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Call-Me-Kenneth
A former construction robot who led an uprising against Mega-City One as revenge for humans mistreatment of robots.
- A.I. Is a Crapshoot: If you're going to have robot slaves you really should not give them the capacity to feel emotions.
- The Bad Guy Wins: An alternate version of Call-Me-Kenneth appears during Helter-Skelter, originating from a universe where the robot uprising was successful and led to a robot dictatorship in Mega-City One.
- Cranial Processing Unit: Averted. Call-Me-Kenneth's "brain" was actually located in his armored chest, with Dredd's destruction of his head not slowing him down much.
- Dead Guy on Display: Call-Me-Kenneths body was displayed like a religious symbol by Walters robot cult, many years after The Robot War.
- Hypocrite: Despite allegedly fighting to liberate robots, Kenneth oppresses and destroys any robot who aren't slavishly devoted to him.
- Insult Backfire: When Dredd compares him to Hitler, Kenneth responds "I'm a big fan of Adolf Hitler".
- Villain Has a Point: His methods were extreme, but Kenneth raised a very valid point, the humans ARE abusive and cruel to robots.
- Starter Villain: The main villain of the comics very first real story arc.
- Your Head Asplode: Dredd destroyed the head on Kenneth's original body by shooting it, which did little to stop him, since Kenneth's "brain" is stored in his armored chest.
Phillip Janet Maybe
A child prodigy/Serial Killer who Dredd has several run-ins with over the years.
- Arch-Enemy: He served as one to Judge Dredd because PJ Maybe managed to elude the law for so long. Dredd took a personal interest in the Maybe case after first arresting him as a teenager, and if it were up to him Maybe would have been executed long before his eventual demise.
- Attention Whore: While he's careful to avoid getting caught, Maybe has an insatiable need to have his crimes acknowledged, boasting of being "the greatest serial killer ever". Dredd notes that Maybe often leaves clear evidence of his presence behind at crime scenes for this reason.
- Becoming the Mask: He really grows to enjoy his Byron Ambrose persona.
- The Chessmaster: He's been able to elude the judicial authorities many times over the years by changing his face and faking his own death. Many of his elaborate murders fall under this as well, requiring an immense amount of planning aforethought and improvisation mid-way through.
- Cold-Blooded Torture: After kidnapping an old classmate, PJ Maybe proceeds to torture him by pulling all but six of his teeth out without anaesthetic until he dies from blood loss and trauma.
- Corrupt Politician: Subverted. He manages to become mayor of Mega-City One under the guise of Byron Ambrose. While it's only a figurehead position, he's actually pretty good at it and makes an impact. He remains a serial killer on the side, but it doesn't really impact his decision-making.
- Dead Person Impersonation: He's murdered and impersonated specific persons several times, including his neighbour's son when he was a teenager and philanthropist Byron Ambrose to escape Dredd in Ciudad Baranquilla.
- Depraved Bisexual: While he is in love with his Swedish love droid, Inga, he has no qualms about sleeping with men and women alike to further his schemes before killing them when he no longer needs them.
- Dirty Coward: While he likes to think of himself as a fearless criminal mastermind, he resorts to crying and begging when faced with the prospect of his own execution. Dredd notes how odd it is that somebody who's taken so many lives would be so afraid of death.
- Disguised in Drag: When his face is no longer able to accept face changes, he dresses as a woman to evade capture, though presumably gets a boob job, since he's sporting an ample cleavage under his dress.
- Disproportionate Retribution: He kills six of his old classmates decades later because they got him kicked off the school play. He also made certain to kill the last one by having a fuel tanker fly into his block, causing over 20,000 deaths in the subsequent inferno.
- Embarrassing Middle Name: His middle name is Janet because his parents wanted a daughter.
- Faking the Dead: He often goes to ridiculous lengths to fake his own death in a very public and spectacular manner. For example, when disposing of his Juan Pedro Montez identity, he kidnaps the real Byron Ambrose, replaces his heart with an artificial model the same as his own, has a Judge under SLD-88 hypnosis swap the DNA records for PJ Maybe and Byron Ambrose in their files, and finishes by publicly burning himself (actually Ambrose) alive on a massive bonfire so that the Judges will believe him dead.
- Even Evil Has Loved Ones: Inga seems to be the only individual that he cares about. Although, as Byron Ambrose he does come to care about looking after “the people” as a collective whole and do so well at it that the city and judges both adore him - this just doesn’t mean he will stop killing any of them individually.
- Hoist by His Own Petard:
- His decision to send Inga (a rare Lunquest 7 love droid) to assassinate the bedridden Chief Judge Sinfield is what prompts Dredd to start looking into the possibility of PJ Maybe's survival, ultimately leading to him being captured (again) and his identity as Byron Ambrose compromised.
- Maybe's decision to try and kill Dredd with a grenade ultimately gets him killed when Dredd simply shoves PJ off a ledge, letting the grenade blow him apart mid-air.
