Dredd Doesn't Know Kung Fu

Swede has been getting too big for Clubland. Time to cut him down to size by 'Iron Fist' here. Too bad Judge Dredd was patrolling nearby. No problem, just throw some shurikens at his chest.


Dredd can give as well as he can receive...


...but this new guy is just too good, Drokdamnit!

So who was the mystery assailant who took down the baddest Judge of Mega City One?

Stan Lee?! Dredd got served by a punk named Stan Lee!!

So will we, Dredd. So will we.

From Judge Dredd Complete Case Files 10 trade paperback.

Friday Night Fights: Classic Edition Round 5

Yesterday I talked about 2000AD's The Simping Detective and what a great character undercover Judge Jack Point is. Not only that, dude can take can of himself too:


That's his catchphrase, by the way. Whenever someone asks him, "What's your point?", he says, "Comes after the Jack." And if you didn't get it then you don't know Jack.

Anyway, just because he walks around in clown makeup doesn't mean he can't deliver some whup-ass. Observe:


Five ninjas, people! FIVE!! and that's after the bar brawl above. You don't wanna mess with this Bozo.

Neither do you wanna mess with Bahlactus!

From The Simping Detective tpb, by Steve Spurrier and Frazer Irving.

The Simping Detective (Rebellion, 2007)

I was gonna write a long winded review about why The Simping Detective is awesome and should be read by all comic book readers...but I won't. Not because these stories which first appeared in Judge Dredd aren't a joy to read, they are. I'm just not one of those who can write long winded reviews. All I can say is, "I like the book. Here's why."

The protagonist is Jack Point, a Mega City One Judge working undercover as a private detective who dresses up as a clown. A simping detective ("simp" is someone who dresses up like an idiot or a simpleton). In Mega City One, walking around dressed like a clown is normal. You don't get much respect but no one thinks it's strange either. Oh, in case you're not familiar with Mega City One, Wikipedia is your friend. It's Judge Dredd's hometown don't you know?

Jack's beat is Angeltown, a corrupt sector in Mega City One complete with a corrupt sector chief, a mysterious crime boss and lots of femme fatales. If this sounds like something Dashiel Hammett cooked up or the next vehicle for Humphrey Bogart to star in if he was still alive, then you'd be right. Simping Detective is written in the style of a Film Noir albeit with a guy in a ridiculous clown getup as the main character. It's also written in a noirish style: lots of narration and one liners. A wordy comic is an oxymoron some might argue as all those balloons and captions will crowd the page. True, so writer Simon Spurrier gives entire panels to Jack's words and it works. It doesn't distract the reader away from the art and in fact enhances it. Also, with a limited page count to tell a story (8 pages...2000AD is an anthology magazine y'know?) Spurrier needs all the space he can get to deliver the plot and hook the reader and make them come back for more.

Jack Point is a conflicted Judge. He's one of the good guys working undercover but the temptation to chuck it all in and go native is a strong one and we see him struggle with that thought frequently in this collection. It doesn't help that his immediate boss is a bent Judge out to get him (and Jack's scheming to expose his boss as well) and some rogue Judges are asking him to quit and go freelance with them. He likes the vile underbelly he calls his home but his loyalty to duty reminds him that he's only there under false pretenses and when the time comes he has to do what's right. Jack Point is definitely not a one dimensional, obey-the-law-or-die-creep character like Dredd. Kudos to Steve Spurrier.

He is ably assisted by Frazer Irving who manages to translate Spurrier's plot into beautiful art in the limited space given to him. Irving doesn't bother with the setting preferring instead to concentrate on the characters. If you see the setting included then you know it's important. Otherwise, it's just a pair of talking heads (sometimes three) talking against a black background. This is a 2000AD comic so it's in black and white but occasionally colours do appear for a panel or two and when they do, they pop out.

When Spurrier's plots are added with Irving's art the result is a very good collection of stories. I would even recommend this to fans of classic noir who wouldn't touch a comic book or a sci-fi book with a ten foot pole. You don't need to know anything about Mega City One or "Ol' Stony Face" Judge Dredd (who makes a cameo) to enjoy The Simping Detective.

There are some loose ends left unresolved by the end of the book and I hope there'll be a future collection to address these threads. Besides, I like to read more of Judge Jack's adventures. My favourite story in the collection: No Body, No How. Jack wakes up and discovers that he'd been sharing his bed with a dead woman who had been shot through the head. No sign of forced entry and the bullet came from his gun but he doesn't remember anything. Then his date shows up. Cracking story.

