Review: Judge Dredd: The Cursed Earth
Thoughts
The story is a welcome callback to those old Golden and silver age comics, with the story/villain of the week Narrative. Set against the backdrop of the larger quest, of the team delivering the vaccine for the tutty-fruity virus to Mega-city two, this premise gives the writers ample opportunities to explore an anthology of short stories about the bizarre inhabitants of cursed earth.
Bar a couple of extended tales, most of the plots are wrapped up in one or two chapters, with Dredd losing and gaining companions during his arduous quest. When it is possible, the writers try and infuse some underlying themes such as the evils of slavery, dangers of playing god with science, humanity devolving into dangerous cult, civilization collapsing, corporate greed, and the recurring theme of humanity being a largely deplorable species. With only a few exceptions, such as the protagonist Dredd, exemplifying the best of us.
There is this unabashed embracing of the weird, zany and out of this world in the writing. Which makes sense when you consider this was written all the way back in 1978. Unlike today’s writers, comic book artists at the time had much more creative liberties that they could take. They didn’t bog you down in the mechanics and rules of this world. They found something interesting and went with it.
2000 AD’s Judge Dredd takes place in the distant future, where humanity, after several apocalyptic catastrophes, are inhabiting an irradiated wasteland. With few corrupted bastions of civilizations in the form of the Megacities, ruled by the iron fists of the Judges. Majority of the planet is uninhabitable, and the corruption and radiation in these places have altered humans in gruesome ways.
Radiation, pollution and dark science is the triumvirate used by the writers as their wish-bag, to make up any and all bizarre monstrosities and justify it with either of the three. Be is dinosaurs once again roaming earth thanks to overzealous researchers exploiting genetic engineering (a whole decade before ‘Jurassic Park’ was published. Or humans exposed to radiation gaining psychic and mutant abilities. Or mad scientists using ‘science’ to create everything from blood sucking vampiric automatons, to anthropomorphized corporate mascot Frankenstein monsters. You never are given an explanation of why, but just have to get on with the program and enjoy the ride.
Sweet, Furry, adorable and hard breaking Tweak:
Without question, one of the major breakout characters in the Cursed earth storyline, other than Dredd himself, is the affectionate marsupial-like alien ‘Tweak’. A caring leader of his people, tweak, is forced to hide his intelligence and let himself be captured, along with his family, so that humans don’t discover their underground civilization and bring war and destruction upon them, coveting their precious resources.
Treated as a dumb livestock, taken to earth as a slave, experimented on, and bearing the loss of his wife and children, Tweak nonetheless is a noble creature, recognizing a kindred spirit in Dredd, assisting him in his mission across the cursed earth, and by the end becoming one of few existences who could be considered as a friend to the stoic Judge.
In one of his final words in the series, Tweak heavy hearted and tired tells Dredd ‘I want to go home’, a few words which pull at your heartstrings. And reminiscent to the last words of Starro, the villain the latest 2021 suicide squad movie. Fortunately, unlike Starro, Tweak is able to return to his home planet, thanks to assistance from the honorable Judge Dredd. His losses and trials might be everlasting, but at least the noble leader of his people is given a chance to heal and gain peace and freedom.
His name is Judge Joseph Dredd:
Speaking of Dredd himself, much like Karl Urban’s brilliant portrayal in the 2012 cult classic, Dredd is able to express much emotion, despite having half his face permanently hidden due to his helmet.
Dredd is not just a gung-ho 90s action hero, who saves the day by just pumping his enemies full of lead and spitting out cool one-liners. Well, he does that, but Dredd as a character is also one with great character. Dredd is a judge who absolutely believes in the tenets of the Justice system as prescribed to the Judges. And as such is unflinching when it comes to dispense Justice to those who ask for it. Be it the citizens of Mega city one, the scattered misguided denizens of the cursed earth, a wronged alien forced to slavery and injustice, or non-human freakish Frankenstein constructs who were brought to live owing to the whims of a madman. Dredd offers help to anyone who asks him of it.
In this sense, his helmet, which he doesn’t take off, doesn’t symbolize the blind uncaring justice that cannot be bothered by the plight of the suffering. Rather, it is the indifferent yet just avatar of Justice and vengeance, which treats everyone the same, punishes the wicked while protecting the weak.
Despite his stoicism and adherence to rules, Dredd is also a character who is capable of immense compassion and empathy. He is able to connect and sympathize with the plight of wronged humans and even the alien tweak, offering his sincere apologies for his treatment at the hands of humanity. He cannot stand evil and injustice, and is unflinching when it comes to standing up against it.
Despite his stoicism and adherence to rules, Dredd is also a character who is capable of immense compassion and empathy. He is able to connect and sympathize with the plight of wronged humans and even the alien tweak, offering his sincere apologies for his treatment at the hands of humanity. He cannot stand evil and injustice, and is unflinching when it comes to standing up against it.
