Headscratchers / Riddick

• Is that believable that Matthew Nable's character is Cole Hauser's character's father? The two actors are only 3 years apart, and neither of them looks older or younger enough...
  • Given that the Riddick universe contains inter-stellar travel, stasis technology, and biological engineering (Riddick's eyes for example) so it is entirely plausible, if not possible, that the universe also contains anti-aging technology.
  • Also, maybe the son was younger than he appeared but due to a hard life of bounty-hunting as well as his addiction, appeared older. Matthew Nable's character seemed pretty disciplined and likely took better care of himself.
  • Alternately, cold sleep during interstellar travel may suspend the aging process, so the father might not seem that much older than the son if he spent a lot more time in such a state than his offspring.
  • According to the wiki, Johns Junior is 38 years old but after taking away the time spent in cryo he's closer to 29.
• Paying twice as much for someone dead rather than alive makes no sense at all- can't they just put a bounty on Riddick's head and add they want him dead only? Because if you can pay twice as much for him dead, you essentially say you don't want him alive. Especially since it's easier to kill someone rather than just catch.
  • Perhaps some people would rather have him alive. Case in point: Boss Johns.
  • It could be a legal loophole. Making the contract Dead Only is basically putting a hit out on Riddick (or whoever else you want dead) but with Dead or Alive (double pay if dead) at least gives the option, however unlikely, that the target would be captured rather than outright killed.
  • Also, consider what's happened to EVERY place where Riddick has been brought alive. Every prison: almost everyone dead. Every planet: almost everyone dead. Bringing a dead Riddick, PROOF that he's dead and not "left for dead", would make the Universe as a whole a much safer place, and well worth the expense.
  • It may not be legal technically to put a hit out on someone and this might have been the closest you could legally get to sending out an assassination letter. Which considering Riddick does NOT live in a nice universe it's possible that someone in the past has brought Riddick in alive, collected (or not) and cut him loose on someone they (or a third party) wanted dead. Dropping Riddick in the middle of the enemy camp has got to be one of the most deadly things a person can do.
  • Normally bounties pay twice for the person to be brought in alive. Riddick is just so unlikely to be killed and not to mention a career criminal that they'd pay more for him dead.
    • That's partially how I took it. Whoever set the contract wanted Riddick at all, preferably dead (as indicated by the pricing); however, if 'circumstances' dictated that Riddick was alive (e.g. get him into the ship to kill him, set on autopilot, running battle until ship arrives, Riddick is presented alive to the contractor), then whoever brought him in would still get something for the trouble. Not as much, since the contractor now has to deal with a pissed Riddick...
  • There may be jurisdictions where bounty hunters are only allowed to go if they're seeking to bring people in alive. By claiming they're pursuing the "Alive" side of the contract, they can search those areas for Riddick and then kill him "in self-defense" if they find him. Or just haul him off alive and shoot him the instant they're out of that jurisdiction.
  • It's possible that said bounty condition was made when they heard that Riddick became the leader of the Necromongers, pretty much the scariest badass army in the universe, who had been known to wipe out star-systems, they probably wanted to kill him because of the risk him being the leader was, and they might be able to broker a deal under the whole "keep what you kill" mentality of the Necromongers.
• How the blue fuck did a sweet-tempered and kind-hearted devout-Christian Nice Guy kid like Luna end up working for an asshole like Santana?
  • He simply needed the money and wanted to help clean up the galaxy. It's easy to forget that Riddick is a very bad person and while this was clearly a good kid I think the reason he wanted off planet wasn't because he really truly didn't want to screw with Riddick after two seconds of learning what he was capable of. Which most sane people don't.
  • Lack of opportunities. He's a newbie and took the first crew that would accept a meek greenhorn.
  • Also, Santanna gives as an explanation that he's a good luck charm.
  • The actual reason may be simpler: When Santana is trying to persuade Johnns' crew that there's no reason to land, he refers to his crew being (part of) a clan. Luna's probably on the crew because he's part of the (extended) family.
• Why doesn't the Necromonger make absolutely certain that Riddick was dead? It seems from the previous movie that they take the "You keep what you kill" motto very seriously. To the point that even Vargo immediately takes a knee instead of attempting to fight a presumably still tired and injured Riddick. While I find it hard to believe that simply coming back without Riddick would be sufficient proof that he's dead I can accept that. What I can't accept is that when/if Necromongers find out that he survived that his assassin gets to live very long after that. Not because he tried to kill the Lord Marshall, that's clearly part of their society's rules but taking credit for another's kill or a failed kill seems like the sort of thing they'd take very seriously.
  • He was probably convinced that Riddick was dead from the fall. Even if he wasn't, it's not like he's going to fly out of there any time soon. The only known ship on the planet was his own.
  • Based on what happened on Crematoria (Vaako left Riddick for dead in the scorching sun, then reported to Lord Marshall that he was killed) in "The Chronicles of Riddick", The Necromongers are not very keen on making sure Riddick stays dead.
