Review: Riddick (2013)

I love Pitch Black, but The Chronicles of Riddick disappointed me especially the damn shaky cam and over-lit fake-looking sets. I didn't care about the mythology. Calling his home planet "Furya" was just dumb and far too obvious. Alexa Davalos was incredible in that sequel though. I really liked her character, and the film had a good ending. When rumors of another one suggested it'd go back to more Pitch Black territory, I was really looking forward to it. Sadly, I was pretty underwhelmed again. The writer/director avoids shaky cam this time, but the film is full of cruddy CGI, and it's almost a complete rehash of Pitch Black except they have characters you don't care about, a weak silly contrived ending, etc. The monsters are also fairly weak, and there's only one type of them throughout the whole freakin film. I liked his furry companion, but the CGI sucked. It was like a bad cartoon. Plus, after The Chronicles of Riddick, Diesel's character has kind of lost his edge. You can't do Pitch Black again without bringing something new to it.

I miss her.

Review: ChromeSkull: Laid to Rest 2 (2011)

I wasn't very impressed by the first film. A ton of practical gore, which is nice, but you need a good story and characters too like John Carpenter's The Thing. Of course, I know very few movies will ever come close to that, and Laid to Rest was just a small indie, but still, they could've done more. This sequel doesn't improve much. I cared even less about the characters, and ChromeSkull sat around watching for most of the running time with an imitator doing the dirty work. You'd think a movie with the title of its killer would actually feature said character racking up a huge body count, but that's not the case here. I like seeing Danielle Harris in just about anything, but she also doesn't have much to do except try to win ChromeSkull's affection. You see more of his organization, but it still doesn't make much sense. Obviously, they have to be rich, but how do they get their money? Why does ChromeSkull record everything? Who is behind it all? Is it entertainment for some sick wealthy group of psychos or what? The problem with a film like this is if you're not invested in the characters, it's just boring.