This week marked the start of a new Judge Dredd arc from writer Rob Williams, artist RM Guera, colorist Giulia Brusco, and letterer Annie Parkhouse.
Dredd had a bit of a moment earlier this year with the instant-classic story, A Better World, which had praised heaped upon it by this website and many others. While that was a politically-charged pressure cooker of a story, the next arc is something very different altogether, leaning into the wilderness and survival horror.
And Rob Williams recently made some time to discuss it with The Beat. Check out our conversation below, after the jump!
Rob Williams Interview
ZACK QUAINTANCE: I’ve read the first part, but it still feels like I should ask, what can you tell me about Rend & Tear with Tooth & Claw? I understand this is survival horror…
ROB WILLIAMS: Judge Dredd picks a crack team of Judges for a secret mission, and at the last moment decides to have a cadet Judge accompany them. From that point on… things don’t exactly go according to plan. And it’s a case of attempting to get out of this whole thing alive.
ZACK: Survival horror is perhaps not a genre often associated with Dredd. How was it for you as a creator fitting the character (which you know well at this point) into that genre?
ROB: Thematically Dredd fits this ‘genre’ very well. He’s The Law. Well, it turns out when you’re hundreds of miles from safety in a wilderness where there’s ice and snow and a lot of things that want to eat you, nature doesn’t give a shit about ‘The Law’ or anything else you care about. It strips everything away and becomes primal. Survive.
And in terms of the Northern Radlands landscape – the mountains and the forests all white from snow. This kind of feels like a western, which Dredd stories often do. He’s very much the Sheriff archetype. The Clint Eastwood in The Outlaw Josey Wales, occasionally he’s Clint from Unforgiven.
ZACK: I’ll drop most pretenses of professionalism here and say that I think RM Guera absolutely rules. How was it working with him?
ROB: Agreed. It was amazing. I’ve got to know Guera quite well over the years. We did an issue of Unfollow for Vertigo together and one Dredd. He’s the loveliest guy, and collaborating with him often involves long, intense Zoom Calls where we talk story and films and novels and life.
I think he’s always looking for the truth in things – be it via culture and knowledge or the panel that he’s drawing. The work he puts in here to drawing trees, rocks, the depth of the snow. Everything is thought out. He’s just a modern master and I was thrilled that he wanted to not just do another one-off Dredd but to make this a longer collaboration. I think he’s created something exceptional.
ZACK: In addition to the giant bear in part one, was there anything else you asked him to draw that turned out especially excellent?
ROB: Ah man, all of it. The way he brings this landscape to life. The look of the Judges’ uniforms and weaponry. The snow trailing off mountain peaks so you get a sense of the wind up there and how it would cut you to pieces. There’s a character you’ll meet who is a native of these lands, who just feels completely fully formed. And Giulia Brusco – Guera’s regular colourist – has also done an exemplary job here. It all looks so good in black and white like a Toppi strip, but Giulia came in and just made it soar in colour.
ZACK: What made this the right story to follow A Better World?
ROB: Because it’s totally different from A Better World. It strips away the City and its politics and over the course of the story, it strips away all the bullshit from Dredd and the others and digs down into who this person is as a human being.
ZACK: Finally, I just have to ask…when might we see Dredd directly address what went down in A Better World? I caught a quick line in the Next Man Up prologue…
ROB: We’re talking about it – following up the ramifications of A Better World and the plot threads we left dangling. Plans are afoot between Arthur Wyatt, Tharg and I, put it that way. It might be a little while yet, as it should be probably. I have another long-form Judge Dredd with Henry Flint we need to get to first. But a sequel, of sorts, is on the way.
Rend & Tear With Tooth & Claw kicked off in 2000AD Prog 2376.
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