With the amount of terrible deeds which humanity is shown to perform, not only in this story, but in the series in general, one might think that the writers have a very nihilistic view of people. Nothing can be farther from the truth. Despite its capacity for great evil, and despite being a species in decline, humanity in 2000 A.D are represented not by the legion of inferiors, but by Dredd, who is sole beacon of justice and righteousness in this f****d up world.
Against overwhelming odds, opposition and very human nature itself, Judge Dredd stands alone as a bulwark or a higher ideal which we are meant to emulate. Which is shown up until the climax of the story, when Dredd, alone, tired, thirsty, unprotected and injured walks the final stretch, Death crawling across the cursed earth, carrying the valuable cargo of life saving vaccines, and still keeping his mission on the forefront. Nothing but steel will, and his belief in the office of his Judgeship allow him to walk the threshold of Megacity two, to his destination, and having completed his mission, fall unconscious.
Even on recovery, after waking up, the first thing he does is ensure the safety of his companion Tweak, to ensure he is well, and to arrange for the noble alien to be taken back to his home planet, as gratitude for their fellowship. Judge, through his morals and actions, shows those around him, and us as readers how to be better human beings, and an ideal to be emulated.
Final Thoughts
If despite all this you still are having doubts as to whether or not to take up ‘Cursed earth’, I urge you to do it, if only to experience the psychedelic, eye popping art work, which is like a crescendo of colors and emotions.
This is not the subdued, stylized, minimalist art style of the current comic landscape. It belonged to a time, when artists and illustrators held nothing back, and threw everything at the metaphorical wall. The sheer amount of things drafted on every cover page of every story is just mind boggling. They seemed to have a quota of one color spread every issue, and damn it if they didn’t make it worth the wait.
In conclusion, if you want to read a balls to the walls, post apocalyptic adventure, do not missed the collected works on ‘Judge Dredd: the Cursed Earth’
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Synopsis
Megacity two is afflicted by a deadly plague left over from the Germ Wars, 2T-(FRU)T colloquially referred to as the ‘Tooty Fruity!’ which turns those it infects into human flesh craving cannibalistic maniacs. As of the start of the story, over 70% of mega city two has been infected and was under the control of the roving cannibal warbands. All outside contact has been lost, no help can arrive due to the loss of the spaceport, and what remained of the city’s uninfected beleaguered citizens and defenders have cordoned themselves off, busy defending against hordes upon hordes of the infected.
An attempt by Megacity one to deliver the crucial vaccine by air, which can turn the tide against the virus was lost, due to attacks by the cannibalistic infected. So, Dredd is assigned the mission of delivering the vaccine to the Megacity two, by traveling over the thousand mile stretch of radioactive toxic stretch of land separating the two megacities, referred to as ‘The Cursed Earth’. Aiding him in this mission are two fellow Judges, a former smuggling Biker spike who knows the lay of the land, and a bunch of guard automatons protecting the vaccine stored in a cooling unit assigned to a formidable battle tank named the Land raider. The team commence their long, arduous and danger-filled journey across the cursed earth, on the way encountering all manner of people, mutants, and other abominations of the radioactive world, who call the wasteland their home. And many of their interactions are less than cordial. The book collects as a form of anthology, with mostly villains of the week, and stories of the week format, where Dredd & co. meet more and more fantastical adventures and overcome them by the skin of their teeth.
Story 1: The Devil’s Lapdogs.
First in their journey, Dredd comes across a small townstead which is located next to a toxic sandstorm which afflicts the locals regularly. The sandstorm brings with it a mischief of overgrown mutated Cursed earth rats, a single poisonous bite from which can kill a grown man. The town, ruled by a crazed religious nut and his followers refer to the rats as the ‘Devil’s lapdogs’, and in order to save themselves resort to sacrificing a few among their numbers to the creatures as means of appeasement. All the while not realizing that the sirens which they play at the time of the rat’s arrival is what attracts the creatures to attack the town. Judge Dredd arrives, gets caught, escapes, has a tussle with the Lap Dogs, driving them, like the Pied Piper to a sea of magma, flash frying them. Oh, in the meanwhile the crazy leader gets eaten by rats. Pretty run of the mill, adventure of the week stuff.
2. The Mutic Mountains.
The vaccine delivering team arrives in the erstwhile Mount Rushmore, which was modified to include President Carter, and after the ruination brought by the atomic war also the face of the Mutant leader Morgar.
The Mutie Brotherhood, led by Brother Morgar, are a fanatical group of malformed humans, who all hate normal humans referred to as Normies. When the vaccine delivery team arrives and tries to traverse Mount Rushmore to continue their journey, they are attacked by the brotherhood. After death defying struggles, they manage to escape relatively unscathed to resume their journey, although with Brother Morgar and his goons still at their heels.
3. Dark Autumn.
Continuing their journey Dredd and co. encounter a man who lives in the wasteland in company of his old frail mother, and one who knows the identity of Dredd as well as their purpose in coming to Cursed earth. He is Novar, a powerful psychic mutant, who has the abilities of telekinesis and future sight, and is a pacifist who is content to live out his days building metal trees to replicate the real ones from before the atomic wars.