- Karma Houdini: Zigzagged Trope. He's one of the few recurring bad guys, but there's about an equal chance that he'll commit a bunch of crimes and successfully escape as there is that the Judges catch him. This was finally subverted for good during the events of Prog 1998, with Dredd shoving him off a high ledge and shooting him through the chest with a Lawgiver round; while this looked like a Disney Villain Death, the grenade PJ was holding detonated midway down, turning him into Ludicrous Gibs.Dredd: This case is closed.
- Literal Change of Heart: In order to trick the Judges into thinking he's dead, Maybe kidnaps Byron Ambrose and has his heart forcibly transplanted into him, while Ambrose is fitted with PJ's artificial one.
- Ludicrous Gibs: His grenade blows him apart mid-air, sending bits of PJ Maybe raining down onto the street below.
- Magic Plastic Surgery: His standard method to evading detection after Dredd incarcerated him for the second time is to change his physical appearance entirely with the face changing machines in Mega-City One. Eventually, he has it done so many times that his face cannot physically be altered any further, forcing him to use other means to evade the law.
- My God, What Have I Done?: Maybe is utterly horrified when Inga is destroyed by a Hi-ex round as a result of his failed attempt to assassinate Sinfield, spending the next few hours alternating between hysterical blubbering and desperate attempts to figure out how to cover his tracks.
- Not the Fall That Kills You…: Subverted. The grenade he's carrying explodes, killing him before he can hit the ground. Even if it didn't, the lawgiver round to the chest on the way down didn't do him any favours.
- Obfuscating Stupidity: His poor spelling masks his genius ability. This is even done in his narration. He deliberately performed poorly in school and pretended to have Cloudcuckoolander tendencies in his early teens to avoid people realizing just how smart he really was.
- Older Hero vs. Younger Villain: PJ Maybe starts as an teenaged killer, and has aged about two decades since then. Dredd himself is more than twice his age when Maybe is Mayor.
- Plagued by Nightmares: After getting kicked off the school play in his youth, PJ Maybe keeps having nightmares of the six schoolmates responsible taunting him. He responded to this like any sane person would — by finding the schoolmates again and giving each one a Cruel and Unusual Death. This doesn't prevent him from suffering nightmares, but it does make him able to ignore them.
- Pragmatic Pansexuality: While he's a committed Robosexual, he's perfectly willing to sleep with both men and women to achieve his ends.
- Pragmatic Villainy: While he's an unrepentant murderer, he doesn't see the practical use in acquiring a millions-strong bodycount as mass-murdering supervillains like Judge Death or Sabbat the Necromagus have done.
- Robo Sexual: His robot, Inga, is his true love, though he will sleep with human women to further his own ends.
- Rouge Angles of Satin: He is a notoriously poor speller and this even manifests itself in his narration, which is riddled with grammatical and spelling errors.
- Serial Killer: He uses pretty outlandish methods, such as the hypnotic chemical SLD-88, rare robotic bugs, and appetite-stimulating chocolates to commit murders. Sometimes he just goes on killing sprees For the Evulz.
- The Sociopath: He's actually a pretty thorough Deconstructed Character Archetype. He lies and manipulates, has no regard for others, and is quite narcissistic and in need of stimulation. He sometimes feels compelled to kill, and John Wagner ultimately presents him as a pitiable figure instead of an incarnation of pure evil. He does feel bad on occasion, such as when he lost his parents, but he doesn't really know why.
- Taking You with Me: He tries this one on Dredd by threatening to blow them both up with a grenade. Dredd simply pushes him over, shoots him, knocking him off the ledge, where he is blown up on the way down.
- Teens Are Monsters: He already acquired a sizable bodycount before he was even 18.
- Tom the Dark Lord: A Serial Killer named Philip Janet Maybe. When Dredd asks him about it, Maybe explains that his parents wanted a daughter.
- Villainous Breakdown: His final act of desperation is to try and blow Dredd up with a grenade while claiming that they're not so different. Earlier in these episodes, he's actually seen talking to the voice in his head. Even it tells him that he's losing it.
- Villainous Crossdresser: In "Ladykiller", he disguises himself as a woman in order to evade the judges.
- Villain with Good Publicity: During his tenure as mayor he was beloved by the citizens for his good performance, but he was still a serial killer behind closed doors.
Deathfist/Stan Lee
An extremely dangerous assassin and martial artist hailing from Radlands of Ji (Radioactive wasteland in post-war China)
- An Arm and a Leg: Shimura cuts off his hand and tells him that he'd better get himself a new name.
- Bald of Evil: A lethally deadly martial artist who is completely bald.
- Bare-Fisted Monk: Prefers to fight unarmed, hence his nickname of Deathfist.
- Enlightened Antagonist: After years of intense meditation, Stan managed to master the power of 'Black Chi', regenerating his left hand and granting himself vast mystical powers, at the cost of what little sanity he had left.