There is also an all-text story included along with a cover gallery and some sketches by Irving.

Judge Dredd Hates Comic Scalpers!

Yeah, in Dredd's world selling old comics is illegal. This is why:

Click and drag to embiggen

"After one or two, kids gets so they can't give it up. Then the price goes up and up..." Ain't that the truth, Ruth? Thank Heaven for Judge Dredd. He knows how to take down these lowlife scum....find out where their hideout is and shoot them. He is the Law, citizen!

From Judge Dredd: The Complete Case Files 01 collection

Batman/Judge Dredd: Judgement On Gotham (DC, 1991)

Hoo-yeah! This was one inter-company crossover that I couldn't wait to get my hands on when I first heard of it back in 1991. Two of my favourite nutcases together in a team-up book? And they're going after Judge Death? And the three main people involved in this book are Alan Grant, John Wagner and Simon Bisley? I've died and gone to nerd heaven.

Story: Judge Death, the Dark Judge who theorises that life itself is illegal, dimension-jumped his demon self to 1990s Gotham City and immediately starts killing upon arrival. A time waster, he is not. Batman appears on scene and since he's Batman, he takes down Judge Death pretty quick by putting Death's host body on fire forcing Death's essence/soul/whatever to flee down some dark Gotham alley. Batman, while investigating the charred body, presses a button on the dimension-jump belt and is transported to Mega City-One where he meets up with Mean Machine Angel and Judge Dredd. And the fun begins.


A whack to the jaw worthy of a Bahlactus sucker punch, an arm twist and Batman goes down like a rookie. But Bats gets his own back while being interrogated:

Meanwhile, back in Gotham, Judge Death has teamed up with the Scarecrow and they go to a heavy metal concert. They're in Gotham, they're looking for some fun killing spree, why not a concert? Lots of fresh meat there.

By this point, Batman has managed to escape Dredd with the help of Psi-Judge Anderson and together they jump back to Gotham just in time to see Judge Death and Scarecrow killing and gassing everyone at the concert. They fight, Judge Dredd dimension-jumps in the nick of time to help the good guys and the bad guys lose.

This crossover sold so well apparently that Dredd and Batman met up again another two times. I did not get the chance to read those subsequent meetings but from what I heard their second and third books together weren't very good. Hunt down Judgement On Gotham in the bargain bin if you can. It's a fun read and just might get you interested in 2000AD's Judge Dredd if you aren't interested in him already.

By the way, one of the funniest thing in this book was when the Scarecrow sprayed some of his fear gas on Judge Death and the dark judge started hallucinating. What is Judge Death afraid of?

Bwa-Ha-Ha-Ha-Ha-Ha-Ha!!

Judge Dredd: Judge Death Lives, Part 2

Continuing the Judge Death Lives saga, we pick up the story with Dredd on the case. I love the bikes here, the Lawmaster. They're what Pancho from CHiPs wishes he had if the 'Pimp My Ride' show existed in the '80s. These things have infra-red guided rocket launchers, machine guns, lasers and could probably pick up a porn channel or two on the computer. These bikes are that good.

Meanwhile, Judge Death has fully occupied the body of the man who freed him from his prison:

Death has his body, he has his helmet, his creepy like hell Judge's uniform and he has a disco ball. Let's PARTA-AYY! The people in that guy's building are so dead.


The Dark Judges go all Charles Manson's Family on the party goers. Don't you just hate gatecrashers?

The reason Dredd and the other Judges aren't going in, kicking butt and taking names is because Death has put up a shield around the apartment block. Unfortunately, the people inside don't know that:


Dredd knows what's gonna happen. That's why he's not doing that wave-your-arms-in-a-futile-attempt-to-stop-the-people-from-running-into-the-shield manoeuvre.


See?


By the way, Judge Anderson (as drawn by Brian Bolland) is HOT.


Thanks to her psychic abilities, she figures out where the Dark Judges are.


Those powers of hers must be hell on her love life. You can't lie to her. She always knows.

"Did you pee in the shower again, honey?"

"Nooo..."

"LIAR!"


Anyway, with the help of her psychic juju she and Dredd manage to break through the shield that surrounds the building and go hunt fot the bad guys. Judge Fire gets whupped first but not being alive to begin with, he escapes easily. Judge Fear takes his turn to kill Dredd:




Exactly how frickin' cool is Judge Dredd, anyway? Nothing scares him. He is the LAW!