Judge Dredd encounters Novar the same time that Morgar and his muties catch up to them, and exchange gunfire. One of the Judges dies in the ensuing fight, which triggers Novar, who in anguish proceeds to dismantle his metal tree, and use its leaves and branches to kill and dismember Morgar and members of the Muties. Terrified, the rest of the pursuers chose to flee to safety.
Dredd is grateful for his help, and offers to bring him and his mother along to civilization. Novar however refuses, content to live out his days, in the cursed land which is his home.
4. Night of the vampire
Dredd and co. stop at a modest hillbilly farmstead, and accept the hospitality of people who are quite cordial, in contrast to the usual rabble. But they are being afflicted by a terror, a mysterious mechanical creature, who like a vampire, is draining all the blood from townsfolk in the darkness of night.
Dredd decides to help the people, and in search of this Vampire creature comes across the ruins of fort knox, destroyed during the atomic wars. Overcoming the fort’s defenses, Dredd and the group of villagers enter the structure and encounter the trio of ‘vampires’, who are in fact medical droids in charge of Robert Booth, the last president of the United status, and the perpetrator of the Atomic wars.
For his crimes, he was removed from office and sentenced to a hundred years in suspended animation in Fort Knox and watched over by the medical droids. But a few decades after, a bomb hit the facility, damaging its key systems, the containment for the prisoner was failing, and the droids, as was their programming, went in search of fresh blood to keep their prisoner alive, even if it meant draining live people dead.
Having subdued the robots, and mollified the villagers, Dredd releases President Booth, with his sentence altered to time served. Booth and the robots are put to work with the villagers, tasked to bring life back to the cursed earth as a penance for his crimes.
5. The Slay Riders
Dredd and co. have to cross the Mississippi, a pollutant and nuclear waste laden abomination, that is always set ablaze. They are commuted across the river, by means of Slay riders, who run barges run by alien slave labor. These aliens were captured by humanity before the atomic wars, when they explored the stars on star ships, to be kept in an alien reserve.
But in the chaos following the wars, the reserve was shut down and the aliens were sold as slaves to uncaring humans, who work them to the bone in addition to torturing them. Dredd is disgusted by this, but his mission takes priority and he decides to put off the plight of aliens for now.
As they are leaving the slay traders, one of the aliens, a rock eating marsupial like creature escapes from his cage and follows them. Pursued by the slavers, Dredd manages to see the creature’s plight and decides to intervene.
In the succeeding battle, they manage to drive away the slavers, with the alien crushing the slave leaders head between its powerful pincers. The alien, christened as tweak, moves to a plantation, where he is seen piling stones over what appears to be graves. The slavers earlier had mentioned that the creature was a man eater.
Wanting to know the truth, Dredd opens the grave and finds to his dismay, the remains of two other aliens, one an infant. Dredd deduces these are the mate and child of the alien Tweak, who were killed by the plantation owner sometime in the past. Tweak had escaped to prepare a proper grave for them, and lay stones on it, so that they may have ‘food’ for their afterlife.
Dredd helps him honor the dead, and muses how much suffering tweak had to suffer; kidnapped from his home, taken light years away, made into slaves, and his family killed for no reason. He feels a sort of disgust at how terrible humans can be. The group commences their journey, with tweak accompanying them.
6. Battle of the Burger Barons
The group arrives at the town in between that is ‘in between’ two warring faction cities of Burger Kings and McDonald's Marauders. After the atomic wars, the livestock of the area had mutated to super cows the size of elephants, which gave more meat per animal, and this combined with the chaos following the collapse of civilization caused the rival burger chains to grow in power and lust after dominating all the people, to gain them all as customers. Which devolved into the burger wars
After the initial skirmish, the burger kings are pushed back, while Dredd and Spike along with the residents in-between are taken prisoners and taken to McDonald city, run as a tight dictatorship. Dredd and Spike manage to turn the table on their captors and escape into the wasteland, and after a brief skirmish with Burger kings, are rescued by the team aboard the Land raider.
Since their mission is crucial and time sensitive, Dredd decides to leave the two rival factions to be for the time being, planning to lead an expedition in the future to set things straight.
Dredd and co. have to cross the Mississippi, a pollutant and nuclear waste laden abomination, that is always set ablaze. They are commuted across the river, by means of Slay riders, who run barges run by alien slave labor. These aliens were captured by humanity before the atomic wars, when they explored the stars on star ships, to be kept in an alien reserve.
But in the chaos following the wars, the reserve was shut down and the aliens were sold as slaves to uncaring humans, who work them to the bone in addition to torturing them. Dredd is disgusted by this, but his mission takes priority and he decides to put off the plight of aliens for now.
As they are leaving the slay traders, one of the aliens, a rock eating marsupial like creature escapes from his cage and follows them. Pursued by the slavers, Dredd manages to see the creature’s plight and decides to intervene.
