This week's Dredd was good but all wrong!

Thread Zero · 25 January, 2002, 04:10:38 PM

MAJOR SPOILER ALERT**********MAJOR SPOILER ALERT*******

I really liked this week's Dredd by Morrison and Doherty but the portrayal of Dredd and Justice Dept was completely wrong.

Even taking into account Dredd's occasional humanity, these are some of the big time errors:

Bear with me!

1] Biggest mistake is having the mother being united with her child.

She is dependant on an illicit drug and would be unfit to look after her child.
The child would be taken into foster care and or/a drug rehabilitation unit.

2] Despite Dredd being humane, he's overlooked the many crimes the mother has perpetrated. This is the list -
a] Wilful abandonment of a minor. Namely leaving the baby on a pedway. I'd say that would be at least a year or three in the cubes.
b] Attempted suicide. The mother jumping off the terrace. Suicide is illegal in MC1. 6 months I reckon in the cubes for that.
c] Possession and use of an illegal substance, namely heroin. 6 months a piece I'd say.
That is a minimum of at least 3 and half years in the cubes.

3]The mother would never be reunited with her child so soon. First she would have to serve her time and be weaned off the drug. It's silly to think she would be fit to look after her child.

scojo who really is related to Judge Dredd

Thread Zero · 25 January, 2002, 04:19:52 PM

Oh year, if Dredd wanted to stick even closer to the letter of the law, he could add the crime of wilfully infecting a minor with an illegal substance.

Namely the child becoming addicted to heroin in the womb.

scojo firm but fair

Thread Zero · 25 January, 2002, 04:25:40 PM

But I guess if it were the true Dredd as I have mentioned, there wouldn't be much of a story then!

No happy ending I mean!

scojo

paulvonscott · 25 January, 2002, 04:54:20 PM

From your title Scojo, I was about to agree with you. I really liked the Dredd story and felt it was churlsih to complain it wasn't right but...

I thought the introduction of heroin to the Mega City timeline really missed the point of the comic strip. We've had a addiction stiries before, whether it's uncle umps, sugar, tobacco or caffiene.

I'd also like to know where they grow this heroin?

Having said that, it would be interesting if it was actually very easy to cure in the Meg now, making the drug somewhat impotent. Although of course until they are busted then they probably aren't going to.

Also, how do we know they escaped the cubes? They could both be sent to the same cubes. I bet it happens (it does in out society sometimes).

Anywya, i thought the story was great, even though it really jarred on me in many ways. I thin k I'd rather have seen the same idea done by another writer.

EAC. Sorry.

Thread Zero · 25 January, 2002, 05:18:51 PM

PVS,

I guess the trick with a Dredd story like this is to get the balance right.

When does Dredd stop being a judge and act just like a normal human being?

I reckon if John Wagner has written it, Dredd would have been lenient to an extent but the mother would still have to serve some time in the cubes.

I good example would be the meg story - Bury my knee at wounded heart. Issue 46 (vol 2). Dredd empathised with the old man to an extent but he still had to do the time.

scojo

fraston · 25 January, 2002, 06:07:48 PM

i think the only people who can write decent dredd stories are Wagner and Rennie. Anyone else just doesn't come close in my opinion.
start the campaign for no-more-sentimental-weeping-kid stories.

Wake · 25 January, 2002, 06:14:32 PM

>i think the only people who can write decent
>dredd stories are Wagner and Rennie.
>Anyone else just doesn't come close in my opinion.

What, not even Alan Grant?

paulvonscott · 25 January, 2002, 07:36:18 PM

I didn't actually mind the whole Dredd observing the family and the sentimental side of it. Whether you like it or not, you can't tell me Dredd hasn't thought about that life for himself. In fact I hope it's a choice still open to him. You might want him to be just a hard bastard comic character with a gun, but Wagner has created something quite different. He isn't just that.

Whoever the writer is, I don't think anyone comes close to Wagner. It stops just being a comic strip when he writes it. I read the pit yesterday for the first time and it was great, evrything I want from Dredd. I left the magazine when he did in despair at what was happening without him.

I think other writers (and that includes Grant) can write a really good Dredd story but get the feel and balance of it somehow wrong. I enjoyed the last Grant story and that last Morrison one (no dubious references for a start) but there was just something about them that jarred a little.

I think it's time for these one off dredd stories to be relegated to second strip and allow (if he is willing and able) Wagner to do an ongoing storyline based series of Dredd. I honestly think with the ongoing timeline (which is a good thing) that opportunity's for the strip are just being p*ssed away.

I would like to see at some point in the future, Dredd leaving and his post being taken full time by Rico. I know there's hints at it but we don't know for certain. It's not as bad as you think. I don't want it to be like superman, where the same Dredd's still pounding the streets fifty years after I'm dead.

fraston · 25 January, 2002, 08:05:52 PM

not anymore, no.

it's not just about dredd being hard bastard: it's the grasp of the irony that dredd is imbued with. MC1 is a lunatic asylum and dredd is the striaght man, which is why i dislike the "cop with a heart" stories because it's just not dredd is it? it could be any old cobblers.

anyway, i only ever like dredd when written byt he 2 chaps i mentioned. but i am new to dredd so i have less of an attachement to him than most. no nostalgia here, not like in the good old days