Realising they're no match for a psychic and a walking embodiment of the Law, the Dark Judges teleport to their home dimension. Dredd and Anderson decide they must follow them there or otherwise, Death and his brothers are just gonna come back again. So, Welcome to DEADWORLD!

The restless spirits of the people the Dark Judges have killed (and they've killed everyone on their world) are urging Anderson to seek vengeance on their behalf. For some reason, they're all bald. Anyway, Judge Fire quickly puts Dredd out of the fight with a fiery trident through the shoulder:

Judge Anderson gives in to the dead and decides to screw with the Dark Judges by using the restless souls' desire for revenge to take Death and his buddies down:




So basically, the demons are defeated by ghosts.



Again, Anderson looks hot. She was released from a coma where a psycho demon was sharing her mind, volunteered for a suicide mission, travelled to another world, got mind-raped by billions of dead people who want to destroy the demon judges that killed them, all on the same day...and she still looks a million bucks. Dredd as usual is non-plussed. He gazed into the face of Fear and had a trident through his shoulder blades and all he has to say is, "Eh. Time for a holiday, I think".

The Judge Death Lives storyline is actually a very compact story written by T.B. Grover (one of many pseudoyms of the legendary John Wagner), with incredible pacing and gorgeous art by Brian Bolland. It's short, sweet and sharp. You don't need to know who these people are and you can still enjoy the story. That's a sign of good story telling.

Judge Dredd stories are available in paperback collections and can be found at Amazon UK. I strongly recommend them. There are eight collections so far. I'm not sure yet if this particular story has been collected and if it hasn't, that is a crime that should be remedied sharpish

Retrospective edit (21/03/09): This story has indeed been collected in Judge Dredd Collected Case Files 05 and Anderson's first battle with Judge Death is collected in Judge Dredd Collected Case Files 03.

Judge Dredd: Judge Death Lives (2000 AD, #225-228)

I love me some Judge Dredd. The star of Britain's anthology comic, 2000 AD, and his own magazine, Judge Joe Dredd is a lawman many people in Texas feel they should have. Police, jury, judge and occasionally, executioner, Dredd is one of the many Judges who patrol a futuristic city: Mega City One, made up of most of the United States' eastern seaboard in a futuristic, post-nuclear war Earth. Most of the population is unemployed, mutants are exiled to the now desert midwest, the city's mayor is an ape and Dredd's own brother tried to kill him once. Right, that's all you need to know about Dredd if you don't know about him already.

Now, issues (or progs, as they like to call it) 225 to 228 of this weekly magazine features the return one of Dredd's scariest enemy: Judge Death. He's the anti-Dredd. He doesn't bother arresting people. He just kills them. All crime are committed by the living, Death argues, therefore life itself is guilty and should be punished. Sentence is death. Yup, makes sense to me. But let's see where it all started.......

That's Judge Anderson of the Psi-Division. She's psychic and Judge Death is trapped in her mind in their last encounter. Someone, maybe Dredd...I haven't read that particular story yet, so sue me...trapped her in BOING, a kind of Jello-like "miracle plastic". She can't get out, ever, lest Judge Death be allowed to escape. Which of course what will happen here otherwise, no story.

And here's the schmuck who's gonna cut through the BOING and release him:

I like what the tour guide Judge is saying there. He's like, "Oh, here's the uniform of the Judge who invented the thing that can disintegrate your flesh. Poor devil. Moving on....."

Anyway, the guy cuts through the BOING:

It's a disembodied head with a visor and teeth. Kinda reminds you of this, doesn't it?:



Did the 2000 AD guys copy the look from Lord of the Rings? Perish the thought. No one ever read Tolkien's books before 2002, anyway.

Judge Death hijacks the body of the man who helped free him and orders him to meet up with some of his (Death's) friends back at the man's apartment. Now we understand why the man did what he did. He was forced by Death's pals to go and free their leader. And what kind of pals does someone like Judge Death keeps? Probably not the kind you'll take home to your mother to meet.


"We lied!" Well, duh...

Smiling guy on the left is Judge Fear, fiery dude is Judge Fire and last but not least, Judge Mortis on drums. The Dark Judges, folks. Buy their t-shirts or they'll kill you.


Click here for Part 2.