In the succeeding battle, they manage to drive away the slavers, with the alien crushing the slave leaders head between its powerful pincers. The alien, christened as tweak, moves to a plantation, where he is seen piling stones over what appears to be graves. The slavers earlier had mentioned that the creature was a man eater.
Wanting to know the truth, Dredd opens the grave and finds to his dismay, the remains of two other aliens, one an infant. Dredd deduces these are the mate and child of the alien Tweak, who were killed by the plantation owner sometime in the past. Tweak had escaped to prepare a proper grave for them, and lay stones on it, so that they may have ‘food’ for their afterlife.
Dredd helps him honor the dead, and muses how much suffering tweak had to suffer; kidnapped from his home, taken light years away, made into slaves, and his family killed for no reason. He feels a sort of disgust at how terrible humans can be. The group commences their journey, with tweak accompanying them.
6. Battle of the Burger Barons
The group arrives at the town in between that is ‘in between’ two warring faction cities of Burger Kings and McDonald's Marauders. After the atomic wars, the livestock of the area had mutated to super cows the size of elephants, which gave more meat per animal, and this combined with the chaos following the collapse of civilization caused the rival burger chains to grow in power and lust after dominating all the people, to gain them all as customers. Which devolved into the burger wars
After the initial skirmish, the burger kings are pushed back, while Dredd and Spike along with the residents in-between are taken prisoners and taken to McDonald city, run as a tight dictatorship. Dredd and Spike manage to turn the table on their captors and escape into the wasteland, and after a brief skirmish with Burger kings, are rescued by the team aboard the Land raider.
Since their mission is crucial and time sensitive, Dredd decides to leave the two rival factions to be for the time being, planning to lead an expedition in the future to set things straight.
7. The coming of Satanus.
Satanus perhaps has one of the longest story arcs in the whole of the Cursed Earth anthology.
A few years prior, in the Dinosaur national park, scientists attempted to recreate the extinct creatures from the prehistoric era, from fossilized remains. They started by placing tyrannosaurus DNA in alligator eggs, successfully creating the beast named Satanus. Yet as he grew, his hunger for flesh, as well as his ferocity only grew, unsatisfied with the cattle and livestock being given to him.
In order to mollify it, and to give him something to hunt, the administrators of the Dinosaur park, created an entire population of dinosaurs, both herbivores and carnivores, and released them into the park along with a drugged Satanus and other T-Rexs. The park proved a popular tourist attraction, with folks arriving from far and wide to see the wondrous animals.
All this time, Satanus who was kept docile with the help of drugs in his food, was biding his time for escape. Finally there came a point when the park administrators decided to lobotomize Satanus and his violent brethren, to make them easier to herd as tourist attractions. They successfully completed the procedures on the others, but when it was time for him, Satanus managed to break free of his restraints, and turn his fury on his captors. He and his ilk escaped to the mountains, hunting their prey and killing any hunters who came to pursue them. And it was to their mountains that Dredd and co. had arrived.
As he watched his new prey park to the town named Repentance, Satanus reminisced about his previous life. 65 million years ago he was the son of a formidable leader named the ‘old one eye’. She had taught him to hunt and to survive, and when he came of age, drunk with youth and power, Satanus challenged the matriarch for the position of leader of the pack. In the ensuing battle, Satanus was ripped apart and soundly defeated, while his mother would go on to create a legend of her own. As he lay with his final breaths, he considered the folly of his existence, and how he could never redo his life.
But thanks to the meddling by humans, Satanus was inadvertently reborn, in a world devoid of dinosaurs and his terrifying mother. In this age, filled with weak human prey, Satanus built his own pack and reigned supreme as ruler of the mountain.
As he was reminiscing about this, Dredd and his group were drugged by the townspeople, and carried away to be presented as sacrifices to Satanus, their God and protector. At the sacrificial pikes, the creatures arrive to devour him, Dredd manages to cut his restraints and escape the literal jaws of death. He saves his fellows and in the ensuing battle manages to kill some of the pack as well as injure and enrage Satanus.
Dredd returns to town, and locates their land raider. He is followed closely by Satanus, who devours the townsfolk in a killing frenzy. Dredd cajoles the beast into the town’s clock tower, and unloads the armament of the Lands raider onto it, as well as bringing the whole structure down on Satanus.
Having dealt with the threat, he exiles the population of ruined Repentance to the wastelands and goes on with his mission. As everyone has left, from the remains of the clock tower, rises once again the monster known as Satanus. Very much alive, it once again slinks off into the night, biding its time for revenge in the future.
8. Giants aren’t gentlemen.
Dredd comes across lush grasslands with overgrown vegetation, and is accosted by green giants, who try to eat them. They escape and come across a facility, which used to be an Agricultural research center, and is now controlled by a mad scientist Dr. Gribbon.
