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Judge Dredd has a shot at returning to a screen near you — albeit a smaller one.
Entertainment Weekly reports that Jason Kingsley and Chris Kingsley, owners of the U.K.-based studio Rebellion Developments (which also happens to be the company behind the Sniper Elite series), will executive-produce a Judge Dredd television show with Mark Stern and Stuart Ford, president and CEO of IM Global Television, respectively. The show, entitled Judge Dredd: Mega City One, will be a joint production between Rebellion and IM Global.
“We’re very excited to be beginning the journey to get more of Judge Dredd’s Mega-City One on the television screen,” the Kingsleys told Entertainment Weekly. “Thanks to the legions of fans who have kept up pressure on social media, and a lot of background work and enthusiasm, we aim to make a big budget production that will satisfy both our vast comics audience and the even greater general screen-watching public.”
Dredd and his fellow Judges are a judge, jury and execution force in a future United States in which the entire Eastern Seaboard is a single, massive urban dystopia. Judge Dredd comics are infamous and beloved for their over-the-top violence and social commentary, as well as the titular character’s unflinching morality and the deadly tactics he wields to enforce it.
Dredd already has two film adaptations under his belt, one starring Sylvester Stallone and, more recently, 2012’s Dredd, starring Karl Urban, for which the Kingsleys also served as executive producers. Dredd received mixed reviews, but has since developed a strong cult following for its faithfulness to its source material. The titular Judge was created by writer John Wagner and artist Carlos Ezquerra, and debuted in the second issue of 2000 AD, the British weekly sci-fi comics anthology series that has been running since 1977.
Rebellion Developments has published comics since it acquired 2000 AD (that is, the publisher of the same name that publishes 2000 AD) in ... the year 2000. According to Entertainment Weekly, the new show will be an ensemble drama about judges in Mega City One. It is still in early development and has no talent attached as of yet, but it does have a poster, which you can see in full at Entertainment Weekly.
