayed in the shadows and that made them seem scarier. The fault of Riddick, was the villains were up close and personal, making them all too human. Yes, we knew too much about them, and that took away the boogyman factor...which made them seem weak as compared the the Empire? We should have largely learned about the Necromongers by reputation, not over wordy drama.

Lastly, the film was painfully slow in advancing the plot, and or, scenes therein, and looked and played like low rent Shakespearian opera...and thus, it needed a quicker pace and a more real world feel, ala Babylon A.D., which is more speculative science in style than science fiction/fantasy. It is that kind of mood that Riddick needed, sort of like a fast moving Mad Max/Road Warrior or Blade Runner in space feel, as opposed to what we got. Vin Diesel promised us an Evil Star Wars, but the film played like Star Wars lite, instead of like a more aggressive and vicious version of Star Wars, which it should have been!

Uber, did you really just state that Mad Max was a fast paced movie compared to Riddick? :) Or for that matter, that Riddick should have been more like Babylon A.D.--a movie the director disowned? (Don't get me wrong, A.D. was interesting in its own right, but it was a horrible hack job of top stuido execs.--tell me, if you've seen it, exactly why the children were so important. That's right, they never really say. I had to read the wikipedia about the book it was based on to find out.) Granted, I haven't yet seen the DVD of A.D., which is supposed to have more of the director's original vision in it. Anywho...

Riddick was great. I know everyone is entitled to their opinion, but my opinion is that your critques are not well placed. The FX were quite effective for most of the movie. They were dark and industrial, much like your aforementioned Bladerunner. There's not much of a cooler scene than Riddick running through/over buildings with fire pouring into the sky.

The Necromancers could not be like Star Wars because we already knew what the Empire was. They were just bad people trying to quell the rebellion. The Necromancers needed more explanation and provided more depth to the story. It could be argued that Karl Urban's role could have been left out completely, but as it was, he was an interesting character that added another dimension to the movie.

My own critical points about the movie are along the lines that the dialogue (outside of Deisel's) was too campy for some of the situations (or too cliche). Also, while I think that pacing, in general, was alright, some of the editing in transitions and placement of scenes were off. It made some things more complicated than they should have been.

I am really excited about the new Riddicks and as someone else said, I would love to see Dench and Urban reprise their roles. Adding elementals into the story just makes it that much more interesting. Hopefully the movie gets less executive meddling than A.D. did. (And is it too much to hope for a duck that antagonizes Riddick, a la The Pacifier? *evil laugh*)

((please, god, let me live long enough to see these movies I have waited so long for...and thank you for answering my prayers...))

Everyone knows that to appreciate Sci-Fi, you need a higher IQ.

If you didn't understand and appreciate Chronicles, you could make a living as a movie critic.

So I gather the next film will have a taste of Pitch Black, and will then expand upon this with Riddick's time on the throne of the Necromongers. I like the idea of Riddick as reluctant leader…but remember, he liked his independence. Don't care to see Thandie Newton return though, I for one never thought she was that attractive. Karl Urban’s Vaako was cool, but he’s off to Star Trek. With Alexa Davalos’ Kyra killed off in Riddick, (sad to see her character go) guess she could make an appearance in the next movie in a memory or maybe a part of his conscience. And now a chance to see Furya… I definitely look forward to seeing this next movie.

@shazan: Might want to go back and read Dune again. Other than a certain fleeting resemblance to a single specific set design aesthetic (the fact that Helios happens to be a desert planet, I suspect) there's really no resemblance whatsoever.

With that said, I'm glad to see a return to Riddick's Universe... I'm really interested in seeing what the Underverse is all about.

Oh and a side comment to SciFi Wire: Lighten the Captcha info, or at least give us a reset button to choose a better code-block. Most times it takes three or four tries to submit simply because it's almost damn impossible to read.

Writer/Director David Twohy and star Vin Diesel promised the expected audience and fans that Riddick would be "an Evil Star Wars", their words, not mine...and they did not deliver on that promise! And yes, Mad Max/Road Warrior played much faster than Riddick.