He has used his mad science to create anthropomorphized mascots taking inspiration from old pre war advertising booklets, such as the Michelin man and the alki boys shaped like pills. He has kept all these freaks in the facility, ruling over them like the mad tyrant that he is. He captures Dredd and is about to perform mind altering surgery on him, but Dredd manages to escape his restraints, and with the help of some revolting freaks manages to turn the tide on the facility, razing it in flames.
Gribbon, enraged at the loss of his creations, has Dredd at gunpoint and is about to kill him. But one of the last surviving alki boys jumps in front of the gun, causing it to jam, killing both it and Gribbon. Dredd leaves the place of suffering to turn to ashes and proceeds with his mission with a heavy heart.
9. Loser’s leap
The group reaches the city of Las vegas, which has turned into a den of gambling and corruption, even more so than its current day counterpart. The whole city is addicted to gambling with them resorting to more and more extreme violent games with human lives on the line to bet on. The city’s Judges who are meant to police the city have themselves fallen to the temptation and are gambling addicts. The minority who see the city for the decadent self, form the anti gambling league and underground resistance.
Enraged at what he sees as the perversion of the Justice system, Dredd confronts the corrupt judges, and is almost put to death for his troubles. He is saved thanks to the timely intervention by Spike and with the help of the AGL enters the yearly Judge death race, to determine who gets to govern over the city.
Thoroughly beating his competitors Dredd wins the race, and helps the AGL uprising, putting all the corrupt judges in cuffs. He then places the AGL as replacement for the judges, telling them to properly govern the town. Having performed his duty the group continues on.
10. Tweak’s story
Things are getting dire in Mega City one, as the city’s beleaguered defenders try to hold ground against the infected, who are trying to acquire the taste of the forbidden fruit, that is human flesh.
In death valley, the group has taken a break to repair the refrigeration unit for the vaccine. Spike and tweak, who at this point has learned human speech converse, and to the surprise of Dredd and Spike, the alien tweak is much much smarter than either of them, and had been hiding his ability to communicate fluently with humans.
Dredd asks his cursed earth companion the reason for this subterfuge, and tells him his story. Tweak was the leader of his people, and they lived in large underground cities, mining rocks which are their sustenance, as well as gold, diamond and other precious stones.
One day, their advanced sensors picked up the arrival of human astronauts who were on a mission to identify and capture alien species, in particular on a lookout for intelligent life. Taking precautions, Tweak ordered all traces of their civilization to be removed from the surface, as well as for the entire populace to hide underneath, until the true motives of the visitors were determined.
Having used their advanced machines to remotely probe the minds of the humans, Tweak came to learn of the violent human history and their capacity for great evil. As well as, using his powers of precognition, Tweak managed to divine the eventual decline of the human race. Fearing for his people, Tweak decided not to make contact with humans.
Unfortunately, Tweak children, still too young to understand the seriousness of the situation, slipped out to the surface to see these exotic creatures called humans. Mistaking them to be dumb animals, the human expedition captured the children, as well as Tweak’s golden furred partner, who had followed the young ones trying to save them.
Tweak was faced with two choices, either reveal to the humans they are intelligent and save his family, but in doing so invite the unwanted interest of earth whose intentions would most certainly be selfish. Or, continue to feign ignorance as lower beasts, saving his populace, but condemning his family to slavery and danger.
Being a good leader, Tweak put his people ahead of his emotions, and enforced the policy of isolation. But, unable to abandon his family, he willingly allowed himself to be captured, and transported to earth to serve as slaves.
On earth, the researchers, suspecting Tweak to be intelligent, subjected him to a battery of cruel experimentation, all of which he endured, for the sake of his people. He successful managed to trick the humans into thinking he was just a dumb animal.
But his fears of humanity’s dark side came to a realization, when he and his family were sold to separate slave owners, thus separating them. Taken to a plantation, the daughter of the slaver got hurt while being forceful with Tweak’s children; and the slaver prepared to put them down. They, as well as their mother who tried to intervene, were shot and killed. Not before she managed to crush the planter’s head within her strong pincers.
They were long dead by the time Tweak escaped from the Slavers and arrived at the plantation. Unable to save them, Tweak, with the help of Dredd, proceeded to bury his family in a grave of rocks, as is their custom.
Having listened to the story, Dredd asks Tweak, why he revealed all of these secrets to them, especially in the presence of greedy Spike, who, hearing the amount of precious stones on Tweak’s planet, already had designs to turn them into his own. Tweak replied that he trusted Dredd; as for Spike, even though he knew of his secrets, the biker won’t be able to tell anyone about it. Keeping in mind Tweak’s ability for precognition, these words sounded ominous to Dredd, who began to wonder if any of them would survive this mission.
11. Legion of the Damned
In the final stretch of their journey, what remained of Dredd’s retinue, Judge Jack, Spike rotten, Tweak as well as a few surviving battle droids, reach the Death valley, where the Battle of Armageddon was waged during the period of the Atomic wars.
