Judge Dredd: The Complete Case Files Volume 1
Year: 2099 Progs 2-60
Writers: John Wagner, Pat Mills, Robert Flyn, Kelvin Gosnell, Charles Herring, Malcolm Shaw, Joe Collins
Artists: Carlos Ezquerra, Mike McMahon, Ian Gibson, Brian Bolland, John Cooper, Massimo Belardinelli
Where to start reviewing a collection of some fifty-odd Dredd tales? Well, we can always do something like this; Dredd catches criminals by shooting, jailing them and sometimes killing them in the process. First published in 1978-1979 what hits you is how well the material holds up when being read some 25 years later. For anyone reading this that is used to a monthly title that structures its story across 22 pages the most startling thing is the pace. Stories begin, develop and conclude in 6 pages or less! The single largest tale in the collection is the 9-part Robot Wars story, although Dredd’s posting to Lunar One is the setting for several stories.
Mega-City One, although seen as one of the sources for Blade Runner’s future dystopia, is not a totally bleak place to live. Far from it, we see the Judges enforcing law upon all, in an even-handed fashion that seems quite idealistic. For example, if you are a businessman, you are free to conduct business as you please up until you cross the line into unlawful activity of any kind, like kidnapping your rival’s children and replacing them with spy robots. Some of the laws are quite inventive, like cars having to be environmentally clean machines; something that in real life London is preparing to do a version of in the next few years. The Judges recognise mental health problems and how it affects citizens’ responsibility for their actions, even if those citizens engage in illegal activity, though there must be a sentence it must be one that is appropriate for both victim and criminal. The ultimate idealism in Judge Dredd is that it looks like, sooner or later, everyone receives their just desserts.
The whole notion of law, coupled with an image of a life not much different now gives the stories a timeless quality. With the stories of Dredd enforcing the law on the Lunar colony, we get a sense of imperfection to prevent the future being too perfect, with a wild west atmosphere being present initially in the Lunar stories before it is tamed by Dredd. We get a brief look at the politics of the future with Sov-Cit judges attending the Lunar Olympics, their presence being one of the few things that dates the collection. Dredd restores law to Lunar One and then returns home to Mega-City where a hilarious tale unfolds of Dredd being uncharacteristically polite to all and even tolerating crime, until he is officially reinstated – at which point normal service is resumed with a vengeance!
The creative staff reads like a who’s who of British comics at the time, with several names that went on to work on US comics such as Brian Bolland and Carlos Ezquerra, the former in particular being known for his work on Batman: The Killing Joke. All the writers deliver good stories, even if some of them are a bit hit and miss in their villains or plot. For the price the amount of material here makes it a more than worthwhile purchase.
Lines that leapt out at me as I read the book were:
“Twist it to the right, Judge Giant. Loosen the insides.”
“Aah!”
“My boy! What are they doing to my boy?”
“We’re trying to rip his head off, ma’am.”
And
“Anything special you boys want me to put on your gravestones?”
“P-Put ‘Died of old age’, Judge. W-we surrender.”
And what about Dredd? Dredd isn’t a stone cold character. Although we never see Dredd really lose it, it is clear he is devoted to the ideals of the law, loathing those that break it in clear knowledge of what they do and especially any crooked Judge, who is worse. Even if his duty as a Judge means killing his brother Rico, Dredd does it – although Rico’s death is one of the few times we see Dredd’s emotional resolve crack slightly. Then there is his home life. Here Dredd actually has one as he is saddled with Walter the Wobot and his landlady Maria. Overall it’s fair to say the character is still being developed in these early strips, a development that the Cursed Earth epic would take much further.
Ben Crofts is resident in Essex, works in London and has found comics and philosophy mix surprisingly well.