Dredd is on Max, and it’s the violent thriller the MCU wishes it had

I don’t know if you’ve heard this recently, but the Marvel Cinematic Universe is getting darker. Deadpool & Wolverine was the MCU’s first R-rated movie, it’s been trying to make a bloody and violent Blade movie happen for going on a decade now, and everyone behind the scenes of Disney Plus’ new Daredevil show can’t stop talking about how violent and dark it is. In other words, now that it isn’t at its peak cultural powers, the MCU is desperate to prove that it can be more than just shiny superheroes sarcastically saving the day. But now that Dredd is on Max, it’s a great time to remind yourself of how great a truly grimy, R-rated superhero movie can be, and why Disney will never have the guts to pull it off.

Dredd became a cult classic almost immediately after its 2012 release, and it’s easy to see why. The movie follows Judge Dredd (Karl Urban) as he tries to lay down the law in the futuristic hellscape known as Mega-City One. One day, Dredd gets stuck showing around a rookie Judge candidate (Olivia Thirlby), who happens to be a mutant with psychic powers, when he is suddenly tasked with investigating a homicide at the Peach Trees apartment building. The massive, 200-story building turns out to be the home of the horrific Ma-Ma Clan, and Dredd and his trainee have to wage a bloody fight to the top of the tower to take Ma-Ma (Lena Headey) and her drug-dealing goons out.

Written and apparently directed by Ex Machina’s Alex Garland (though Pete Travis gets the official director’s credit), the first thing that stands out about Dredd is the effectiveness and effortlessness of its world-building. An opening voiceover gives us all the setup we need about Mega-City: Its streets are filled with horrible violence, and the Judges are the equally violent protectors of those streets. From there, the movie instantly descends into grisly B-movie action, gnarly kills, and fittingly disgusting sets, which all perfectly set the vibe for the movie’s comic book world.

Every part of Dredd feels finely tuned around its singular tone. The hallways of the Peach Trees are gross, the paint-chipped walls are lined with trash, and the regular civilians look the other way as soon as gang members darken their doors. The whole movie is dirty in an over-the-top way that helps perfectly set the stage for a world that asks the Judges to be ultra-violent and incredibly scary, in comical metal masks while they wander the streets, ready to shoot anyone that looks at them wrong.

It’s an objectively silly and ridiculous premise, but where Dredd separates itself from the MCU’s recent offerings is by never winking once at itself. Marvel movies, especially over the last few years, have seemed ashamed of the comic books they’re based on, constantly joking about the costumes or the superhero names of characters in a desperate bid to seem cool rather than dorky. But Dredd isn’t embarrassed to be a Judge Dredd movie — it revels in it. Garland never lets the movie sink to the level of making sarcastic jokes about itself, because it’s clear he wants you to get invested in the grit and grime of the world he’s creating on screen. He knows the whole premise is silly, and knows that taking that silliness seriously is part of the fun.

Unsurprisingly, it’s when the shooting starts that Dredd really gets great. One thing that’s immediately obvious, and truly wonderful, about Dredd’s gunfights is that they were clearly made in a pre-John Wick world, drawing its influences from a number of places instead of just the hot new action style on the block. You’ll never catch me saying a bad word about John Wick, but his cinematic imitators are cheap and they’re everywhere. Including Marvel properties.

Netflix’s Daredevil premiered the year after the original John Wick, and it’s full of the buttery-smooth, balletic action that Keanu Reeves, Chad Stahelski, and David Leitch made famous. It’s undeniably excellent when done right, but when done wrong, or used too much, it becomes frictionless and bland. The hits lose their impact and the melees lose their danger. It stops feeling like a frenzied brawl, and more like a series of guys who are scripted to be slightly less tough than our hero. Netflix’s Daredevil drew way more than its fair share of action from this particular well. While we don’t know just yet whether or not Daredevil: Born Again will take this same approach to its fights, it seems like a pretty safe guess, considering the legacy of the original show.

Dredd, by comparison, is more like an action buffet. There are gunfights that end in a flash because Dredd’s just that good, but there are also brutal hand-to-hand fights, shootouts that drag on long enough to turn the set into Swiss cheese, and plenty of slow-motion kills of all varieties. It’s not exactly fair to say that Dredd or his partner Anderson really ever feel like they’re in danger, but watching them dispatch their foes in a hundred different, equally bloody ways keeps the action interesting and fresh in a way that’s hard to find in comic book movies these days.

None of this is to say that every comic book movie needs to be Dredd. That absolutely shouldn’t happen. But if Disney’s really committed to upping the bloodshed and nastiness of the MCU and proving it can make superhero movies for the true actionheads in the audience, then it could do a whole lot worse than Dredd. And if you’re anxiously awaiting Daredevil: Born Again, in hopes that it could reveal a darker, grimier corner of the MCU, do yourself a favor and watch Dredd while you wait.

Dredd is streaming on Max, and is also available for digital rental/purchase on Amazon and Apple TV.