- My Kung-Fu Is Stronger Than Yours: He's the only opponent to ever curbstomp Dredd in a one-on-one fight using only hand-to-hand combat skills.
- Ontological Paradox: Stan along with his daughter, Yin Mie, tried to destroy the universe via the time rip in the Undercity. Lee was later pushed into the time rip and, in an absolute rage, struck out against it, completely annihilating himself but causing the Big Bang that kicked off the creation of the universe and eventually himself.
- Red Baron: He's referred to as Deathfist just as much as he is Stan Lee.
- Shout-Out: On one hand, the guy's name is Stan Lee, but on the other hand it's also Stan Lee.
- World's Best Warrior: Stan has mastered martial arts to the point he can beat almost anyone (including Judge Dredd the first time around) without too much difficulty and is hailed as the strongest martial artist to ever come out of the Radlands.
Sabbat the Necromagus
A necromancer from the future who creates the Zombie Apocalypse during "Judgment Day".
- And I Must Scream: Dredd sticks his head on the lodestone and he eventually loses his mind.
- Corrupted Character Copy: His backstory paints him as one to Walter from Dennis the Menace (UK) — if Walter ever got tired of Dennis' menacing and retaliated in the worst possible way.
- Complete Immortality: He literally cannot die due to his magic power as a Necromagus sustaining him for eternity.
- Disproportionate Retribution: When his classmate Den bullied him, Sabbat (known as "Soppi Walters" back then) murdered Den, resurrected his corpse, and made the Undead Child suffer for decades as his body continued to decay, with Den's mind still intact through the whole process.
- Evil Sorcerer: He's an omnicidal lunatic with a thing for the dead.
- Fate Worse than Death: Dredd plants his head on top of his own lodestone after he survives decapitation. Sabbat will remain there, helpless for all time. As Dredd put it "The sentence is life. No remission".
- Laughably Evil: He creates a bunch of undead soldiers who perform a synchronized dance number while they're slaughtering people.
- Losing Your Head: He shrugs off being decapitated and sprouts tentacles from his disembodied head.
- The Man Behind the Monsters: The zombie horde is controlled by this human-looking necromancer, giving Dredd a clear target to take out the Keystone Army.
- Mind over Matter: He threatens to drive a chainsaw into someone's skull by levitating it.
- Multiversal Conqueror: He becomes worse in the "Judgment Days" What If?. Banishing Sabbat to another universe with the Sov Apocalypse Warp technology allows him to infect every fictional universe within 2000 AD with his zombie hordes.
- Necromancer: He's a really powerful one, as he can resurrect and animate the dead on a global scale by tapping into a planet's spiritual energy.
- Not Quite Dead: Dredd tries to take him out by decapitating him with a katana, but it turns out Sabbat can shrug off an injury like that since he's already dead. He quickly sprouts tentacles from his neck and resumes the fight.
- Omnicidal Maniac: He orders his zombies to kill the Earth so he can harvest the corpses and expand his army further. He's already done this on an alien world in the future of Strontium Dog, which led to The Federation nuking the planet to keep him from invading the rest of the galaxy. Sabbat fled into the past.
- Our Liches Are Different: It's eventually revealed in his Not Quite Dead moment that his body died a long time ago; he only keeps it around for appearance's sake.
- Take Over the World: His end goal is to use his undead army to take over the galaxy.
- Tom the Dark Lord: His birth name is Soppi Walters. Definitely a Non-Indicative Name for an Omnicidal Maniac.
President Booth
Robert L. Booth was the last elected President of the United States before Justice Department took over. He was a psychotic imperialist who unleashed the Atomic War of 2070.
- 0% Approval Rating: He murdered his way to the Presidency because he saw he wasn't going to win the election, then he murders the assassins who helped him do it, then he went to war with pretty much the entire planet, and then he kicks off a nuclear war that results in the post-apocalyptic aftermath the world of Judge Dredd takes place in. Decades later he returns with an army of mutants to take power back for himself, but even they eventually turn on him and kill him off for good. He's probably considered the greatest monster in human history by this point if he wasn't already.
- The Atoner: Enforced and Subverted. Dredd sentences him to a lifetime of farm work in the Cursed Earth. Instead, he spends the next three decades building a mutant army to try and take back America.
- Best Served Cold: His plans for revenge take around thirty years to come to fruition. During that time, he builds the New Mutant Army in the Cursed Earth.
- Evil Old Folks: Even as an old man in the Cursed Earth, he still tries to take back power with a mutant army.
- Human Popsicle: The Justice Department can't bring themselves to execute the last President of the United States, so they sentence him to 100 years suspended animation instead.
- Hoist by His Own Petard: He's finally killed off when his mutants turn on him.
- Greater-Scope Villain: He is the reason the Earth is a radioactive wasteland in the first place, and if it wasn't for his actions neither the mutants nor the Mega Cities nor the Judges themselves would even exist.
