Prog 2371 - Smash the State

[Jacqusie]

I wonder if we're already ramping up for an epic 50th anniversary story?

By Wagner?

That would be good.

Dredd gets piles & goes on an adventutre to buy some Preparation H and a nose hair trimmer

[Fortnight]

Young Dredd has an accident with a teleporter/cloning machine combo during a freak time storm and multiple copies of him scatter throughout time allowing him to be whatever age you fancy indefinitely. 

Every 10 years however many are alive at the time get together for a shindig and a catchup and the youngest agrees to take over when the oldest dies. The ones in between get a lifetime off.

[broodblik]

I know a lot of you guys wanted the Maitland experiment to work but that would have killed the thing that makes MC1 so interesting: the madness, stupidity the ultra violence, the psychos , the simpletons. What type of stories would we have if all sectors where happy and peaceful - picking flowers, making tea or just how to hula-hoop stories.

[IndigoPrime]

There were potentially other avenues, in that it could have continued as-is rather than spread, causing some great tension. The issue with reverting quite so severely to the status quo is it leaves Dredd himself totally isolated. He has repeatedly recognised the need for change. He has Fargo's words ringing in his ears. He's constantly supported Beeny. So where does that go in light of this story? Probably nowhere. But that makes Dredd a walking contradiction – a hypocrite, really. At the very best, he's going to need a pair of extra tight boots while immersing himself in constant peril and danger, to distract from his own inaction.

Also: say Hernandez becomes the big bad. Inevitably, he'll be beaten because big bads always are. So we get a new Chief Judge, presumably backed by Dredd. But Dredd himself obviously won't step up. And then what? He walks away, while everything slowly repeats in slightly different ways. It's like he has no self-awareness sometimes.

[warmachineuk]

I'm incorrect, as seen in authoritarian regimes, in that you can put the genie back in the bottle if you beat enough people with daysticks.  That creates huge resentment, usually leading to cycles of more riots and beatings.  The status quo can be restored, just uglier.

I reckon there's another story in this.  Maitland had lieutenants and they saw the evidence, first hand, her idea worked.  They're demoted and scattered to nothing jobs but can see MC1 creaking under the strain.  Meanwhile, Dredd investigates how an assassin simply walked out of prison.  This leads to why and what Dredd really hates: politics.  Dredd is a believer in the daystick but really hates corrupt judges, so has to ally with said lieutenants against Hernandez.  Hernandez can't demote or publicly slander Dredd 'cos he's Dredd.  So, it's time for even more murder and intrigue at the highest level.

[BPP]

That angle was never from a rooftop tho.

[IndigoPrime]

Maitland certainly had supporters, although I'm not sure how many people were working under her (nor how many really wanted to). The tricky bit is figuring out where this entire strand ends up, and what part Beeny would then play.

Dredd has always considered her the future (or at least 'a' future), but clearly in the Williams/Wyatt Dredd universe, she has no future. People like Hernandez want the hard rule of law. Throughout the story, we saw Judges letting shit happen to get their way. Logan comes across as complicit or – at best – unwilling or unable to push back against those elements and so does not. Surely at some point, Beeny is either removed from the board as well, due to being a reformer, or has to play an endless game of keeping her head down until she is disillusioned with the system to the point she wants no further part in it?

There had of course been hints that she could be Chief Judge. But in this version of the Dredd universe, that seems about as likely as Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez as US president, or Caroline Lucas being UK PM.

[Funt Solo]

That angle was never from a rooftop tho.

All things considered, I'm glad I'm not a good judge of realistic angles of sniper fire from rooftops.

[Funt Solo]

I know a lot of you guys wanted the Maitland experiment to work but that would have killed the thing that makes MC1 so interesting: the madness, stupidity the ultra violence, the psychos , the simpletons. What type of stories would we have if all sectors where happy and peaceful - picking flowers, making tea or just how to hula-hoop stories.

I wondered about a middle ground where the experiment had limited success. Or - if you really wanted to lean into the madness of the city angle - the entire NW Hab Zone seceding from the rest of the city. Now I'm on that path - you could have Beeny as CJ of the NW Hab Zone. Dredd stays there, and the main city goes down the ultra-authoritarian path it was heading for when TC tried the takeover a few years ago.

[Vector14]

I know a lot of you guys wanted the Maitland experiment to work but that would have killed the thing that makes MC1 so interesting: the madness, stupidity the ultra violence, the psychos , the simpletons. What type of stories would we have if all sectors where happy and peaceful - picking flowers, making tea or just how to hula-hoop stories.

I wondered about a middle ground where the experiment had limited success. Or - if you really wanted to lean into the madness of the city angle - the entire NW Hab Zone seceding from the rest of the city. Now I'm on that path - you could have Beeny as CJ of the NW Hab Zone. Dredd stays there, and the main city goes down the ultra-authoritarian path it was heading for when TC tried the takeover a few years ago.

Then the NW Hab zone can't handle all the regular citizens who want you want to defect to their utopia. Maitland follows the numbers and their system only works perfectly with the optimal amount of citizens. They have a tide of regular mega city 1 "refugees" they can't handle, echoing the real world economic west.

They end up erecting walls, caging kids and shooting illegal immigrants in order to maintain their perfect utopia AND BECOME THE THINGS THEY FOUGHT AGAINST!

[Southstreeter]

That angle was never from a rooftop tho.

I can't quite figure out Maitland's position here. Given that we see the (incredibly fast moving) bullet's trajectory, she must already be falling backwards when the bullet hits her. I guess it's artistic licence, showing the shot and the resulting fall in one frame.

[Tomontherun94]

Jovus, that double page.

Started reading Dredd with the Mega Collection and later prog 2073 so for me Maitland's always been there and I would consider her a major supporting character. Her death felt just as impactful as Hershey's (both times) or if a character like Beeny got killed off. I'll be disappointed if this is some kind of fake-out though