Marvel Knights The Punisher #1 Long Review
The cover of The Punisher #1 shows Frank Castle on the cover drawn in ultra realistic detail. He is wearing military fatigues and his trademark Punisher T-shirt. He is also wearing a shoulder holster and holding a large rifle against the background of an orange flaming skull with red targets over its eyes. The upper left shows the Marvel Knights Logo with a Punisher skull and the issue number.
As our story opens up, the Punisher is holding a gun to the neck of a scrawny well-dressed man in a white tux with a ponytail. Bodies, blood and cash are strewn about the room. Frank Castle, the Punisher tells the man to get a haircut and then leaves. The scared man in white pulls out his cell phone and calls a man named Mike. He tells Mike the story of how he went down to Sticky Eddie’s to score drugs. When he walked in there was a drug deal going down. He says that he waited while the mob men finished their drug transactions when suddenly the Punisher comes busting through the door.
The Punisher holding two Uzis guns down everyone involved in the transaction but when he gets to the man in white he hesitates. The man in white tells the Punisher that he just came to score some drugs and that he is not a part of this gang. The Punisher looks at him and then just walks away and leaves. Much to the amazement of the man in white.
The man in white tells Mike over the phone that since the Punisher left, he is free to collect all the money and drugs and go into business for himself. All he needs is for Mike to come down and pick him up, Just then the imposing figure of the Punisher appears behind the man in white. He feels the Punisher's hands grab the sides of his head as he tells Mike that he has to go now. A tear rolls down his face. The punisher then snaps his neck by twisting his head completely backward. The man in white’s body now lays broken on the floor, a pool of blood oozing from his mouth,
The Punisher produces a gas can and starts coating the scene in gasoline. He covers the bodies, the money, and all the drugs with gas. And on the way out he throws in a grenade. As the Punisher Frank Castle walks away the warehouse explodes and plumes of smoke rise into the night sky.
Frank makes his way back to his apartment, on the stoop he meets a man named Dave. Dave has multicolored hair and piercings. He gives the Punisher a thumbs up and says “Mr. Smith! Dude!” The Punisher looks at him and says “Hey Dave.” Upon entering the building another man says “Hi Mister Smith,” The punisher replies “hello Mister Bumpo.” Mr Bumbo is large and seems to fill his entire doorway. He asks, “hey could you…” and before he can finish his sentence The Punisher has already sensed the problem. The man is stuck in his own doorway. The punisher reaches out and grabs Mr Bumpo’s shirt and pulls him free of the doorway. The man exclaims “Thanks!”
The Punisher walks past a timid looking woman peering from a cracked door. She says “hello Mister Smith.” The Punisher replies “hello Joan.” As he walks past the woman looks on biting her lip. The punisher enters his room which he rented under the name John Smith. He is now a solo act working without the advanced tech of his friend and partner Micro. He laments the fact that the days of fancy tech are long gone and now its time to do things the old fashioned way. He begins to look over his collection of weapons. Assault rifles, and shotguns, pistols and grenades and many more weapons of war. Frank Castle thinks the scum of the city need a wake-up call. And they best prepare themselves because he is coming.
The next scene opens with a small army of men in white suits holding a vigil over a badly burned body laying on a drawer in a morgue. One man weeps and calls out “baby brother! Look what they did to you Eddie!” The man swears to make everyone pay. No one knows who organized the hit that took out both parties and killed Eddie, but also left all the money and drugs behind. Burned to ashes. Apparently having no interest in it. No one wants to say or even think that it could have been the Punisher.
Meanwhile, Frank Castle is making his way down to the morgue in the hospital. An orderly stops him and lets him know that the morgue is off-limits to civilians. The Punisher asks him how much did the gangster Bobby Gnucci pay to look at his brother’s corpse? The orderly says it cost one hundred bucks and he would also be glad to give him the same deal. The Punisher has heard enough and slams the orderly into a locker. The orderly protests and says that he will run out of air. The Punisher asks if he would like for him to shoot in a couple of air holes. The orderly declines.
Frank makes his way to the morgue where he is greeted by two armed guards both in fine suits. They guards berate him and tell him he better get lost if he knows what is good for him. The Punisher produces a small wrist-mounted blade and impales the first guard in the forehead. The men inside morgue hear the screams and cry out “oh no!” The Punisher enters the room shotgun in hand and exclaims “Oh yes!” Some of the men freeze giving the punisher a clean shot at the first man. His chest explodes. Someone cries “get him!” And bullets begin flying.
Bobby Gnucci calls out, “Punisher you psycho! You are Dead!” He then catches a buckshot in the shoulder and falls back onto his brother’s cold steel body drawer. His lungs fill with a scream. Another man shoots at The Punisher but he quickly pulls a body from a drawer to block the bullets. The man gets the same idea and attempts to also pull a body from a drawer to block bullets with, but the shots penetrate the body and flood the man’s chest with pellets. Never hide behind the skinny guy. The Punisher thinks to himself. A grenade silences everyone else and all that is left is Bobbi Gnucci. The Punisher lets Bobbi know that he will be used to send a message. Then he guns him down.
Later on that night The Punisher walks the streets of New York City. He wants to send a message to the scum of the city. The Gnucci family is just the beginning. Sticky Eddie the dealer, his brother Bobbie aka Mr Date Rape. And Carlo. Ma Gnucci’s number one son. The Punisher stalks Carlo walking the streets with a bodyguard and a date. He appears to be taking the lovely young lady to the empire state building. When they arrive, the observation deck is closed for the evening but Carlo bribes the doorman for private access. He orders his guard to wait at the stairs while he shows the young lady up,
On the deck Carlo marvels at the view while his date looks on impressed. They are unaware of The Punisher at the staircase below dispatching of Carlo’s guard by choking him to death with his gloved hands. As Carlo brags looking out the window The Punisher approaches. Carlo’s date spots him first. He shushes her quietly and approaches Carlo.
Carlo turns around when he hears something, but no one is there. One of the observation decks windows is swinging open however. Carlo’s heart fills with fear as he calls out “Baby! NO!” He is afraid that she jumped from the deck. Carlo looks out the window to check when suddenly The Punisher grabs his hair from above. He pulls Carlo out the window, and holds him high above his head looking out from the top of the Empire State Building. He laments to himself while throwing Carlos over the top. His body seems to take forever to fall. And while it does, Frank Castle the Punisher reflects on the motivation that inspires him to defend New York City the way he does. Frank Castle, The Punisher, it seems is back in action. And with that this comic comes to a close.
So I have always been a fan of the Punisher, but I never fully got on the bandwagon with his comic. There were some interesting storylines going on in the pages of his books and the character's aesthetics were cool, but it all felt a little bit nerfed. There was really no over the top gore even though the Punisher primarily used guns and explosives as his weapons of choice. This all changes with this Marvel Knights series. This is the violent gory world of The Punisher realized without the limitations of the comics code. This is a welcome addition to my favorite mature superhero books of the nineties and two thousands such as Spawn and Bloodshot. If I had known about this book I might have read more Punisher sooner. But I will be definitely checking out more in the future.
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