The folks at 2000AD are clearly fed up of waiting to see if the accountants at DNA Films will bow to the online petitions and constant fan-badgering and release a sequel to 2012's Dredd: They're taking the initiative and starting their own continuation of the film, beginning next week in Judge Dredd Megazine #340. This new continuity doesn't replace Dredd's ongoing 36-year-old saga, instead running parallel. Y'know, like an Ultimate Judge Dredd. I can see how the whole "sequel to Dredd movie" angle may well play well with the mainstream press, perhaps generating some mass-media attention.

The strip, "Dredd: Underbelly," is by writer Arthur Wyatt and artist Henry Flint.  2000AD sent along these images, showing Flint's process for creating the issue's cover, from preliminary sketch to finished item.

“I wanted to challenge the reader with this image," Flint explains. "The cracked window and the blood is an after thought while getting carried away with Dredd’s coolness. The idea was to have Dredd confronting us directly, asking us the question whether or not we wanted to read a movie Dredd comic. We, as an audience, have perhaps given him the wrong answer and he’s giving his response by shooting us. The out-of-focus shadow running from top to bottom on the left is us the reader slowly starting to topple over holding our guts in wounded agony.”

As long-term followers of Flint's Twitter feed already know, he's a very funny individual indeed.