I thought Dredd 3d — the 2012 film starring Karl Urban with the screenplay by Alex Garland (Ex Machina) — was going to suck. Then I watched it on Netflix and thought it was really cool, from the way they made the character to the visual style and the awesome action. It was way better than the 1995 Judge Dredd with Sylvester Stallone and rob Schneider.
I've been holding out hope that a Dredd sequel would happen, but it doesn't appear likely. In an interview with IGN, screenwriter Alex Garland, who's currently promoting his directorial debut Ex Machina, said that Dredd 2 is basically dead in the water. His hope is that somebody else will make the sequel and do a better job than he did, just like how he did a better job than the first one. He added, "And then if they do that, then finally, maybe this character will break out in the way that it deserves to."
That sucks. Garland has written some impressive stuff, and Ex Machina looks amazing. I want him to write and direct other Dredd films. He did mention how Dredd 2 and 3 would have looked, though, and they sound awesome.
"The first film we made it for about $35m, although quite a lot of that was to do with shooting in 3D. Or a chunk of it. And we managed to make that film for that budget by locking it in a building essentially, sort of Die-Hard-style. In the second film it was going to go out into the desert, which would be The Cursed Earth — people who know the comic book would know immediately what that means. And maybe throw some money at some key sequences. That's how you do it I guess. I think we could have made it for another $30m, $35m type thing. We could have made it for $30m if we shot it in 2D. $35m maybe 3D I guess. Of that order. But the third one that would have been more expensive, because it would have been going back to the city and maybe bringing in some Dark Judges or something like that."
…. F*ck. Who's making the decisions over at DNA Films and Lionsgate?! Come on people. Forget the 3D too. We don't need that. How do we keep getting Expendables movies but a Dredd sequel can't happen?