- Manipulative Bastard: Booth rigs the Presidential Election when it looks like he will lose and assassinates not only a potential whistleblower, but also the guys he had assassinate him. After Dredd resentences him to a lifetime of labour in the Cursed Earth, he riles the mutants into forming an army and attempts to take back America.
- No Celebrities Were Harmed: At various points in the comic's run, he's been used as an expy of Ronald Reagan, George W. Bush, and, most recently, Donald Trump.
- President Evil: He stole the election, then had his associate who tried to warn the Justice Department murdered. He invades the rest of the world for their resources, leading to a nuclear war that kills hundreds of millions and turns much of the U.S. and other countries into an uninhabitable wasteland. He then managed to top himself; when his supplies of artificial blood ran dry, his life-support robots began murdering innocent people in order to preserve his unworthy life. After Dredd stopped this by waking him up and assigning him to life at hard labor, he escaped and assembled a mutant army to try and conquer America to set himself up as a supreme dictator once again.
- Red Baron: Before the war, the people nicknamed him "Smooth Booth". After, he's "Bad Bob".
- Turned Against Their Masters: The mutant army he raised ends up killing him when Dredd uses him as a human shield.
- 25th Amendment: He served as Vice-President under Harvisson and took office as President upon Harvisson's death.
- Unishment: He considers Dredd's sentencing of him to a lifetime of labour in the Cursed Earth to be this, since he's a charismatic enough villain to raise an army with which he plans to take back America. He even tells Dredd as much. Dredd, for his part, tells Booth that he should have just executed him.
Nate Slaughterhouse
A cybernetically-enhanced former soldier of the Space Corps who becomes a vigilante after he loses his wife and son to criminals.
- Anti-Villain: He's a Space Corps veteran who comes to the Big Meg after he and his wife both sign off and try to integrate themselves into society. Then he loses his family and becomes a Vigilante Man.
- Badass Longcoat: Wears one when he starts searching the streets for his missing wife in the cold and when he first becomes a Vigilante Man, most likely to conceal the fact that he's a Cyborg.
- Cyborg: As a mandroid, he received top-of-the-line military cybernetic enhancements to replace most of his missing body after it was destroyed in combat.
- Humongous Mecha: In addition to being a Cyborg Super-Soldier, he's also a skilled mech pilot. He gets a reconditioned surplus mech from a friend, which he uses to complete his Roaring Rampage of Revenge on Schultz.
- Names to Run Away from Really Fast: Nate Slaughterhouse is an appropriate name for a mandroid Super-Soldier.
- No-Sell: His second suit is able to shrug off even Hi-Ex rounds.
- One-Man Army: In his second suit, he wipes out an entire criminal base in the Canadian territories. Not even an army of well-trained Judges are enough to stop him.
- Rocket Punch: One of his abilities is to be able to launch his fist at an enemy and retract it with an attached cable. He uses it to kill the crime boss who had his son murdered and his wife kidnapped and mindwiped.
- Super-Soldier: His mostly cybernetic body makes him nearly unstoppable even as an ex-soldier (though the parts where going to be replaced with standard prostheses eventually). Later, after Nate escapes from prison he's upgraded with an even stronger suit.
- Vigilante Man: After losing his loved ones he goes on a one-man crusade to eliminate the criminals of Mega-City One.
- We Can Rebuild Him: He is rebuilt as a Cyborg after losing most of his body in combat. His organic body is little more than a head.
- Who Needs Their Whole Body?: He managed the feat of escaping from a prison hospital with no legs or arms.
- Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds: He was a decent enough man before his killing spree, but tragedy broke him completely.
- You Killed My Father: Inverted. The death of his son is what finally sets him off on his Roaring Rampage of Revenge.
Owen Krysler/ The Mutant
An alleged messiah who had been prophesized by the Psi Corps that he would save Mega-City One from a disaster in 2120 in his role as the Judge Child. He is kidnapped by the Angel gang, only for Dredd to eventually discover that Krysler is evil, and has staged the whole kidnapping simply to entertain himself. Dredd abandons him in space, only for Krysler to set his sights on Earth to seek revenge on Dredd for his abandonment, which leads to his execution. In a Bad Future, Krysler is cloned by his retainer and accidentally reborn as the hideous Mutant, who conquers Earth and kills Dredd.
- Ain't Too Proud to Beg: When Dredd realizes his evil and abandons him on an alien planet, he begs to be taken back to Earth, to no avail. Happens again when Grubwilder throws him out of his castle to face the retaliation from the Justice Department following the failure of his revenge plot against Dredd. Again, begging does nothing, and Owen Krysler is bombed to ash.
- Bad Future: In a possible future, Krysler is cloned and reborn as the hideous Mutant with amplified psychic powers, who conquers Earth, destroys Mega-City One, turns most of its inhabitants into vampires or monsters, and kills Dredd. Dredd and Anderson manage to stop him by going back to the past and destroying him before he becomes a threat, averting the disaster and making sure he was Killed Off for Real.