A hundred thousand judges and mega city troopers gave their lives fighting the mechanized battle droids protecting President Booth. The legion of the damned as they were called, were programmed to engage in endless war against the judges. After their victory, The judges sentenced President Booth and erected a war monument in the location. One where Dredd now came to pay his respects.
However, their arrival reactivates the remnants of the Legion, who, still programmed to kill judges, open fire on them. Judge Jack, frayed and broken following their arduous journey across cursed earth, disobeys direct orders, and surrenders with the kill dozer. He is blasted to smithereens for his efforts.
The remainder of the group, high tail it to a nearby abandoned fort, and mount a defense against the legion. For four days and nights, the defenders hold the fort, until the legion brings in larger armaments and ends up killing Spike.
Realizing the futility of continuing to defend, Dredd dresses up Spike’s dead body in his Judge uniform, and rigs the last of droids to ram into the legion and self-destruct. Under the cover of a sand storm, he sends them into the thick of the attackers, spike and the droid exploding in a fiery explosion, taking out the enemy general as well as the majority of their forces.
Lacking anymore transportation, Dredd and Tweak, the last survivors, carry the vaccine package on their backs. In front of them, is a 60 mile long journey, which needs to be completed within 3 days, before the unpreserved vaccine becomes contaminated. But, as soon as they set out, Dredd loses sight of Tweak in the sandstorm. Believing himself to be the lone survivor, Dredd nevertheless steeles his nerves and continues his mission.
12. Death Crawl.
In the final chapter of the story arc, we see Dredd, alone, hungry, tired, unprotected and dehydrated trekking on foot across Cursed earth, in the final stretches to Megacity one. He soon begins to hallucinate, imagining that all the enemies he’d faced in the Cursed earth had come back, and were ganging up on him.
Amidst the hallucination, he is accosted by a straggler group from the Legion mechs, one of whom gnaws at his leg. Dredd blasts the thing, along with his leg, to get free. Now useless, Dredd resorts to crawling on the desert floor, towards his destination, with the remnants of the decrepit machines crawling in pursuit.
On the third day, near the end of his limits, he is spotted by the guard patrol outside the walls of Megacity two. Dredd gains a final wind, and getting upright, walks himself across the entrance of the city, before collapsing.
The officers of the city take him to get treatment, and take his precious cargo, to be processed and distributed to the plague ridden city. The first thing Dredd demands to know, once he regains consciousness, is whether his companion made it. He did, tweak had staggered to the city, shortly after Dredd himself, his own cargo intact.
Unfortunately, he is once again behaving like a dumb animal and is mistreated by the officers in Megacity two. Enraged at this Dredd gets some retribution for his companion. When they are alone, Dredd tells Tweak that he wants everyone to know how brave and intelligent his friend is. But plagued by the evil of humanity, Tweak fears this would lead to humans destroying his own planet and people, and begs Dredd to keep his secret. Dredd accents, but wishes to do something for Tweak, to which Tweak replies ‘I want to go Home’.
Cashing in on his position as savior of Megacity two, Dredd demands that his furry companion be taken back to his planet and set free without any harm. His request is obliged, and Tweak is to be taken to a star freighter back to his planet. Dredd says final goodbyes to his cursed earth companion, and someone he considers a friend, hoping to meet again, under better circumstances.
Having completed his herculean task, and having put all his affairs in order, Dredd prepares his less intense journey back to Mega city One, and back to his duties as Judge.
Satanus perhaps has one of the longest story arcs in the whole of the Cursed Earth anthology.
A few years prior, in the Dinosaur national park, scientists attempted to recreate the extinct creatures from the prehistoric era, from fossilized remains. They started by placing tyrannosaurus DNA in alligator eggs, successfully creating the beast named Satanus. Yet as he grew, his hunger for flesh, as well as his ferocity only grew, unsatisfied with the cattle and livestock being given to him.
In order to mollify it, and to give him something to hunt, the administrators of the Dinosaur park, created an entire population of dinosaurs, both herbivores and carnivores, and released them into the park along with a drugged Satanus and other T-Rexs. The park proved a popular tourist attraction, with folks arriving from far and wide to see the wondrous animals.
All this time, Satanus who was kept docile with the help of drugs in his food, was biding his time for escape. Finally there came a point when the park administrators decided to lobotomize Satanus and his violent brethren, to make them easier to herd as tourist attractions. They successfully completed the procedures on the others, but when it was time for him, Satanus managed to break free of his restraints, and turn his fury on his captors. He and his ilk escaped to the mountains, hunting their prey and killing any hunters who came to pursue them. And it was to their mountains that Dredd and co. had arrived.
As he watched his new prey park to the town named Repentance, Satanus reminisced about his previous life. 65 million years ago he was the son of a formidable leader named the ‘old one eye’. She had taught him to hunt and to survive, and when he came of age, drunk with youth and power, Satanus challenged the matriarch for the position of leader of the pack. In the ensuing battle, Satanus was ripped apart and soundly defeated, while his mother would go on to create a legend of her own. As he lay with his final breaths, he considered the folly of his existence, and how he could never redo his life.
