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Something that separates Judge Dredd from other science-fiction comics is the fact that the strip — which launched in 1977 — is both told in something approaching real-time, and with one long-running continuity that means that events build on the past in ways that can, at times, be surprising and devastating.

For example, the 1982 storyline The Apocalypse War — in which Dredd’s home of Mega-City One (which is made up of the majority of the Eastern Seaboard of the United States) goes to war with it’s Russian equivalent, East-Meg One, climaxing with Dredd destroying the entire city and essentially committing genocide via nuclear missiles — has fueled multiple subsequent stories as the effects of generational and institutional trauma are explored.

Indeed, the current Dredd storyline running in British anthology series 2000 AD, ‘A Better World,’ is built on a number of long-running plot threads, as one Judge in the accounts department has proven that there’s an alternative to brutal policing when it comes to cutting crime: well-funded social programs. If there’s one thing that Judge Dredd (the strip) has demonstrated, it’s that it’s not afraid of changing the status quo and letting readers deal with the consequences along with Dredd and his fellow fictional characters… so should readers expect that the police department might end up being dismantled for good at the end of the current arc?

Surprisingly, neither of the storyline’s two writers are saying no. In fact, Rob Williams even went so far as to tease that there are “big repercussions at the end of this [storyline]” when talking to Popverse recently. His collaborator Arthur Wyatt agreed. “Here’s hoping for years of Dredd stories coming out of this one,” he said. “I do think [the stories] get interesting and textured when they build on each other.”

‘A Better World’ is currently running in 2000 AD, with issues available digitally via the 2000 AD webstore. The full interview with Williams and Wyatt can be found right here.

Read a preview from the opening of ‘A Better World’ right here.