Judge Death
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Judge Death is a fictional character of the Judge Dredd universe recounted in the UK comic 2000 AD. He is the leader of the Dark Judges, a sinister group of undead law enforcers from the alternate dimension of Deadworld, where all life has been declared a crime since only the living commit crimes. After years of appearing in Judge Dredd stories, he later got his own series in the Judge Dredd Megazine and in 2000 AD.
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[edit] Origins and history
The full story of his journey from being Sidney D'eath, the son of a sadistic traveling dentist, to his incarnation as a creature of pure evil is recounted in the Judge Dredd Megazine series Young Death - Boyhood of a Super-Fiend and given extra detail by Anderson: Psi Division - Half Life. A young sadist thrilled by inflicting pain, Sidney would soon go on to murder three bullies from his school. He joined the Judges in order to be able to kill people legally, gaining the nickname 'Judge Death' for his hard-line stance on executing all lawbreakers.
The psychotic and obsessive Judge shortly afterwards encountered the witches Phobia and Nausea, who he saw a means to achieve his vision of total justice - the complete extermination of all life. He reasoned that all crime is committed by the living, therefore life itself is a crime. Using their dark magic, he had himself transformed into the unstoppable undead Judge Death and along with the “Sisters of Death” and his fellow Dark Judges, he wiped his world clean of all life.
Once that was done, he left “Deadworld” and crossed dimensions to reach Mega-City One. His body was destroyed after his first massacre and his spirit took control of Psi-Judge Anderson in an attempt to rebuild it. He ended up trapped, but the other three Dark Judges arrived to free him and together they slaughtered thousands of citizens. He and his cohorts struck several times, causing great carnage each time, but they were always defeated by the Judges Dredd and Anderson. Eventually the Sisters of Death, now spectral beings, arrived in MC-1 and along with the Dark Judges, they initiated Necropolis - a horror that took the lives of 60,000,000 people.
Necropolis failed and Judge Death soon ended up as the only Dark Judge left free in this world. Inevitably he too was eventually captured, after jumping across dimensions to Gotham City. He would break loose on several occasions afterwards, being recaptured each time. In his final escape in 2124, he managed to keep his escape secret for a while and then lured Anderson into a trap by murdering children. Catching Anderson unawares, he put her in a coma so she couldn't stand against him - he also infected her with a pestilence spirit so that when she woke up a great plague would be unleashed. Anderson, warning herself via a hallucination of herself around during Death’s rise, purposefully remains in her coma.
Death went out into the Cursed Earth, slaughtering as he went and re-evaluating his cause and methods. He decided that Weapons of Mass Destruction were the most effective way to achieve his ends and went on a quest to find them. Using a bunker full of nuclear weapons, he destroyed Las Vegas before being reduced to a spirit again, whereupon he was dragged into Hell by the vengeful ghosts of all those he had killed.
[edit] Changing attitudes to Death
The representation of Judge Death in the Judge Dredd and related comic strips has changed somewhat in character over the years. In his first appearances his image was extremely dark and sinister, with a real air of menace. However, later stories have tended to present him in a much more humorous light. For instance, in the Judge Dredd/Batman crossover graphic novel Judgement on Gotham Death was used as a practically comical figure. John Wagner decided to rectify this in the solo Death story My Name Is Death, and while later strip The Wilderness Days added humour to Death's tale, he was still a menacing and unstoppable killer; Alan Grant's Half Life, released at the same time, also treated Death as pure, unstoppable evil.
[edit] Judge Death's Appearance
Judge Death appears in something close to a Judge's helmet, though its modified visor resembles a portcullis. Many 2000 AD illustrations make use of the visor as a visual shorthand for Judge Death. His mouth is pulled into a toothy rictus. On his right shoulder is a pterosaur, as opposed to the Judges' eagles. His left shoulder pad and elbow pads are festooned with bones. His tunic is fastened with crude stitches rather than a zipper, and his badge and belt buckle are shaped like a human skulls with extended fangs, the latter with bat wings.
[edit] Alternative version
Following the release of the Judge Dredd movie, a comic set in its continuity, entitled Judge Dredd: Lawman of the Future, was published, and soon featured a story introducing this continuity's version of Judge Death. He remains a death-dispensing monster from another dimension, but in this storyline, he is actually an alternate-dimension incarnation of Dredd himself, who died in the line of duty, but was supernaturally resurrected through his undying desire to dispense law. As all crime was committed by the living, Death reasoned, then living itself was a crime. Hence the monster's catchphrase: "The crime is life, the sentence is death!"
[edit] Powers and abilities
Judge Death is a spirit inhabiting a corpse. The body itself is very difficult to hurt, as minor damage is just ignored. If the host body is destroyed then Death’s spirit can escape and possess living humans. Death, usually with the help of another, prepares the new host body by using a mixture of chemicals to decay the flesh and let the body reach full ripeness. In "Batman/Judge Dredd - Judgement on Gotham", Scarecrow helps Death with this task.
Death always kills his victims in particularly gruesome ways. His main way of killing people is to thrust his razor sharp fingers into the body of his victim and then squeeze the heart until it bursts.
[edit] Cultural references
- Depeche Mode member Martin Gore has been photographed wearing a Judge Death t-shirt.
- Thrash metal band Anthrax used an image of Judge Death on their 2006 bandshirt for their "cursed earth" tour.
[edit] See also
[edit] Publication
- Judge Death (by John Wagner and Frazer Irving, collected in Judge Death: My Name is Death, 112 pages, 2005, ISBN 1-904265-73-1):
- "My Name is Death" (in 2000 AD #1289-1294, 2002)
- "The Wilderness Days" (in Judge Dredd Megazine #209-216, 2003-2004)