    • That was different. In Chronicles of Riddick, Riddick is essentially a nobody to the majority of Necromongers. The Lord Marshall was concerned because of the prophesy (which considering he had at least one Furian in his army he clearly doesn't take but so seriously) by this point Riddick IS the Lord Marshall. The man who "killed" him presumably went home and claimed the title of Lord Marshall for himself in keeping with the you Keep what you Kill code. As mentioned above it's probably a high crime to claim a kill that isn't yours or didn't happen especially if said kill elevates you to the rank of Lord Marshall.
• If the assassin had guns that could blast through a huge piece of rock, and Riddick was hiding behind a very small rock, why didn't he just blast Riddick with them?
  • It didnt blast through large pieces of rock, it destabilized and brought the entire thing crumbling down.
• Why don't they lock the locker again after that fake bomb dilemma?
  • Bad writing probably, but if you want to be generous, the mercs might have thought Riddick wouldn't try to get to the locker when they were just a few feet away from it.
• Initially Santana's crew keep a girl in stasis to collect bounty on her. Before starting the hunt for Riddick, they ditch the girl to avoid overload. But, considering that they plan to collect only Riddick's head, doesn't it seem a bit too precise level of cargo juggling?
  • Considering what happens a few seconds later, it is more likely that Santana wants to use her to send a warning to Riddick.
  • It also sets up a good case of Kick the Dog for Santana. He might have gotten away with just being a Jerkass in the film, but having him shoot an unarmed woman in the back after promising her freedom sets it up so that when he eventually gets his, no one is going to mourn the Asshole Victim. At least the mercs with Johns and Luna were a little more stable and less back-stabby.
• How long and how well-known was it that Riddick was the new Lord-Marshall? I'm asking because if that was well-known, Riddick would have even more bounty-hunters after him, particularly ones sent by anyone that opposes the galaxy-conquering force known as the Necro-Mongers, who would want to at least interrogate Riddick on his what he knows about them, particularly since he was their leader.
  • People outside the Necromongers probably don't know that he was Lord Marshall. The previous Lord Marshal was never named in the film, so if people outside of Necromonger society ever did hear Necromongers talking about their leader for some reason, they probably always just heard him called the Lord Marshall and not "Riddick." Plus, it's not like Necromongers send out press releases, so the likelihood of people finding out their inner workers is slim.
  • Aside from that, we learn that there were certain requirements Riddick "never got around to doing", so he probably wasn't the LM for long and since he wasn't as keen on invading planets as the other Necromongers were, likely didn't cause much trouble.
    • In the motion comic that was used as a trailer for the movie, there's a more detailed version of Riddick's flashback. The scene with the Necromonger fleet is labeled "en route to the Underverse" so Riddick probably set a direct course toward the threshold (which was exactly what he did at the end of the novelization of the previous movie), without ravaging any planets.
• Why send assassins to kill Riddick when the entire creed of the Necromongers was, 'You keep what you kill' when Riddick gained leadership over them after killing the previous Lord Marshall? If any of the three assassins Krone brought with him successfully kills Riddick, he's gonna get shot too if the assassin has any brains knowing Krone will betray him too.
  • The extended scenes and ending of the Director's Cut elaborate on that, showing that Krone was in it on his own (and with his goons) to kill Riddick. He mentions that the Necromongers should never allow outsiders like Riddick, or merciful souls like Vaako, showing that Vaako didn't care to kill Riddick. He could tell that Riddick didn't give a damn about being a Necromonger, and that made it easy to tempt him with the location Furya to get him out of the fleet. He gave false coordinates, but all he wanted was Riddick gone, so that he could continue the journey to Underverse and attain "transcendence" and become an undead Lord Marshall like in the previous film.
    • Actually Vaako did intend to keep his word and send Riddick to Furya, knowing that if he sent him anywhere else, Riddick would come back and promote him to full dead.
• In the beginning Riddick splints his broken leg with the pieces of his armor. However, he fixes the plates onto his leg with spikes he drills into his flesh. Then later he is seen limping with that leg. How is it possible that that kind of flesh-fixed splint is able to keep itself together without those spikes ripping off from his flesh? The whole point of having a skeleton is that the flesh is too soft and stretchy to support a grown man's weight. Even if Riddick could handle the pain of such a setup, the flesh itself has too much give to fix those spikes securely enough. There would be so much movement with every step that they would come loose in no time. Maybe those spikes were supposed to be drilled all the way to the bone, but they didn't seem long enough for that.
  • They were supposed to be drilled into the bone, the length is a case of Artistic License – Medicine and Sci-Fi Writers Have No Sense of Scale.
• So, what was Santannas big plan if he had successfully Raped Dahl? Boss Johns comes back to base, finds Santanna having a post-rape cigarette, Dahl obviously raped, Boss Johns and his crew kill Santanna, also adding to the fact that Riddick was there, and he seemed like he was going to do the job if Dahl couldn't fight Santanna off. Was it just to show what we already knew? that Santanna is a massive scumbag?
  • It's been a while since I saw the film, but Santanna probably wasn't thinking that far forward. So yeah, he's a massive scumbag, and an utter moron.
  • Seeing that he was a murderous a-hole to the woman he let go to send a message to Riddick, it's safe to say that if he had succeeded in raping Dahl, he seems likely he would have killed her to keep her quiet and make it look like Riddick did it. As to if Johns would see through Santanna's lie is hard to know for certain.