Kurt Loder Reviews Riddick, Salinger and Blind Joe Death
(Universal Pictures)
In his thirteenth year of intergalactic badassery, shiny-eyed outlaw Richard Riddick (Vin Diesel) has escaped from Planet PG-13 (where he was marooned in the 2004 Chronicles of Riddick) and made his way back to the grottier R-rated universe of the first Riddick film, Pitch Black. Why he should be doing this is a mystery understood only by the series' star and its director, David Twohy. Diesel already has one blockbuster franchise going (the recent Fast & Furious pulled in more than $400-million worldwide), and at this point, after a nine-year hiatus, the Riddick films seem unlikely to cohere into anything similar. One can only assume that Diesel's formidable box-office clout makes him a hard man for Universal to say no to.