- Birthmark of Destiny: According to the dying Psi-Division pre-cog, the eagle-shaped birthmark on Krysler's forehead marked him as the future Chief Judge who is destined to save Mega-City One from a disaster. His prediction was wrong. Krysler was destined to be the disaster that would destroy Mega-City One.
- Came Back Wrong: The cloning process hideously mutated Krysler, turning him into an even worse monster than he was before.
- The Chessmaster: Skilled at manipulating others into doing his bidding without even realizing it, he doesn't even need to use his telepathy most of the time.
- Clipped-Wing Angel: When January 5th, 2120 came around in the main timeline, a minor time paradox caused a much weaker version of The Mutant to appear, in an attempt at bringing about the foretold apocalypse. Unlike the original, it's powers were little more than illusions, limited to one area, and Anderson was able to hold it back by herself. It faded from existance when January 5th turned to the 6th.
- Dying Curse: Dredd manages to arrive just in the nick of time as the cloning process is complete, killing The Mutant before it's fully formed. As it lies in a pitiful heap on the floor, it curses Dredd with it's first and last breath.
- Enfant Terrible: A sadistic little boy with very potent psychic powers.
- Exact Words: The prophecy stated that Krysler being made ruler of Mega-City One would avert a disaster. That disaster was Krysler HIMSELF, who through being denied the right to rule would find himself turned into The Mutant, who would go on to destroy the city in 2120.
- Psychic Powers: Possesses very potent telepathic and precognitive mental abilities. These are amplified even more after his transformation into the Mutant, making him virtually unstoppable.
- Your Head Asplode: In the Bad Future, his sheer power is enough to splatter the brains of the entire Psi-Division, including Anderson (who'd been promoted to it's head in this timeline) as soon as he arrives on Earth.
Randolph "Whitey" Whitely
The first villain to be depicted in the strip, he kills Judge Alvin, causing Dredd to be sent after him. Returning for the strip's tenth anniversary, Dredd faces off against him again.
- Back for the Dead: Escapes from Devil's Island ten years into his life sentence only for Dredd to kill him with his badge.
- But for Me, It Was Tuesday: Ten years after he was sentenced to life on Devil's Island, he escapes taking hostages and demands Dredd. After all the events of the decade that had passed since, Dredd has no recollection of him, even directly asking "Who the hell is Whitey?"
- Cop Killer: He shoots and kills Judge Alvin as he patrols past the Empire State building.
- Siblings in Crime: His brother tries to bust him out of Devil's Island, destroying the World Trade Centre in the process.
- Starter Villain: He's the very first villain we see Dredd take on.
The Judda
A cult of cloning fanatics led by a Judge named Morton Judd, one of the original Council Of Five in the days prior to the Atomic Wars. Judd wanted to replace the unruly citizens of Mega-City One with manufactured clones bred to be docile and law abiding, but was soundly opposed by the rest of the council, most notably the legendary Judge Solomon and Judge Fargo, Dredd's clone "father". After a failed coup attempt, Judd and his followers disappeared, only to resurface decades later in the "Oz" storyline, staging yet another attempt at taking over Mega-City One by assassinating and replacing key Judges with his clones. From their headquarters in the Australian outback, The Judda had spent the past 40 years amassing an army of clone followers, noteably several of them made from Fargo's genetic material. Although Judd and the majority of the Judda were wiped out by Dredd, their influence would have far-reaching consequences...
- Alternate History: There is an alternate timeline, Dimension Parralell 717, where Judd was never exiled, and the world is ruled by his Justice Lords, who execute anyone who even THINKS of committing a crime.
- Bald of Evil: Judd himself is the villain of the "Oz" arc and is completely hairless. It's doubtful he ever did have hair, as even during "Origins", he never had hair and was described by Judge Solomon as "morally bankrupt".
- Breeding Cult: While not "breeding" in the traditional sense, the Judda's ultimate goal is this.
- Clone Army: All the Judda, with the exception of Judd himself, are clones, made from genetic material stolen when Judd originally fled Mega-City One.
- The Evils of Free Will: When he was still part of the Council of Five, Judd proposed to replace the entire civilian population with clones, genetically programmed to be obedient to the Judges. Fargo vetoed this proposal on the basis that the Justice Department was tasked to "police the citizens who have, not the citizens we would like".
- The Remnant: Aside from Judge Kraken, two surviving Judda resurfaces in the radio drama "Jihad", as the heads of a fanatical Judda cult.
Armon Gill
A former Space Corps soldier who is manipulated into committing murders of citizens with strong anti-judicial opinions. He believes that his handler is the Chief Judge herself.
- Determinator: He will stop at nothing to do his job. Escaping from a Cursed Earth workfarm which is impossible for any normal human is just one of his many feats.
- Flawed Prototype: While his genetic modification hasn't left him with any physical defects, it has made him irrational and violent, which is what gets him drummed out of the Space Corps in the first place.
