The New Jersey Institute of Technology has been working on a personalized system based on sensors in the trigger and grip that identifies the owner’s hand size, grip, and strength. This system currently claims a 90 percent success.
An Australian firearms manufacturer was inspired by The Lawgiver to come up with the Variable Lethality Law Enforcement electronic pistol in 2000. The gun can only be fired by a designated owner and has multiple firing modes.
Most recently, a number of Armed Forces have begun ordering the ATK XM-25 to the tune of $65 million. The ATK XM-25 is a computerized projectile launcher that can fire ranged ammunition out of the soldier’s line of sight and even around corners. The Pentagon calls it the XM-25 Individual Airburst Weapon, which uses a laser rangefinder to precisely measure the distance to a target, and then primes a fuse on a timed grenade so that the projectile explodes exactly where it should.
The XM-25 looking scarily, brutally futuristic. Or like a metal tube that spits death.
“The way a soldier operates this is you basically find your target, then laze to it, which gives the range, then you get an adjusted aim point, adjust fire and pull the trigger,” deputy program manager Richard Audette told Army News Service. “Say you’ve lazed out to 543 meters … when you pull the trigger it arms the round and fires it 543 meters plus or minus a one-, two- or three-meter increment, then it explodes over the target.”
British troops are calling it the Judge Dredd gun. U.S. troops in Afghanistan instead refer to it as The Punisher.
Next on the Judge’s arsenal is the powerful shotgun, holstered on the Judges’ bikes. Previously, and euphemistically, named The Lawrod, it has been superseded by The Widowmaker 2000 and The Arbitrator.
In 2005, Atchinson developed the AA-12 fully automatic shotgun which can fire up to 300 RPM.
[yframe url=’http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WOoUVeyaY_8′]
To get around Mega City One, wielding its own arsenal of cannons, lasers and autonomous computer control, we come to the Lawmaster. Based on the Harley Davidson, this beast of a bike has become an icon of Dredd’s world in its own right.
A Lawmaster. Just looking at it could get you killed.
Image Source: Judge Minty Concept Art
Having been copied in films like Batman and the remake of RoboCop, motorbike manufacturers have taken notice.
This in now way this looks like the Lawmaster. Nope. Not at all.
Image Source: Newscom
Dodge introduced the non-street legal Tomahawk in 2003, a bike that the builders claimed could go faster than 400 MPH with the V10 engine from a Dodge Viper. About nine Tomahawks have been sold at around $550,000 from the Neiman Marcus catalog. (Check out this thorough review at Allpar.com)
Insanity has two wheels, it seems.
Image Source: Phil McAvoy for BBDO/Dodge
The Gen-Ryu, a Yamaha concept from 2010 for a hybrid model, certainly looks like it wouldn’t look out of place in Dredd’s world.
Yamaha Hybrid Motorbike Concept
You have your bike, cannon, and handgun, but how do you put down a mass of Cits in the full grip of Block Mania? Riot foam!
Riot foam! Use it on grandma!
In the comic, riot foam is sprayed on large groups, where it hardens to form a rock-hard agent that immobilizes the potential prisoners. Sandia National Labs developed a similar product for military use as part of the Less Than Lethal program in 1980. In 1995, U.S. troops tried using it during Operation United Shield in Somalia, but the foam was found to have numerous lethal and semi-lethal side-effects including smothering, solvent damage to the skin on removal, and gun clogging. Sticky Foam was also mentioned in the book The Men Who Stare At Goats.
Sonic cannon! Ideal for teenagers!
At the 2009 G20 Summit in Pittsburgh, police used sonic cannons against protestors to disorientate and disable them. That was the first time such a weapon has been used offensively by American police, although it has been in the police armory since before 2004, when it was on hand for the Republican National Convention in New York. Since then, the sonic cannon has deterred Somalian pirates, unruly football fans at the 2011 Super Bowl, and Occupy Wall Street protesters in Oakland and New York. Most recently, the cannons have been spotted at the 2012 Olympics and being used by Japanese Whaling fleets against Greenpeace ships.
Of course, the one thing that keeps Judge Dredd going, despite the fancy guns, the tricky bike, and all other kinds of technology, is his ability to never be afraid, to get down, get dirty, and solve a problem with his fists.
Possibly the greatest panel in comics, of all time.
Featured image: Brian Bolland.
Thanks for the great article, Tim. All I really know about Judge Dredd stems from the Judge Dredd movie I saw in the 90’s, and the Dredd film I watched last night. I rented it online just before leaving my office at DISH for the day, and it downloaded to my DISH Hopper DVR, ready to watch, before I made it home. It was a great movie, and much better than the old one, but there are only so many things the movie can cover. Your article helped to fill in a few blanks!