But thanks to the meddling by humans, Satanus was inadvertently reborn, in a world devoid of dinosaurs and his terrifying mother. In this age, filled with weak human prey, Satanus built his own pack and reigned supreme as ruler of the mountain.
As he was reminiscing about this, Dredd and his group were drugged by the townspeople, and carried away to be presented as sacrifices to Satanus, their God and protector. At the sacrificial pikes, the creatures arrive to devour him, Dredd manages to cut his restraints and escape the literal jaws of death. He saves his fellows and in the ensuing battle manages to kill some of the pack as well as injure and enrage Satanus.
Dredd returns to town, and locates their land raider. He is followed closely by Satanus, who devours the townsfolk in a killing frenzy. Dredd cajoles the beast into the town’s clock tower, and unloads the armament of the Lands raider onto it, as well as bringing the whole structure down on Satanus.
Having dealt with the threat, he exiles the population of ruined Repentance to the wastelands and goes on with his mission. As everyone has left, from the remains of the clock tower, rises once again the monster known as Satanus. Very much alive, it once again slinks off into the night, biding its time for revenge in the future.
8. Giants aren’t gentlemen.
Dredd comes across lush grasslands with overgrown vegetation, and is accosted by green giants, who try to eat them. They escape and come across a facility, which used to be an Agricultural research center, and is now controlled by a mad scientist Dr. Gribbon.
He has used his mad science to create anthropomorphized mascots taking inspiration from old pre war advertising booklets, such as the Michelin man and the alki boys shaped like pills. He has kept all these freaks in the facility, ruling over them like the mad tyrant that he is. He captures Dredd and is about to perform mind altering surgery on him, but Dredd manages to escape his restraints, and with the help of some revolting freaks manages to turn the tide on the facility, razing it in flames.
Gribbon, enraged at the loss of his creations, has Dredd at gunpoint and is about to kill him. But one of the last surviving alki boys jumps in front of the gun, causing it to jam, killing both it and Gribbon. Dredd leaves the place of suffering to turn to ashes and proceeds with his mission with a heavy heart.
9. Loser’s leap
The group reaches the city of Las vegas, which has turned into a den of gambling and corruption, even more so than its current day counterpart. The whole city is addicted to gambling with them resorting to more and more extreme violent games with human lives on the line to bet on. The city’s Judges who are meant to police the city have themselves fallen to the temptation and are gambling addicts. The minority who see the city for the decadent self, form the anti gambling league and underground resistance.
Enraged at what he sees as the perversion of the Justice system, Dredd confronts the corrupt judges, and is almost put to death for his troubles. He is saved thanks to the timely intervention by Spike and with the help of the AGL enters the yearly Judge death race, to determine who gets to govern over the city.
Thoroughly beating his competitors Dredd wins the race, and helps the AGL uprising, putting all the corrupt judges in cuffs. He then places the AGL as replacement for the judges, telling them to properly govern the town. Having performed his duty the group continues on.
10. Tweak’s story
Things are getting dire in Mega City one, as the city’s beleaguered defenders try to hold ground against the infected, who are trying to acquire the taste of the forbidden fruit, that is human flesh.
In death valley, the group has taken a break to repair the refrigeration unit for the vaccine. Spike and tweak, who at this point has learned human speech converse, and to the surprise of Dredd and Spike, the alien tweak is much much smarter than either of them, and had been hiding his ability to communicate fluently with humans.
Dredd asks his cursed earth companion the reason for this subterfuge, and tells him his story. Tweak was the leader of his people, and they lived in large underground cities, mining rocks which are their sustenance, as well as gold, diamond and other precious stones.
One day, their advanced sensors picked up the arrival of human astronauts who were on a mission to identify and capture alien species, in particular on a lookout for intelligent life. Taking precautions, Tweak ordered all traces of their civilization to be removed from the surface, as well as for the entire populace to hide underneath, until the true motives of the visitors were determined.
Having used their advanced machines to remotely probe the minds of the humans, Tweak came to learn of the violent human history and their capacity for great evil. As well as, using his powers of precognition, Tweak managed to divine the eventual decline of the human race. Fearing for his people, Tweak decided not to make contact with humans.
Unfortunately, Tweak children, still too young to understand the seriousness of the situation, slipped out to the surface to see these exotic creatures called humans. Mistaking them to be dumb animals, the human expedition captured the children, as well as Tweak’s golden furred partner, who had followed the young ones trying to save them.
Tweak was faced with two choices, either reveal to the humans they are intelligent and save his family, but in doing so invite the unwanted interest of earth whose intentions would most certainly be selfish. Or, continue to feign ignorance as lower beasts, saving his populace, but condemning his family to slavery and danger.
Being a good leader, Tweak put his people ahead of his emotions, and enforced the policy of isolation. But, unable to abandon his family, he willingly allowed himself to be captured, and transported to earth to serve as slaves.
