Kick, Push, Kick, Push, Shank.
Rewatching Pitch Black today, it's hit me dead-on why that movie succeeded and Chronicles of Riddick failed. One could argue there were many reasons but they can all be reduced to one: The Furyans. Get rid of that element and the whole narrative pulls together like a Rube Goldberg spidermech.
It's like this: The first movie's plot had all the hewn elegance of a shiv. It knew what it was on about, threw in just the right surprises (Black Guy lives!!) and, best of all, they don't tell you everything (did Riddick kill Fry or not?) The setting was a grungy essentially hard-sf Used Future. The protagonist was a basically human badass. Sure, he's got borderline supersenses and can instantly analyze the weak spots of alien monsters but that's no more than, say, Conan has managed in his time. Chronicles on the other hand wanted to justify that big budget and be a mirror-universe Star Wars or somesuch. Fission Mailed.
The Necromongers (a better name would have gone a long way) work in principle as an expansionist thanatocracy who want to liberate the rest of us from the misery of existence and genuinely can't see why we object to that. They understandably present a problem for anyone who wants human civilization to, you know, continue. Cue the Elementals.
Suppose Aereon (another excessively literal name) and her people (who we should have seen more of) had set up an artificial myth centuries ago, of a fierce warrior who would one day bring down the warrior king of a mighty and destructive society knowing after all that these things always happen - especially if they're helped along. The Lord Marshal of the ... yeah, I'm not saying that again. Call them the Grateful Dead for all I care. In any case, the Lord Marshal, encountering such a myth, would readily assume this song is about him and take steps.
The Elementals work in principle as grey eminences playing life-size board games from behind the curtain. With no Furyans, them propping up Riddick as some kind of dark Messiah would be a calculated gambit. Think of the Bene Gesserit and the way they seeded multiple worlds with invented religions and cue-card prophecies just so their agents have ready-made armies and support networks when they need them. If Riddick just happened to be the right peg to plug into their square hole of artificial myth, that would make sense. That would rock, particularly when he finds out.
More importantly, Riddick would be a badass because his life has led him to that and he embraced it, not because he's the fucking Chosen OneTM (and aren't we heartily sick of that fucker yet).
So, lose the Furyans, ditch the midichlorians and make everybody happy.
It's like this: The first movie's plot had all the hewn elegance of a shiv. It knew what it was on about, threw in just the right surprises (Black Guy lives!!) and, best of all, they don't tell you everything (did Riddick kill Fry or not?) The setting was a grungy essentially hard-sf Used Future. The protagonist was a basically human badass. Sure, he's got borderline supersenses and can instantly analyze the weak spots of alien monsters but that's no more than, say, Conan has managed in his time. Chronicles on the other hand wanted to justify that big budget and be a mirror-universe Star Wars or somesuch. Fission Mailed.
The Necromongers (a better name would have gone a long way) work in principle as an expansionist thanatocracy who want to liberate the rest of us from the misery of existence and genuinely can't see why we object to that. They understandably present a problem for anyone who wants human civilization to, you know, continue. Cue the Elementals.
Suppose Aereon (another excessively literal name) and her people (who we should have seen more of) had set up an artificial myth centuries ago, of a fierce warrior who would one day bring down the warrior king of a mighty and destructive society knowing after all that these things always happen - especially if they're helped along. The Lord Marshal of the ... yeah, I'm not saying that again. Call them the Grateful Dead for all I care. In any case, the Lord Marshal, encountering such a myth, would readily assume this song is about him and take steps.
The Elementals work in principle as grey eminences playing life-size board games from behind the curtain. With no Furyans, them propping up Riddick as some kind of dark Messiah would be a calculated gambit. Think of the Bene Gesserit and the way they seeded multiple worlds with invented religions and cue-card prophecies just so their agents have ready-made armies and support networks when they need them. If Riddick just happened to be the right peg to plug into their square hole of artificial myth, that would make sense. That would rock, particularly when he finds out.
More importantly, Riddick would be a badass because his life has led him to that and he embraced it, not because he's the fucking Chosen OneTM (and aren't we heartily sick of that fucker yet).
So, lose the Furyans, ditch the midichlorians and make everybody happy.