The second issue of Rebellion’s Judge Dredd: Compact Crimes series will include episodes of the 1978 “Cursed Earth” storyline that the publisher once promised would never be printed again.
The “Cursed Earth” story included two “Burger Wars” episodes, the first by John Wagner and Mike McMahon and the second by Jack Adrian and Brian Bolland, that depicted Ronald McDonald, the Jolly Green Giant, and other corporate mascots doing monstrous things. McDonald’s, Burger King, and Green Giant sued the owner, IPC, which agreed to never print the episodes again; the publisher also, at the insistence of the Green Giant corporation, added a supplemental story clarifying that the evil green giant in the story was not the real Green Giant.
Many years later, in 2014, U.K. law was changed to allow the use of copyrighted characters in parody. As a result, the stories were reprinted in the 2016 collection The Cursed Earth Uncensored, and they will also be included in the second volume of Rebellion’s just-announced Judge Dredd compact comics (see “Rebellion Announces ‘Judge Dredd’ Compact Comics“).
The “Cursed Earth” story has also been made into a game (see “‘Judge Dredd: The Cursed Earth’ Card Game“).
Click Gallery for evil mascots!
Source: ICv2