- Kill and Replace: He offs a preacher in order to assume his identity and use his home as a base of operations. After escaping from a Cursed Earth workfarm, he kills a Texas Ranger who attempts to claim the bounty on his head and returns to the Big Meg using the Ranger's identity.
- Made of Iron: Thanks to his cockroach genes, he is able to shrug off multiple gunshots at point blank range.
- My Country, Right or Wrong: He is intensely loyal to the Big Meg and believes that what he is doing is for the good of the city.
- Red Baron: He is known as The Justice Killer and The Chief Judge's Man, the latter of which is the title of his story arc.
- Super-Soldier: Genetically modified with leopard and cockroach DNA, he is faster and tougher than a normal human, but it's left him unstable.
- Unwitting Pawn: DeKlerk impersonates the Chief Judge and manipulates him in order to silence anti-judicial activists.
Marlon "Chopper" Shakespeare
When introduced, Marlon is an ordinary juve, trying to avoid going insane in the mindless ennui of Mega-City One. Rather than taking up a bizarre hobby like his parentsnote , he took up an illegal hobby: scrawling. Making a name for himself as the second-best scrawler in the city, he got into a public rivalry with the best; the mysterious Phantom Scrawler. This led to a climatic showdown where the latter was revealed as a rogue painting droid, which committed suicide, whilst Marlon himself was captured by the Judges. When released, he took up skysurfing, but began to pursue the illegal field of stunts for that hobby, ultimately getting invited to the illegal Supersurf 7 competition. He won, but was captured again. When Supersurf 10 was made legal in Oz, public outcry facilitated his escaping from prison and fleeing overland to Oz on his skyboard, where he competed in the competition and almost won, only to then flee into the Radback to escape being imprisoned a third time. He returned to America for the Supersurf 11 in Mega-City Two, and was one of the handful to survive the death-trap course, collapsing with severe injuries mere feet away from the finish line, though he did blow up the crazed sponsor of the event before hand. He competed for the last time in Supersurf 13, and then retired, fleeing once more to Oz to wed his long-suffering girlfriend.
- Action Survivor: He's just an ordinary cit trying to survive in a Crapsack World. He's not hugely combat capable, but is excellent on a board and is very capable at evading the judges in an aerial pursuit.
- Anti-Villain: He's just an ordinary citizen who is bored and has no prospects.
- Calling Card: His trademark as a "scrawler" is to leave a smiley face on any surface he defaces.
- Disney Death: Gets shot to death in "Song Of The Surfer", thanks to Supersurf 11 being set up as a Blood Sport with snipers and other lethal obstacles strewn around the course. Returns alive and well in the next story due to a change in creative teams.
- Skysurfing: Takes up skysurfing as a hobby after he's released from his time for scrawling, and discovers that he has a talent for it. Finds fame after winning Supersurf 7, though never fully captures those Glory Days in later stories.
Nero Narcos
The head of the Frendz crime syndicate, Narcos instigated the Second Robot War in order to take over Mega-City One.
- Because It Amused Me: Narcos calls his takeover of the city "a game" and claims he did it mainly because he was "bored". Dredd thinks it to be complete bollocks.
- Brain in a Jar: His original body was too damaged to salvage, so in his first few appearances, he was one of these, placed below a large painting of his former self.
- Did Not Think This Through: After his Second Robot War succeeds, he quickly discovers that ruling Mega-City One is very different and much harder than running a crime syndicate. Without any Judges, he can't effectively control the unruly civilian population, who end up doing more damage to his robot forces than the remaining law enforcement does. He also has no real support base, meaning that once his robot army is decimated by Dredd, he has no backup or replacements.
- Full-Conversion Cyborg: As his original body was injured beyond repair, his brain was extracted and placed into a mechanical bodysuit that gives him all the benefits of being human. He can even feel pleasure.
- Gag Penis: His sophisticated robot body has an extendable one. According to him, it's "a man thing".
- No Kill like Overkill: Narcos gets shot by at least four Justice Department tanks, four on-foot Judges, and one set of Lawmaster bike cannons. By the time the smoke clears, there's nothing left but a crater and a few chunks of scorched metal.
- Victory Is Boring: Just before his death, he admits this to Dredd, stating that he's done more or less everything a person can, and taking over the city was the biggest challenge he could think of.
Satanus
A massive T. rex originally created for a wildlife park featuring cloned dinosaurs, who survived the Atomic War and became one of the biggest dangers in the Cursed Earth.
- Animal Nemesis: While Dredd has had plenty of non-human enemies, Satanus is the only one who is an animal in the traditional sense of the word.
- Back from the Dead: A sample of Satanus blood was brought back for study, the remnants of which was eventually used by the Cult of Satanus to bring him back to life, forcing Dredd to battle the monster once again.
