I know there are a few Judge Dredd and 2000ad fans on here and something on Instagram reminded me of a thought, or talking point I thought might make for a decent thread. When I used to read Dredd and 2000ad many of the creators referred to Dredd as a fascist which he obviously is when you consider that he rides around extra-judicially executing people, essentially as part of a military dictatorship who emerged after nuclear holocaust / the failure of democracy.
That being said, in his universe (global holocaust/anarchy etc) is he actually a fascist or his he a necessary evil to cope with the amount of brutality and lawlessness? Or a necessary fascist? I know Dredd was inspired by and somewhat based on Dirty Harry who also assumes the role of judge, jury and executioner in many of his films and this in turn led me to think about other fictional anti-heroes and how many of them do monstrous things (outside the context of their world) . Why is the anti-hero such an appealing trope or archetype when the things they would repel us in real life.
It seems that there’s almost no limits to what we’ll allow our fictional anti-heroes to get away with, Dredd being one of the most extreme examples I can think of.
Amirite?
