‘Pitch Black,’ a surprise package in the Sci-Fi genre, was full of stories about powerful supernatural races that can take over the earth, ancient prophecies, and an anti-hero with exceptional skills.
It was a hugely successful venture that quickly grew a large fan base and before you knew it, spawned sequels. Riddick’s character, played by Vin Diesel, was the superstar’s acting breakthrough (well, apart from the Fast & Furious line), and Riddick’s anti-hero persona was an instant hit with the audience.
Furthermore, as the much-anticipated ‘Riddick 4: Furya approaches its release date, the anticipation is building for Vin Diesel to reprise his role as Riddick. Let us go back to Riddick’s roots and have a good look at his past before he returns at large on the big screen!
The troublesome origin story that adds more value to our favorite anti-hero
Our favorite anti-hero, Richard B. Riddick, has lived a life full of struggles right from his birth on the planet of ‘Furya.’ He was one of the last Furyans ever to be born, as this warrior race was brutally slaughtered by ‘Zhylaw.’ Zhylaw was the sixth Lord Marshall of the religious Necromonger empire that believed in ‘Necroism’ and opposed the creation of life.
After Zhylaw became Lord Marshall, he visited a seer from the ‘Elemental’ race who revealed a prophecy about a young Furyan male who would one day be responsible for Zhylaw’s annihilation.
To prevent this from happening, Zhylaw launched an attack on the Furyan planet and personally killed every male born on Furya. The Lord Marshal even went so far as to twist the umbilical cords of newborns to ensure that a male child is never born on Furya. Riddick was one of those infants who had just been born on Furya, and Zhylaw had strangled him with his umbilical cord. Though Zhylaw made sure that he killed Riddick, the young child somehow survived and was rescued by unknown forces.
While growing up, Riddick did not remember much about the Furyan massacre, and he was under the impression that it was his mother who had strangled him with his umbilical cord. He believed that he was abandoned by his mother and dumped in a trash can as an infant.
However, as he grew up, Riddick’s repressed memories about Zhylaw’s massacre returned to him after his first encounter with the Necromonger race. He finally processed everything that happened to him as an infant, and he also kept getting strange visions of a Furyan named ‘Shirah,’ who later shows up in Riddick’s life and guides him through visions. Shirah also gave Riddick some of his powers and abilities, such as the Eyeshine, which made his eyes luminous.
As Riddick learned more and more about his past, he grew up and decided to join the ‘Company.’ He soon became a Company Ranger, a military worker who was sent on missions across planets. Riddick learned many skills, such as how to pilot a ship, and one of his missions was to live on the planet ‘Sigma 3’ and kill poisonous lizards called ‘Sweepers.’ It was quite a dangerous job, and Riddick almost lost his life several times while on this mission.
Later on, he went to work for the ‘Strikeforce Academy’ on Sigma 3’s moon, where he received intensive training as a soldier. However, he later learned that he was being trained to murder and torture people in the name of security, and he spoke up against such inhuman acts. Unfortunately for Riddick, the Academy ignored all his protests, and instead, they sent him to ‘Deep Storage.’ Deep Storage was an inhumane prison where only the worst criminals were kept under high security. Somehow, Riddick managed to escape from Deep Storage, though it is still a mystery as to how he managed this incredible feat.
In the next few years, Riddick took his revenge on many members of the Company and soon became a wanted man on five planets in three different planetary systems. Many bounty-killers also sought him out, but Riddick had grown into a psychopath and a seasoned mercenary who could evade all his opponents and break out of any prison facility.
Riddick in the cinematic timeline
Riddick was first introduced in the movie ‘Pitch Black’ in 2000, which was a huge hit and then paved the way for the rest of the Riddick Movies. So far, there have been three live-action movies, one short film, and three video games that have been released as a part of the ‘Chronicles of Riddick franchise.
Pitch Black introduced Riddick as a criminal convicted of many killings across the universe and having a huge bounty on his head. He had been captured by a bounty hunter named ‘William Johns’ who decided to impersonate a cop to be able to transport Riddick to a prison facility without any difficulties. However, their spaceship gets into a minor accident as it passes through a comet’s tail and malfunctions. The ship ends up landing on an unknown planet home to predatory creatures known as ‘Bio-Raptors.’