- Canon Welding: His mother was Old One-Eye, the antagonist of Flesh
- It Can Think: While never outright stated, it's heavily implied that Satanus is atleast partially sentient, and even remembers parts of his original life in prehistoric times.
- Names to Run Away from Really Fast: His name is well-earned.
- Offing the Offspring: He was originally killed by his own mother, Old One Eye, before being revived through cloning.
- Predators Are Mean: A vicious, sadistic monster who delights in killing humans, and not just for food.
Total War
Years after the failed democracy referendum and the collapse of the Democracy Now movement, splinters of the original group joined together as a loose collection of extremist cells, having decided to use violence to force change under the name "Total War".
- Became Their Own Antithesis: Rather than accepting that the majority of Mega-City One isn't interested in a return to democracy (not to mention ignoring that certain democratic reforms had been instituted on the civilian level), Total War is willing to resort to mass murder to get rid of the Judges.
- Martyrdom Culture: Total War's members are more than willing to die for their beliefs, with their creed explicitly calling on them to "sell [their] life dearly" if cornered.
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Moral Event Horizon: They'd arguably already crossed it once they started using terror tactics and suicide bombings, but nuking a sports arena during a Boing championship, resulting in at least 30.000 direct deaths and god knows how many other from radiation and collateral damage, catapulted them right across it. Two more nukes are set off before they're finally stopped. - Spree Killer: Most Total War terrorists are this, killing large groups of people in multiple different locations before being gunned down by responding Judges or Citi-Def.
- Well-Intentioned Extremist: Much of the group consists of what Dredd calls "true believers", people who genuinely believe in the cause and are willing to do anything to see it happen. The ones we see have been personally victimized by the Judge system and have resorted to violence when peaceful methods for change amounted to nothing.
- With Us or Against Us: Part of their creed is that if you aren't actively working with them, you're complicit in keeping the Judge system running and therefore deserve to be killed.
- Your Terrorists Are Our Freedom Fighters: They certainly consider themselves freedom fighters, and civilian casualties are acceptable collateral damage in the fight for freedom.
The P Street Posse
A vicious and brutal street gang that plagued the urban sprawl that would one day become Mega-City One during the 2020's. In 2026, the Posse led an army of gang members in an assault on the White House, an event that would have massive ramifications for the entire world.
- Karma Houdini: The fact that every single member got off scott free due to witness and voter intimidation, along with corruption in the courts, certainly qualifies them for this trope. That said...
- Karma Houdini Warranty: The gangs actions, not to mention them escaping any sort of punishment, gave Eustace Fargo all the support he needed for his Judge initiative. In 2031, the first Judges took to the streets, and began to systematically crushing the Posse and their allies, who could no longer hide behind an impotent justice system.
- Nice Job Fixing It, Villain: Their attack on the White House was the final straw that led to the suspension of due process and the rise of the Judges, crippling street crime in the U.S.
- Posthumous Character: They only appear on archival recordings in Origin, as most of them were either wiped out by the Judges, or died in the Atomic War. Any survivors would have long since died of old age.
- Villain Team-Up: Organized an army made up of many other East Coast street gangs for the Washington attack.
Don Uggie Apelino
An intelligent chimpanzee who's adapted the mannerisms of a typical mob boss, and runs his own crime family consisting entirerly of criminal apes.
- Cement Shoes: One of Apelinos favorite methods for disposing of his enemies. The alternate universe version who was part of Cal's Legion of Doom managed to do this to the Dredd of his own universe.
- How the Mighty Have Fallen: The radiation released during the Apocalypse War destroyed the higher brain functions of Apelino and his men, reducing them to sub-human beasts that Dredd easily slaughtered.
- Improperly Placed Firearms: He and his men insist on using tommy guns, tying into their whole "20th century mobster" persona. Dredd himself remarks that he didn't know anyone still used them.
- Uplifted Animal: Apelino, and other intelligent apes like him, are the descendants of zoo animals who were given human-level intelligence, to the point that some of them are considered citizens rather than animals.
Fairly Hyperman
Stop me if you've heard this one; the last survivor of his home planet, arriving on Earth where he uses his amazing superpowers to battle evil... except that's where the similarities end. Fairy Hyperman is a smug and condescending humanoid alien who tries to set himself up as the resident superhero of Mega-City One, making an enemy of the Judges in the process.
- Destructive Savior: He's very irresponsible about using his powers, and outright mutilates or murders several criminals, which he just shrugs off. When he grabs a fleeing car, it sends the perps inside flying out through the windshield and splatters them on a building. Fairly Hyperman just remarks "you win some, you lose some".
- Expy: Of Superman. His design is also reminiscent of Miracle Man, with the colours inverted.
- Flying Brick: Like the hero he's a parody of, he's won the Superpower Lottery; flight, strength, invulnerability, etc.
- Insistent Terminology: Always refers to his powers as "fairly", like Fairly Cold Breath, Fairly Hot Vision, etc.
