Comic Review 165 // Judge Dredd: Complete Case Files 17

Feels good to be reading Judge Dredd Case Files. I love the Dredd verse so much, and I keep being sucked back in. This week we hit up Judge Dredd: Case Files 17. The cover tells us straight away what is going on, with Dredd knocking a zombie. Means we have hit Judgement Day!

Title: JUDGE DREDD: CASE FILES 17

Tagline: JUDGEMENT DAY HAS COME!

Page Count: 304

Writers: Garth Ennis and John Wagner

Artists: Carlos Ezquerra, Chris Halls, Dean Ormston, Greg Staples, Ian Gibson, Peter Doherty, Sean Phillips, Simon Coleby, Steve Dillon and Yan Shimony.

Colour: Ergina Hart

Letters: Annie Parkhouse

Fluff: Mega-City One – the dangerous future metropolis where crime is rife. Keeping order are the Judges – a hardened police force acting as judge, jury and executioner. The toughest of them all is Judge Dredd. He is the Law, and these are his stories. 

Volume 17 includes the mega-epic Judgement Day, in which Judge Dredd and Strontium Dog Johnny Alpha have to team up to stop the evil Sabbat and his zombie hordes from destroying the world! 

This pulse-pounding collection features stories scripted by John Wagner (A History of Violence) and Garth Ennis (Preacher, The Boys), and with art from Carlos Ezquerra (Strontium Dog), Steve Dillon (The Punisher), Sean Phillips (Sleeper) and Dean Ormston (Lucifer), amongst others.

Babes in Arms: Great opener by Garth Ennis. Four women who were betrayed, beaten and severely injured take revenge on their now eloped and wealthy ex-husbands. Truly epic story, the characters/villains are relatable to, and you can't but hope they will get their revenge. This story makes me happy.

Almighty Dredd: A rather humorful Dredd tale here. We get to me a Dredd-worshipping perp who is killing his victims in Judge Dredd's name. A rather silly strip with cartoonish artwork by Ian Gibson.

A Magic Place: A depressing little tale to get us ready for Judgement Day. Set in the Rose Garden of a walled hideout, we remeet Dink Jowett. Who in a previous story discovered the garden and ended up doing time after stealing a rose. Having completed his six-month sentence, Dink and his girlfriend Rose came under the stewardship of the old lady. Their perfect world is soon destroyed as a gang takes refuge in the garden. While attempting to protect the roses, Dink is gunned down, and though dying, he warns the Judges and ultimately saves this unique location of MC-1.

Judgement Day: This is a fantastic epic and the main focus of this case file. Dredd is leading a Hotdog run of recruits into the Cursed Earth. While checking in on a Mining group, the team discovers a ghost town, and as they travel into the mines, they are attacked by the walking dead! Turns out the Dead are returning to the living. This story has a lot going for it. One the villain. Sabbat is just pure evil; he is Judge Death's level of corruption, wanting to raise an army of the dead in an attempt to take over the galaxy. Two. Johnny Alpha. That's right, Alpha is sent back to the past, and his goal is to kill Sabbat. Three. All the other Judges. I love seeing Brit-Cit, East-Meg, Hondo City, Murphyville etc., all being represented and finally. Four. The global wipeout of over three billion people. Cities are lost, the death toll is brutal, Judge Dekker (Dredd's favourite Rookie) is killed. This story cuts deep, and I love it!

The Marshal: Another brutal story. Turns out one of the Tech Judges has been testing chemicals out in the Cursed Earth, and following an error in his chemical mixes, he kills a group known as the Marshalls (based on the lone rangers). The surviving member vows revenge and heads to MC-1 to track down and kill those responsible. You can't help but feel bad for the Marshal.

Texas City Sting: Straight forward action-packed tale of Dredd and Hershey travelling to Texas City to find some warrants. Pretty straightforward and an excellent refresher after the whole Judgement Day Arc.

Taking of Sector 123: Back to MC-1 and following Judgement Day, the Justice Department is highly undermanned, and 12 Sectors still refuse the rule of the Justice Department. One of the main rebellious sectors is 123. Soon Dredd is waging war on the sector and is proving who is the top dog. A brutal ending to this collection and a build-up for the theme of the following collection, Mechanismo!

Want to learn more about 2000 AD? Why not start with the 2000 AD Encyclopedia (link is via Amazon, and I get a kickback). Thank you for reading, and if you want to chat more, come find me on Instagram.