Riddick is forced to fight for his life and survive on this planet while escaping the Bio-Raptors as well as Johns. The passengers on the ship begin losing their lives one after the other at the hands of these vicious creatures. Riddick leads some of the passengers to safety, and they stay together to fend off the bio-raptors. By the end of the movie, the only survivors are Riddick, a young girl named ‘Jack’ and a man named ‘Imam’ who had been leading his co-passengers on a pilgrimage to New Mecca. The trio decides to return together, and Riddick operates the ship as they travel to New Mecca.
After the success of Pitch Black, the producers released a short film titled ‘The Chronicles of Riddick: Dark Fury’ [2004], which served as a connecting bridge to the next movie in the franchise that was released later in the same year. Dark Fury focused on Riddick’s travels with Jack and Imam after surviving Pitch Black.
However, they get in trouble with a mercenary ship ‘Kublai Khan.’ Though the trio works together to kill as many people on board, they get separated, and Riddick comes across ‘Antonia Chillingsworth’, the ship’s owner. Antonia collects criminals as her hobby and freezes them to display them as art, and she wanted to add Riddick to her collection.
After a lot of trouble, Riddick overpowers Chillingsworth’s right-hand man and her army of aliens. He finds Jack and Imam, and the three of them somehow manage to escape in one of Antonia’s shuttles. At the end of Dark Fury, the trio finally reaches ‘New Mecca’, and Riddick decides to go to the planet U.V. 6 from there.
The Chronicles of Riddick was released later in 2004, and it picked up right where Dark Fury ended. Five years have passed, and Riddick still hasn’t left U.V.6, which gets its name from the ultraviolet lights on the planet. In the meantime, Necromongers have been invading planets all over the universe under Lord Marshal Zhylaw’s commands. They finally show up on ‘Helion Prime’, which was the home planet of Riddick’s friend, Imam.
Imam knows of Riddick’s history as a Furyan, and he asks the Helion Prime leaders to get Riddick to fight for them. Though Riddick is reluctant to join the struggle at first, he is filled with fury to learn that Imam was killed due to the Necromonger’s attacks. He then makes it his life’s mission to avenge Imam, and he kills The Lord Marshal Zhylaw, thereby fulfilling the prophecy that was told decades ago. Having killed Zhylaw, Riddick then becomes the new Lord Marshal and takes over the Necromonger’s leadership.
The third installment of the franchise, titled ‘Riddick: Rule the Dark’ came out in 2013, and it was all about Riddick’s struggles after becoming Lord Marshal. He does not seem content with being Lord Marshal and wishes to learn more about his origins and visit his home planet, Furya. However, a Necromonger named ‘Krone’ leaves Riddick on an unknown planet full of predators. Riddick realizes he is stuck on a strange, desolate planet without any mode of travel and tries to survive while fighting off the predators on the planet.
After a lot of struggles, he comes across an abandoned mercenary station, built years ago on this planet, and he finds some essential supplies for his survival. He then uses an emergency button that summons two different ships. The ships were led by two different groups of people, one being led by a mercenary ‘Santana’ while the other was led by his enemy’s father ‘Boss Johns.’
Riddick’s plan seems to be going haywire, and an upcoming storm causes a lot of chaos as he is surrounded by enemies on all sides. However, he manages to get rid of Santana and takes over his ship with some help from Boss Johns. Riddick expresses his gratitude to Johns and even thanks him for being a more kind-hearted man than his son.
A fourth Riddick film, titled ‘Furya’, has been in the making for quite a while, and the title hints that the movie will be more about his past origins and life history.
The popularity of the Riddick series led to the release of a Riddick video game titled ‘Escape from Butcher Bay’ in 2004. The game was centered around Riddick’s imprisonment at ‘Butcher Bay,’ and it was quite a hit among fans. The video game is still listed as one of the greatest Xbox games of all time.
Butcher Bay also served as a prequel to the first Pitch Black movie, and it included Riddick’s escape from the highly inescapable prison of Butcher Bay. Later, video games such as ‘The Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena’ [2009] and ‘Riddick: The Merc Files’ [2013] were also released on various platforms.
