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Judge Dredd: Mega-City One - TV show announced!

Started by Jim_Campbell, 10 May, 2017, 05:10:35 PM

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SIP

Quote from: ZenArcade on 18 May, 2017, 05:54:10 PM
SIP you haven't put a foot wrong in this thread and. I admire and support your views in your posting. Z

Cheers sir! Really appreciate that.

Andy Lambert

QuoteAnyway, I'm bowing out of the debate at this point as I seem to be very much in the minority here (to my surprise). When you are the only person crying out for something, perhaps you need to realise when to give it a rest :-)

Hey, I may not agree with everything you say, but you're putting your views across eloquently and with consideration, so please don't feel you can't continue to do that. My last post may have appeared a bit garbled and brusque, I was on a train at the time and didn't have time to say what I wanted to say properly.

At the end of the day, it doesn't matter what we talk about here - it's very unlikely to influence the making of the tv series. Shouldn't stop us from from a little wishful thinking though... ;)

SIP

No worries Andy, I haven't taken any offence from anyone at all. Just think that I appear to have a contrary view to most of the direction of current, so probably less inflammatory if I step out of the debate.

JOE SOAP

#573
Quote from: SIP on 18 May, 2017, 03:00:09 PMThe walking dead TV show has been a grim monotone for series after series extremely successfully. So can't agree on that point. Similarly game of thrones also holds a fairly dark tone with some use of humour.  Many a dredd epic has done exactly this and have been considered amongst the favourites of readers. Day of chaos for example.

We absolutely disagree on the direction we would want, I think packing in 40 years of the more wacky elements of Dredd would be a mistake.

But Judge Dredd isn't The Walking Dead or Game of Thrones and that goes not just for the TV series but also the original comics and books of those 2 series. Dredd has a different set of tones, settings, stakes and a different purpose of intent. It's perfectly OK for a single episode or film to take a more serious angle for its duration but when a whole series of Dredd is stripped down and back to just being about future cops in a violent city, it can very easily slide into being just police-state porn, so it needs some element of the absurd and irony to off-set the harshness - to lampoon to a certain degree - because too much harshness in a show about an oppressive, walled city-state, really will turn-off a broader audience.

There's a tendency when adapting comics to just shoehorn them into or make them cohere to all ready established, well worn tropes or genre beats. Dredd needs to be more than just a comic that's watered down to the tropes of a police procedural or Homeland Security TV show. It needs to be a lot more than that, otherwise it's not really being faithful to the inventiveness and uniqueness of the source, and there's less of a point in spending so much adapting it when it would be cheaper to just do a series about fascist cops in a modern day setting.

There doesn't need to be '40 years of whackiness' in every show but it will be elevated when it's a little more than just the odd sarcastic/sardonic quip from Dredd. You only need to look at the comical or absurd elements in the recent Judge Harvey story to see that it still works and is still relevant - and how diminished would PJ Maybe be without the absurdity of his escapades mixed with his personal banality?

Think of RoboCop and how it neatly toes the line between its variety of themes and tones: urban harshness, fatalistic-futurism, social commentary, pathos and absurd humour are all perfectly juggled in one film.

Despite what many in the press often proclaim, Judge Dredd isn't just Dirty Harry set in the future.




sheridan

Quote from: Woolly on 16 May, 2017, 06:19:07 PM
Things I want:

I really hope we get to see Brit-Cit at some point, and a spin off Armitage series if we're especially lucky.
Brit-Cit would be good (as a spin-off, in a CSI:$insert-city-here manner).
Quote
Judge Giant needs to be in it.

Yep, though which one?
Quote
Even if this isn't going to be a continuation of the 2012 film, I hope Karl and Olivia can reprise their roles.
Even if they're not the same characters, I'd like to see them make an appearance (think Superman / Smallville / Supergirl / New Adventures, with actors from one making appearances in what comes after).

Richard

QuoteIt's all about tone. Including some of the more zany, or supernatural, elements of the comic in a gritty, grounded approach a'la 2012 Dredd would be fine.

I agree. But most of the people on this thread seem to be arguing in favour of a wacky comedy approach, which would certainly alienate most non-fans, and would be so different from the 2012 film that it wouldn't make sense to do it, given that (as SIP says) it's that groundswell of support inspired by the film which has led to this project. Nobody clamoured for a sequel to the 1995 film or for a TV series based on it.

As someone else said recently, there were already some interesting SF elements in the 2012 film, you've just forgotten them because we tend to take Anderson's psi powers for granted. We could have more stuff like that, but still have a show that non-comics-fans actually want to watch. What we can't have is a nostalgia-fest for people who love the first three Case Files. That won't work.

I think Game of Thrones went about it the right way: although set in a fantasy world, it started out down to earth, let us get to know the human characters, and gradually built up the dragons, zombies and magic. Having Judge Death in the first episode would be a mistake. By all means have him turn up later on.

JOE SOAP

#576
Quote from: Richard on 18 May, 2017, 07:47:37 PMWhat we can't have is a nostalgia-fest for people who love the first three Case Files. That won't work.

