When it was first announced that Hollywood was about to make another attempt to bring the uber-popular (in the UK anyway) comic anti-hero Judge Dredd back to the big screen, many fans viewed the news with trepidation. That was in no small part due to the dismal 1995 film starring Sylvester Stallone as the lead character.

This next go around, the titular character is being played by Karl Urban (‘Star Trek’) and the film’s title has changed to the simple ‘Dredd’. So far, we’ve heard from Dredd creator John Wagner who seemed excited about the new take on the character, saying that the new movie was closer to the comic version of the character.

However, despite Wagner’s praise for the new script and actors, many fans of the character were still hinging their thoughts on one thing… would Hollywood have the guts to make ‘Dredd’ into the rated-R movie that it needed to be to do the character justice?

Well now it seems we have an answer and it is a resounding “yes!” The MPAA just issued a rating on the film and it did indeed earn it’s rating for, as the bulletin states:

“strong bloody violence, language, drug use and some sexual content”

Sounds like Judge Dredd to me. Now that we’ve got a look at Karl Urban and Olivia Thirlby in character (above) and this astounding turn of events, I’m actually getting excited to see Dredd’s return to the screen. Now if DC would only do the same with that long-delayed Lobo film that they’ve been hinting at.

‘Dredd’ is directed by Pete Travis (‘Vantage Point’), written by Alex Garland (’28 Days Later’) and is scheduled to blast into theaters on September 21.