What makes Riddick so powerful and versatile?
From a very early age, Riddick was defeating many powerful forces in the universe and never backed down from a mission. He was wanted all over the universe and had several bounty hunters and mercenaries looking for him, but Riddick always managed to be one step ahead of them. After being imprisoned for speaking against the Command, Riddick sought his revenge and went on a killing spree, eliminating several corrupt officers in the organization. He also killed the leader of the Necromongers ‘Lord Marshal Zhylaw’ and became the leader of the most powerful race in the universe. Even as a child, the Furyan warrior somehow survived a fatal attack by Zhylaw and stayed alive despite being strangled by his umbilical cord.
He has a lot of willpower, and Riddick always finds the means to survive even in the most inescapable situations. He is highly intelligent and very quick when it comes to identifying problems or devising escape plans. Riddick has also escaped various high-security prisons all his life, which is only a testament to his intelligence and problem-solving abilities.
Riddick is a sociopath, and he does not feel any negative emotions about his killings. He also doesn’t seem to feel much empathy and even calls himself an animal. However,
he is not just a ruthless killer, and all his crimes have been out of his need to survive rather than just for the sake of killing. Though Riddick has killed uncountable beings across the universe, he is not a crazed villain who kills anyone and everyone in his path. He has morals that prevent him from taking an innocent’s life, and he also looks out for children.
Riddick was gifted ‘Eyeshine’ by the spirit of a Furyan called Shirah, and this Eyeshine made his eyes glow luminescent even in the darkness. It also helped him see things clearly in the dark and gave him night vision. In a comic version of the story, Riddick gets his Eyeshine after asking a veterinarian to perform surgery on his eyes at a prison facility. Later, in the Butcher Bay comics, we learn that the Eyeshine was more than just a surgical procedure that Riddick got done at prison. In reality, Shirah had gifted him this ability after his surgery, and she also helped Riddick get in touch with his Furyan history.
Shirah also helped Riddick unleash the ‘wrath of the Furyans’ that resides within his being. She once touched his chest with her hand and left behind a glowing blue handprint that ‘carries the anger of an entire race’. Riddick then got the ability to produce energy waves that were powerful enough to even kill a whole group of Necromongers.
Riddick was trained in krav maga, hapkido, eskrima, and even ninjitsu, making him a formidable opponent in any fight. He also received military training and was highly skilled in combat as well as wielding weapons and hunting. Even without using his eyes, he is an extremely powerful fighter with super strength and speed. He also has a very high threshold of pain, and his body is strong enough to even remain conscious after being exposed to very powerful tranquilizers.
As a marksman, Riddick’s weapon of choice is a knife, and he even owns a special pair of ‘Ulak Blades’ which he puts to use while fighting off his opponents. He can also adapt well to any surroundings and forge tools out of anything naturally available to him. He is pretty resourceful and can even heal severe injuries on his own and find some food to survive even on barren planets.
All we know about Riddick 4: the gallant return of Vin Diesel’s iconic character!
Though a lot of details about this upcoming project are still under wraps, it is official that Vin Diesel is once again returning to play Riddick in the fourth installment of the franchise. Titled ‘Riddick 4: Furya’, the movie is about Riddick’s origins and childhood in Furya.
Vin Diesel has also taken to social media to share details about the movie’s filming progress, and it is clear that he is quite eager to return as Riddick. He even shared a storyboard for the film, which seems to be about a young boy whose eyes shine just like Riddick’s. Though no official timeline has been announced, we know that the movie’s script is ready, and it will give fans a glimpse into Riddick’s mysterious origins. With Vin Diesel himself hyping the movie up on social media, it is safe to say that we don’t need to wait too long and that the movie is just around the corner!
Conclusion
The Riddick franchise has been quite a hit with fans and has created a sci-fi universe unlike any other. As the movie that gave him his acting breakthrough, Riddick has also had quite an impact on Vin Diesel and also seems to be his passion project. It is a story very close to the actor, and he is quite determined to return to play Riddick. We are pretty excited to see what’s in store for Riddick, as we look forward to this anti-hero’s return in this new addition to the franchise!