- Kryptonite Factor: The radioactive remains of his home planet Kapok, or Green Kapoknite, which Dredd finally shoots him with. Turns out the Justice Department have been saving fragments of destroyed planets found in space, just in case one of these flying jackasses decide to make a nuisance of themselves.
- Shooting Superman: Many criminals and Judges try this, to no avail, as Fairly Hyperman is invulnerable. It finally works when Dredd is given bullets made from Green Kapoknite.
- Smug Super: And how! He basically tells the Judges they're only fit to work as crossing guards, and condescendingly calls Dredd "little buddy" whenever they meet.
- Villain with Good Publicity: Unsurprisingly, he's a huge hit with the people of Mega-City One, even though he doesn't even qualify for Hero Antagonist, considering the amount of collateral damage he causes.
La Reine Rouge
Sov leader of a massive crime syndacite that encompasses much of the Euro territories, making her play in the shadows for ever more “legitimate” power. A nasty tendency to collect organs and keep victims alive far past should be possible.
- Ambition Is Evil: Desires for her fingers in many pies, which is part of what got some disrepencies noticed by a Meg-City accountant.
- Bad Boss: Has an underling executed for failing to find a way to kill Maitland.
- Cold-Blooded Torture: Notorious for her vivisections, artificially keeping some victims alive and conscious through machinery.
- The Dreaded: Greatly feared with the extent of her reach.
- Good Smoking, Evil Smoking: Seem smoking mid-operation on herself getting a replacement lung. Very much evil.
- Offing the Offspring: Orders a hit on her son the Red Prince once he falls into Judge hands.
- Older Than They Look: Said to have operated in her position for over seventy years, while still looking relatively young.
- Pragmatic Evil: To an extent, knows when to hide and flee - and speaks detrimentally of the Red Prince for his focus on vengeance.
- Red Baron: Known as La Reine Rouge or alternatively as “the Red Queen”.
The McDonalds-Burger King Marauders
Two warring clans of marauders in the Cursed Earth, both sides are the descendants of survivors from the Atomic War - namely, a pair of franchise owners for the popular fast-food corporations McDonalds and Burger King. In the decades since the apocalypse, they have taken the legacies of their forefathers to the extreme, not only taking on the title of Ronald McDonald and the Burger King, but also enforcing the standards of fast-food dining on their subjects with an iron fist.
- Aristocrats Are Evil: The Burger King, what little is seen of him. He's even carried into battle on a throne.
- Bad Boss: Ronald McDonald kills his "employees'' if they fail to uphold the sanitary standards laid out by the McDonalds Corporation, which is a little unrealistic in a post-apocalyptic wasteland. It's heavily implied the Burger King isn't any better.
- Feuding Families: The McDonalds and Burger King families have been at odds more or less since before the Atomic War, though before that, it wasn't quite this lethal.
- Filler Villain: Like Dr Gribbons in the following story, the McDonalds and Burger King clans don't really serve a purpose for the overall storyline, meaning they could be safely cut out if (or rather when) the trademark owners put up a fuss.
- Lawyer-Friendly Cameo: Extremely averted, which is why this story was banned from the Cursed Earth arc compilations for years. This is literally two of the most recognizable corporate mascots of the modern day fighting to the death.
- Legacy Character: Ronald McDonald and the Burger King are just the latest in a long line of men to hold the title; Ronald actually kills the current Burger King early on in the story, which isn't even treated as a big victory, as it just means the next guy in line will take up the crown.
- Made a Slave: Both sides routinely raid other settlements to "recruit" new employees. And to be fair, they do pay them... in burgers and fries. And experience!
- Monster Clown: Ronald McDonald is a far cry from his smiling, friendly Friend to All Children predecessor - he's a tyrant who leads an army of raiders, murders anyone who opposes him, and kills his own men if they don't fall in line.
- Trademark Favorite Food: If you're stuck in their territory, you better learn to like hamburgers.
Dr Gribbons
A strangely familiar-looking mad scientist operating a massive genetically-modified produce farm out in the Cursed Earth. Left to his own devices for decades, Gribbons created a small army of mutants to serve him, all of them based on corporate mascots from the 20th century, such as the Jolly Green Giant, the Michelin Man, and the Seltzer kids.
- Filler Villain: Like Ronald McDonald and the Burger King from the previous story, Dr Gribbons only serves as an extra roadblock on Dredd's journey, meaning the story can safely be cut without changing the overall storyline, if legal issues required it (which it eventually did).
- Go Mad from the Isolation: Dredd thinks that Gribbons was by himself in the Cursed Earth so long with nothing but old advertisments to occupy himself with that he went insane.
- Mad Scientist: With an emphasis on mad, you'd have to be off your rocker to create mutants like these.
- No Celebrities Were Harmed: Gribbons is almost identical to Colonel Harland Sanders, the founder of Kentucky Fried Chicken, right down to their clothes. His personality, on the other hand, is completely different, as Gribbons is a deranged, abusive madman.