As for Babylon AD...the kids represented some kind of quantum leap in evolution for the human race, a sort of, Christ like coming...at least, that is what I got out of it. I didn't read the book Babylon Babies, (I think it is called?)...so I can't say...or compare the two. All I am saying is, that it played better than Riddick, thanks to it remaining moored closer to the real world...and advancing the plot quickly. To be fair, I even tried to rewatch Riddick last night, and found it unwatchable it was so bad! As a character, Riddick is supposed to be a different kind of evil, but he was played as a misunderstood hero in Chronicles. I loved Pitch Black because he was a bad guy, who showed nuances of perhaps being a good guy, but that was kept hidden...and is the key to his character being so cool. Well, the character that Vin played in Babylon A.D. is largely the same guy, he's a criminal and a thug first and foremost, but there is something good in him, maybe? The filmmakers of A.D. served the audience more by playing up the character's bad side--that, and the movie moved. No parts of Riddick moved fast, save for the opening sequence, the prison escape, and or, the climax...and even worse, the film sets, keep reminding you that they are all just that, film sets. In that, there is something really cheap looking about Riddick. Even the prison dogs look cheap...but the creatures in Pitch Black looked almost real at times.

David Twohy broke one of James Cameron's biggest rules for filmmakers. Twohy built huge sets for Riddick, blowing much of the film's budget in the process, which is a no, no...if you aren't going to see alot of primary action there, on set, you don't build that set. James Cameron always said if you are just going to use a set for a small few shots...don't build a whole castle set, for instance, better to use a miniature, a matte painting, film on location, and or, green screen the shot.

Lastly, the special effects often--and more often than not, specifically, looked cheap. The costumes looked like costumes, instead of lived in, real world items, and the lighting was bad, etc. Basically, the film was badly done, and Twohy was in way over his head, having never done a film with such a big budget before. How is it that the animated Riddick, Dark Fury, was better? Likewise, reports say that Butcher Bay, the video game was better? I'm just saying, it serves to give one pause? The Chronicles of Riddick should have been a sure fire hit--I mean how could you mess it up? Getting it right should have been as easy as shooting fish in a bucket with a shotgun, but somehow Twohy managed to blunder the job?

BTW, Twohy didn't like his cut of the film either, and he did a director's cut, which is even worse than the studio version as it is just a longer mess than the original...shorter, mess of a movie.

My last post is to Shroudedwolf.

I for one welcome more Riddick. While I'm not a huge fan of all of Diesel's work, I loved Pitch Black, and quite enjoyed Chronicles. Then there's the game, Escape from Butcher Bay, which was also quite enjoyable, and now that gets a sequel. Here's hoping that the Hollywood execs stays well away from this one, and lets Diesel and Twohy make a decent movie. I'm so tired of the idiotic spewings of Hollywood that passes for sci-fi ("Jumper" springs to mind, good example of really cool concept turned to meaningless drivel).

Riddick is CONAN!, Pirate, Thief, Assassin, and eventually, King. Like Howard's timeless Creation, these stories are fun, they do not have to be deep! Look what that got Watchmen.......

For some reason, a lot of people hated the last movie and I have to say that it was a pleasant surprise for me. I enjoyed Pitch Black for what it was and I truly enjoyed Chronicles. I can appreciate a variety of SciFi related stories and these fall right into the pleasure bin for me.

That being said, I don't know if I would like a reversal in style or budget considering that it really is the story that will make the movie swim. I await more details about the project.

@Requiem.....Diesel and Twohy said that the next movies will go to the Underverse and Furya. The Underverse is supposedly where the dead go after death. Maybe Riddick will find Kyra there?

At least we're talking semi-original material. With all the remakes, fresh air is nice to see. Pitch Black is one of my all time favorite movies, and Riddick, a favorite character.

"Did not know who he was messin' with..."