Is it a goner------- More than likely.

It didn’t get a lot of water last year, could that be the problem? -------- Most definitely.

Around here the last couple of years have been very dry. I have saw a good many huge, beautiful Japanese Maples die from lack of water. Check some of the branch's for green under the bark. If not is there any sign of life? If you break a couple of twigs off do they snap right into or do they bend a good bit first. Are the branch's turning greyish in color. All are a sign of a dead or dyeing tree.

Wait a while longer for someone with more experience than me chimes in.

I would say yes. I garden around 60 miles NW of Chicago and planted a JM in the Fall. I wasn't sure if it would make it, but it has totally leafed out. I was pleasantly suprised.

I should also mention that an animal dug a large hole right at the base last year (you can see where we filled it in. I wonder if that also affected it. The bark is coming off the trunk. Some of the branches show green underneath the bark, but I don’t know if it’s on it’s way to dying or whether it might bounce back.

I would say wait until the first week of June and if it hasn't leafed out by then, then it's probably dead. Bummer on the animal snacking on it. That's happened in my yard as well with other plants, like tulips. The darn squirrels, deer and bunnies all snack on them when I first planted them last year, but this year, not much. Guess they have moved on to other sources to snack on.

Well, it's obviously NOT dead otherwise here would be no foliage on that lower branch! But it does look like it's on its way out :-(

Japanese maples subject to excessive stress or mechanical or root damage can be vulnerable to various soil pathogens which would otherwise ignore a healthy tree. Drought can certainly be a factor as could root damage from the burrowing critter. I would cut off one of the lower, apparently dead branches close to the trunk and take it to your local extension office for a diagnosis. It is possible that Verticillium wilt is present and that can be - and usually is - fatal to JM's. It will also restrict whether or not you can safely replant another in that location. And it often manifests in spring with a failure to leaf out.