Posted in: Movies, Universal | Tagged: pitch black, riddick, riddick: furya, the chronicles of riddick

Riddick: Furya, Starring Vin Diesel, Set To Start Production In August

A fourth movie in the Chronicles of Riddick franchise, which stars Vin Diesel and is titled Riddick: Furya, will begin production in August of this year.

Universal Pictures wants to continue its work with Vin Diesel beyond The Fast Saga, and that means more projects that Viesel himself has a lot of investment in but that everyone else might not be as into. Or at least, that seems to be the case when you're talking about a fourth movie in the Riddick franchise. We've known that a four Riddick film has been in development for a while, for ten years, if we're being technical, because the first time Diesel talked about the project was January 2014, but now there is a production start date.

According to Variety, production for Riddick: Furya will begin on August 26th. The film will be written and directed by David Twohy and produced by Diesel under One Race Films,  Samantha Vincent, Thorsten Schumacher for Rocket Science, Lars Sylvest for Thank You Studios, and Joe Neurauter. The project currently doesn't have a release date, but Variety did get their hands on a brief summary:

"In "Riddick: Furya," Riddick finally returns to his homeworld, a place he barely remembers and one he fears might be left in ruins. But there, he finds other Furyans fighting for their existence against a new monster — and some of these Furyans are more like Riddick than he could have ever imagined."

Two Decades In The World Of Riddick

We first entered the world of Riddick back in 2000 with the release of Pitch Black. While far from a critical smash then, the film went on to make over $50 million at the worldwide box office on a budget of $23 million, making it a sleeper hit. In less than a year, Diesel, who starred in the film, would help kick off The Fast Saga, which would essentially pay Universal bills for the next two decades, and it likely means that Diesel had a lot of leeway in terms of getting his passion projects greenlit.

In 2004, The Chronicles of Riddick was released, and the reviews for this one were even worse than the first one. This film leaned much further into fantasy elements, but that didn't help the movie find an audience either, even if we all were emerging from making The Lord of the Rings a massive hit and we were only two movies or so into the film adaptation of Harry Potter. The Chronicles of Riddick managed to gross $115 million at the worldwide box office, but even on the low end of the reported budget ($105 million), that is a loss, and on the high end ($120 million), it was absolutely a loss.

It would take nearly a decade for Universal to take a chance on Riddick on the big screen again, though the character did spend some time in video games. Riddick was released in 2013 as The Fast Saga was beginning to explode in terms of the box office and quality. Riddick was about as well received as Pitch Black, which was a resounding "well, that was fine" generally, but the film did exceptionally well at the box office compared to the previous films. On a budget of just $38 million, the movie grossed just over $98 million, making it the first certified hit that the franchise has had.

It's a little surprising that it has taken nearly a decade for another movie to come to be. Diesel has been focused on The Fast Saga, and Marvel did snatch him up for Guardian of the Galaxy not long after the release of Riddick, but Diesel has been talking about this film since January 2014. Since then, there have been little updates here and there, but this production update is the first time it seemed like this fourth film, Riddick: Furya, will actually come to be. Considering this timeline, it likely means that by the time Diesel wraps on his, he'll have a break for the holiday and then jump into production for Fast XI at the beginning of 2025, so he will have a busy year ahead of him.

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