Perhaps this shouldn't be so much of a surprise, given that Judge Dredd is a project nestling under the wing of Danny Boyle's DNA films. But we're still ludicrously excited by the news, picked up from Twitter by MTV's Splashpage, that Alex Garland is working on a draft of the script.
Garland previously wrote The Beach, 28 Days Later, and Sunshine for Boyle, and his involvement was confirmed via tweet by British comics artist Mark "Jock" Simpson, who has worked extensively on Dredd strips for 2000AD and has been coming up with concept art for the projected new film. "Working through script visuals for Judge Dredd movie. Alex Garland writes a great script," is the full missive.
The dystopian police-state satire has been running in the weekly 2000AD comic since 1977, and has also had its own monthly 'Megazine' since 1990. Lest we forget (or perhaps we should), a 1995 film attempt starred Sylvester Stallone and Rob Schneider, and was directed by Danny Cannon. It tried hard, and occasionally looked impressive, but was horribly compromised by the fact that only Cannon had any appreciation of the source material, and didn't have the Hollywood power to fight his corner.
Time will tell if this new version sees the light of day, but with DNA and now Garland involved, things are certainly looking up. Screw Gran Torino, this should be Clint Eastwood's acting swansong!