On earth, the researchers, suspecting Tweak to be intelligent, subjected him to a battery of cruel experimentation, all of which he endured, for the sake of his people. He successful managed to trick the humans into thinking he was just a dumb animal.
But his fears of humanity’s dark side came to a realization, when he and his family were sold to separate slave owners, thus separating them. Taken to a plantation, the daughter of the slaver got hurt while being forceful with Tweak’s children; and the slaver prepared to put them down. They, as well as their mother who tried to intervene, were shot and killed. Not before she managed to crush the planter’s head within her strong pincers.
They were long dead by the time Tweak escaped from the Slavers and arrived at the plantation. Unable to save them, Tweak, with the help of Dredd, proceeded to bury his family in a grave of rocks, as is their custom.
Having listened to the story, Dredd asks Tweak, why he revealed all of these secrets to them, especially in the presence of greedy Spike, who, hearing the amount of precious stones on Tweak’s planet, already had designs to turn them into his own. Tweak replied that he trusted Dredd; as for Spike, even though he knew of his secrets, the biker won’t be able to tell anyone about it. Keeping in mind Tweak’s ability for precognition, these words sounded ominous to Dredd, who began to wonder if any of them would survive this mission.
11. Legion of the Damned
In the final stretch of their journey, what remained of Dredd’s retinue, Judge Jack, Spike rotten, Tweak as well as a few surviving battle droids, reach the Death valley, where the Battle of Armageddon was waged during the period of the Atomic wars.
A hundred thousand judges and mega city troopers gave their lives fighting the mechanized battle droids protecting President Booth. The legion of the damned as they were called, were programmed to engage in endless war against the judges. After their victory, The judges sentenced President Booth and erected a war monument in the location. One where Dredd now came to pay his respects.
However, their arrival reactivates the remnants of the Legion, who, still programmed to kill judges, open fire on them. Judge Jack, frayed and broken following their arduous journey across cursed earth, disobeys direct orders, and surrenders with the kill dozer. He is blasted to smithereens for his efforts.
The remainder of the group, high tail it to a nearby abandoned fort, and mount a defense against the legion. For four days and nights, the defenders hold the fort, until the legion brings in larger armaments and ends up killing Spike.
Realizing the futility of continuing to defend, Dredd dresses up Spike’s dead body in his Judge uniform, and rigs the last of droids to ram into the legion and self-destruct. Under the cover of a sand storm, he sends them into the thick of the attackers, spike and the droid exploding in a fiery explosion, taking out the enemy general as well as the majority of their forces.
Lacking anymore transportation, Dredd and Tweak, the last survivors, carry the vaccine package on their backs. In front of them, is a 60 mile long journey, which needs to be completed within 3 days, before the unpreserved vaccine becomes contaminated. But, as soon as they set out, Dredd loses sight of Tweak in the sandstorm. Believing himself to be the lone survivor, Dredd nevertheless steeles his nerves and continues his mission.
12. Death Crawl.
In the final chapter of the story arc, we see Dredd, alone, hungry, tired, unprotected and dehydrated trekking on foot across Cursed earth, in the final stretches to Megacity one. He soon begins to hallucinate, imagining that all the enemies he’d faced in the Cursed earth had come back, and were ganging up on him.
Amidst the hallucination, he is accosted by a straggler group from the Legion mechs, one of whom gnaws at his leg. Dredd blasts the thing, along with his leg, to get free. Now useless, Dredd resorts to crawling on the desert floor, towards his destination, with the remnants of the decrepit machines crawling in pursuit.
On the third day, near the end of his limits, he is spotted by the guard patrol outside the walls of Megacity two. Dredd gains a final wind, and getting upright, walks himself across the entrance of the city, before collapsing.
The officers of the city take him to get treatment, and take his precious cargo, to be processed and distributed to the plague ridden city. The first thing Dredd demands to know, once he regains consciousness, is whether his companion made it. He did, tweak had staggered to the city, shortly after Dredd himself, his own cargo intact.
Unfortunately, he is once again behaving like a dumb animal and is mistreated by the officers in Megacity two. Enraged at this Dredd gets some retribution for his companion. When they are alone, Dredd tells Tweak that he wants everyone to know how brave and intelligent his friend is. But plagued by the evil of humanity, Tweak fears this would lead to humans destroying his own planet and people, and begs Dredd to keep his secret. Dredd accents, but wishes to do something for Tweak, to which Tweak replies ‘I want to go Home’.
Cashing in on his position as savior of Megacity two, Dredd demands that his furry companion be taken back to his planet and set free without any harm. His request is obliged, and Tweak is to be taken to a star freighter back to his planet. Dredd says final goodbyes to his cursed earth companion, and someone he considers a friend, hoping to meet again, under better circumstances.
Having completed his herculean task, and having put all his affairs in order, Dredd prepares his less intense journey back to Mega city One, and back to his duties as Judge.
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