Karl Urban is probably equally as anxious to get this damn Dredd thing off the ground as we are. You may remember, a few weeks ago we reported on some concept artwork that had been released for a potential new TV show. Rebellion Productions and IM Global Television recently announced plans to develop a live-action TV series entitled Judge Dredd: Mega-City One, with Mark Stern and Stuart Ford producing alongside the movie reboot’s co-producers, Jason and Chris Kingsley.

Chances are it would take the form of another reboot, as such, since Mega-City One would probably more closely resemble the style seen in the comics, rather than the 2012 movie. That said however, Urban wants to reprise his role and there’s no reason why Michael O’Connor’s excellent cinematic uniform interpretation shouldn’t be reused.

Urban has been busy promoting his latest movie, Thor: Ragnarok, in which he plays Skurge and speaking with Screen Rant the actor briefly talked about what it would take for him to come back as Judge Dredd.

“Well, Rebellion, who owns the rights to Judge Dredd, are currently developing a television series called Mega-City One, and I’ve had many discussions with them about my involvement of which I am interested, and I said to them, ‘Listen, if you write a character that has a function and a purpose and contributes to the overall story, then I might be very interested in reprising that role.’ I certainly wouldn’t want to step into it and just pay lip service to the movie. There has to be some material there that warrants further exploration of that character. So the ball’s in their court.”

Back in August, Urban appeared at Star Trek’s Las Vegas convention and inevitably ended up talking about his possible links to the Judge Dredd: Mega City One show. Once again, getting everyone’s hopes up, he said that “I am in discussions with them about that. I told them that if they write the material and give Dredd something to do and give him a function, I will be there. I would love to.”

MYM spoke to Mike Molcher, Head of Marketing for Rebellion at New York Comic Con a week ago regarding this very topic and while he didn’t have much to say on the subject, he did say the TV series was at least two years away.

Anyone who knows 2000AD will tell you that this is an untapped source of some of the very best sci-fi story writing known to man. Its mind-boggingly creative pool of talent has included Alan Moore, Neil Gaiman, Grant Morrison, John Wagner and Alan Grant. The only thing that’s more staggering is how no one has taken advantage of this, especially given the success of Marvel and DC…and so many other studios buying up the rights to graphic novels and comic books. Not long ago, Netflix announced it’s buying the rights to almost everything written by Mark Millar, except Kick-Ass and Kingsman, the cinematic rights for those were snapped up by Universal and 20th Century Fox, respectively. Incidentally, Millar began his career writing for 2000AD.

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• First Look: Judge Dredd TV series concept art
• Judge Dredd TV Series Could Go Mega
• Karl Urban Says There’s Movement On Judge Dredd TV Series