Episode IX: “Robot wars”
First print date: April 30 1977
Prog appearance: 10
Writer(s): John Wagner
Artist(s): Carlos Ezquerra
Total episodes: 8
And so we come to the very first multi-part Dredd story, spread out over eight separate progs, and which shows the previous episode as having been the prologue to this epic. Bringing together for the first time the original creators of the strip, this story explores what happens when, as presaged in “Robot wars”, the machines have enough of being treated like slaves and rise up against their oppressive masters.
(Note: Although the episodes were not numbered in the progs (each being in a separate issue was pretty self-explanatory) I'll for the sake of clarity be labelling them as such here).
Chapter I
A mere few days after the attack at the Robot of the Year Show, one of the bigger robots goes on a rampage, stealing from an oil store and destroying all in his path, declaring “Death to the fleshy ones!” A police hover vehicle sent to the scene is easily swatted aside as the robot, Call-Me-Kenneth, stomps off with his cache of oil and vows to rule Mega-City One. There is of course only one force you call in when something bizarre like this happens, and the message is soon flashed to Justice Central, where Dredd, already thinking about the possibility of robots rebelling, is chilled by the words of the dispatcher: robot on the loose, death toll so far is seven. Dredd knows that Call-Me-Kenneth has as part of his body a huge carpentry saw, and shudders at the mayhem he could wreak with such a weapon. He is soon rushing to the scene.
He comes across the robot feeding one of the local cops into a garbage disposal, and blows his head off. But Call-Me-Kenneth just laughs, telling Dredd that his control circuits are deep within his chest and protected by armour plating. Headless, he continues his murderous rampage, slotting a chainsaw onto his interchangeable tool arm and lunging at Dredd. But his visual sensors having been in his head, he does not see Dredd duck at the last moment, and turns away, believing he has killed the Judge. Blundering sightlessly on, Call-Me-Kenneth does not realise that he is directly underneath the power cables for the skyrail, and Dredd shoots with unerring accuracy, hitting the cable and knocking it down onto the robot.
Out of control now, Call-Me-Kenneth slices at himself with the huge chainsaw and is soon a heap of scrap metal, collapsing to the ground. Dredd stands over it, relieved that the threat is over for now, but prophesies dark times ahead if this is not an isolated incident. The city could soon be facing full scale war against its own robots, and who knows how they would meet that challenge?
QUOTES
Call-Me-Kenneth: “Death to the fleshy ones!”
Call-Me-Kenneth: “Now I have oil I am free! No-one can stop me! Soon Call-Me-Kenneth will rule Mega-City!”
Dredd: “We give robots the ability to think, give them human shape and emotions. How long before they develop that other human trait --- evil?”
Dredd: “I sentence you to disintegration!”
Call-Me-Kenneth: “You created me to be your slave, but you built me too well!”
Dredd: “Until today, nobody believed a robot could deliberately commit a crime. If we Judges don't act fast we may find ourselves facing the greatest threat Mega-City One has ever known: full scale war with robots!”
Welcome to the world of tomorrow!
Or more likely, stay in your present! After years of being subservient to humans, robots are about to explode into revolt and take on their masters, and who in Mega-City One does not have something that's not robotic in nature? Just imagine: you go to make toast and it snaps your fingers. You put on the washing are are pulled inside the machine. You sit down to watch the TV and it attacks you. Yeah, everything mechanical with any sort of rudimentary intelligence is about to get its pound of flesh: literally. You don't wanna be here when it all kicks off!
Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes
We see Dredd select high-ex on his Lawgiver (still not named as such) but later we will, as I've mentioned before, find they have been upgraded to respond to vocal commands, eliminating the split-seconds necessary to manually turn the selector.
NEW CHARACTER!
Sort of. Walter, the vending robot, is shown in this episode for the first time. He will later become Dredd's servant and a real pain in both his and my arse. He has a very annoying lisp, leading to him calling himself Walter the Wobot. Arrrrggghhh!!! Makes you want to go kill every robot you can find. Funny: they're thinking the same thing about you...
I'll ask the questions, creep!
What was it that set Call-Me-Kenneth off? He says he's tired of being used, but what was the trigger? Or is this one robot's rampage merely symptomatic of a wider, deeper malaise in the machines of Mega-City One, a simmering anger that is coming to a boil, and finds its first outlet in the mad carpenter robot?
I AM THE LAW!
Dredd may very well sympathise with, or at least understand these robots, for so long mistreated by his kind. But when one of them breaks the law, all bets are off. Once you commit a crime, once you step out of line you're in Dredd's wheelhouse, and he will hunt you down with the remorseless coldness he is known and feared for. Human or robot, man or machine, nobody can escape Judge Dredd.
Laughing in the face of death
We haven't seen much in the way of dark humour yet, but here Call-Me-Kenneth roars, as he launches his chainsaw arm at Dredd, “Call-Me-Kenneth has steel appeal!” Not a bad start, but it will get very much better as time goes on.