Dredd - first look

Back in the day I had high hopes for the Judge Dredd movie starring Sly Stallone - you see Judge Dredd was like our own hero and it felt as if we had some sort of ownership. Where Batman and Superman belonged to an earlier generation, I was there at the start with Judge Dredd (I was twelve when the 2000AD comic came out) and what's more Dredd, although operating in a future America, was British.

Then the Stallone movie came out and fans everywhere went - "What the fuck?"

Will the new movie, simply titled Dredd make up for the fiasco that was Judge Dredd: The Movie? Pete Travis is directing Karl Urban, Lena Headey and Olivia Thirlby are starring, and we’ve seen a few shots from the set already, as well as a nice image of Urban as the man himself, and this new picture is ripe and ready to be poured over by Dreddheads everywhere.

At least they seem to have the look right this time - the uniform looks modern and yet functional, and those shoulder pieces are not as big as those in the Stallone movie, which although true to the comic book style made Dredd look rather camp up on the big screen. And best not mention that cod piece.

Dredd is expected to hit cinemas this December.

Let's hope they keep the helmet on this time - that helmet is Dredd's face!


Sly Stallone said of his Judge Dredd movie -

Stallone's camp Dredd

"I loved that property when I read it, because it took a genre that I love, what you could term the 'action morality film' and made it a bit more sophisticated. It had political overtones. It showed how if we don't curb the way we run our judicial system, the police may end up running our lives. It dealt with archaic governments; it dealt with cloning and all kinds of things that could happen in the future. It was also bigger than any film I've done in its physical stature and the way it was designed. All the people were dwarfed by the system and the architecture; it shows how insignificant human beings could be in the future. There's a lot of action in the movie and some great acting, too. It just wasn't balls to the wall. But I do look back on Judge Dredd as a real missed opportunity. It seemed that lots of fans had a problem with Dredd removing his helmet, because he never does in the comic books. But for me it is more about wasting such great potential there was in that idea; just think of all the opportunities there were to do interesting stuff with the Cursed Earth scenes. It didn't live up to what it could have been. It probably should have been much more comic, really humorous, and fun. What I learned out of that experience was that we shouldn't have tried to make it Hamlet; it's more Hamlet and Eggs"