I think relatively few are hankering after that but you can pretty much go through every era of Dredd and find some outstandingly inventive absurdist elements. Even taking examples from the earliest stories – are the Aggro Dome, Smokatorium, The Taxidermist and even Get Ugly, not brilliantly absurd creations from the early days that can't work?

It really is a question of degree – while churning out a weekly comic for teenagers didn't give much opportunity for reflection on output, the TV series should have the benefit of 4 decades worth of hindsight, so there will be ample opportunity to strike a balance between all the elements that have made Judge Dredd a worthwhile, thoughtful and humorous read for 40 years. How all those elements are brought in and out of focus during the duration of the series is the structural throughline to making it all work.


The Legendary Shark

Quote from: Richard on 18 May, 2017, 07:47:37 PM

...most of the people on this thread seem to be arguing in favour of a wacky comedy approach...



I don't think that's the case. It seems to me that the actual desire is for the absurd elements to remain an integral part of the story because the world is absurd and growing more so with each passing year. Much of the absurdity also stems from the crushing boredom of 400 million largely unemployed citizens looking for something new to distract and engage them. When those absurdities turn out to be dangerous, the judges have to deal with them. Those absurdities aren't just light-hearted comedic high-jinx, they're serious comments on real-world absurdities and vital - vital, I say - to Dredd's world.

[move]~~~^~~~~~~~[/move]




sheridan

Quote from: IndigoPrime on 17 May, 2017, 08:36:18 AM
On arresting Dredd, quite a few things don't work unless you have the foundations set first. Fans often clamour for Death but he makes no sense without knowledge of Dredd, and nor do things like Mechanismo, Cal and 'doubts' about the system.

I don't know about that - Cal was pretty early in the strip's history.  Remember we didn't even have a year of Dredd Mega-City One stories before he was packed off to Luna-City One.  He came back for one week, then went off to the Cursed Earth.  The day he returned from that was the day the Law Died.

sheridan

Quote from: The Legendary Shark on 17 May, 2017, 12:53:56 PM
The advantage we have is 40 years of stories. Hundreds of seeds could potentially be planted, some to grow, some to wither and some as red-herrings or Easter eggs to wrong-foot or titillate the fans. You could even have the whole Harlem Heroes storyline playing out strictly in the background, incidentally on holoscreens or vidzines or in citizens' conversations, for example.

We've got the depth, let's use it.

I really love the idea of having things like Harlem Heroes play out solely in the background.  Like flavour text for casual viewers but a real easter egg for the likes of us.

Dark Jimbo

Quote from: The Legendary Shark on 18 May, 2017, 09:02:05 PM
Quote from: Richard on 18 May, 2017, 07:47:37 PM
...most of the people on this thread seem to be arguing in favour of a wacky comedy approach...

I don't think that's the case. It seems to me that the actual desire is for the absurd elements to remain an integral part of the story because the world is absurd and growing more so with each passing year. Much of the absurdity also stems from the crushing boredom of 400 million largely unemployed citizens looking for something new to distract and engage them. When those absurdities turn out to be dangerous, the judges have to deal with them. Those absurdities aren't just light-hearted comedic high-jinx, they're serious comments on real-world absurdities and vital - vital, I say - to Dredd's world.

Yep. So much is made of the 'Dredd as hero' versus 'Dredd as villian' tropes, but of course there's a less mentioned third one, and by far and away my favourite - 'Dredd as straight man'. Contrast that granite visage and total lack of patience or humour with the idiotic citizenry and you've a recipe for gold, every time!
@jamesfeistdraws


sheridan

Quote from: dweezil2 on 17 May, 2017, 07:52:58 PM
Quote from: Steve Green on 17 May, 2017, 07:49:02 PM
Heavy Metal Kid 'Call-me-Burdis' goes on the rampage and stomps towards Pete Wells Block.

To be played Godzilla style by CF in a robot suit smashing the crap out of miniature buildings.

+++CALL-ME-BURDIS WILL NOT BEHAVE+++

Trapped in the 'Cellar Of Dredd' with only a 1995 movie action figure for company!

"It puts the lotion in the basket or it gets the hose again!!!!"   :o

Judge Dredd-themed bathroom products?  Never gonna happen...


The Legendary Shark

Quote from: Dark Jimbo on 18 May, 2017, 09:24:47 PM

...'Dredd as straight man'. Contrast that granite visage and total lack of patience or humour with the idiotic citizenry and you've a recipe for gold, every time!


Hear, hear!
[move]~~~^~~~~~~~[/move]




sheridan

Quote from: A.Cow on 18 May, 2017, 05:40:33 AM
IMHO I think Walter the Wobot presents an excellent opportunity to explore pathos in the series.  He doesn't have to be a one-dimensional Jar-Jar Binks comic relief job.

As a downtrodden droid, mistreated because of his speech impediment, he'd give a great opportunity to explore the relationship between citizens and their servile robots.

I don't recall Walter being mistreated due to his rhoticism.  Really the main person to mistreat Walter is Dredd, and that's just because the Judge finds the robot annoying.