“Dredd” reboot scribe Alex Garland turned up at this past weekend’s London Film and Comic Con to showcase a scene from the film and participate in a Q&A about bringing Judge Dredd back to the cinema.
The most interesting answer at said Q&A came when Garland addressed the possibilities of sequels. Due to the film’s significantly lower budget than most tentpoles, it would appear as if the movie won’t have to earn much to guarantee a sequel. Garland (via Bleeding Cool) says:
“We’ll see a sequel if the gross is above $ 50 million in the US. It’s a simple financial equation. We’re an independent movie… In terms of Dark Judges, I wrote Death into this script, but it didn’t feel right for the first film. I thought it felt right but after about 16 drafts and it really didn’t work out.
I needed to have set up the city and Dredd first before taking on what is essentially a riff on the Judges. You need to know what the Judges are before you can subvert them.
I wrote a second script which was about Dredd going out to the Cursed Earth. That was rejected for similar reasons.
If they want to make sequels, I’ve got a story that goes from this one into the origins of Dredd and the city. Then the third one has would have a strange, existential attack from the Dark Judges.
“Dredd” opens across the UK on September 7th, then in the United States two weeks later. The film will have its first full screening at San Diego Comic Con this week.
About The Critic
