Launching a new title during an event has a bunch of obvious pros and cons. Tying it into a very big event helps put eyes on it. Tying it into a big event also keeps it from telling its own story to start. Thus does the 2nd volume of Punisher War Journal hit the stands, in the capable hands of rising star Matt Fraction. Matt had done a variety of great indie material, and is in this moment also starting the definitive Iron Fist run co-written with Ed Brubaker. But this is his first solo joint for Marvel. And far from the last. Matt will quickly become one of their best and more reliable writers, tackling Iron Man, X-Men, Thor, a definitive Hawkeye run and a major event series, among many other things before returning to indie stuff with a whole slew of new hits, and then beyond. As I type this, the first (?) season of the Godzilla-related Monarch show has recently concluded, wherein co-showrunner Matt Fraction helped make it easily the best thing to come out of Legendary’s so-called “Monsterverse.” He’s the goods. But before all that, he’s gotta get Frank Castle retooled. Punisher had been enjoying a period of success under famously anti-superhero writer Garth Ennis. First, he did material that was basically satire (Initially with his Preacher co-creator, the late Steve Dillon), elements of which found their way into that dreadful 2004 Punisher movie (Not the part where Punisher and Wolverine essentially have a Looney Tunes fight in which Wolverine’s face gets ground off by a steamroller, tho). Then he turned quite the other way, turning Punisher into an oppressively dark and realistic look at a deranged man fighting a hopeless war on crime. With this new incarnation of Punisher War Journal, the goal was to get a version of Frank that could interact with the Marvel Universe again. Joining Fraction in this endeavor is artist Ariel Olivetti, whose deal I never fully got. The pages look like fully digital painted art, but he’s not coloring it. That’s Dean White’s job. So I guess Olivetti was just doing fully rendered grayscale. It’s a look. Ok, well, this opens with SHIELD agent Jasper Sitwell going to corral SHIELD agent GW Bridge to go after Frank Castle. Then, we check in with Frank.
So, like, the Punisher in Civil War 5, as well as the Punisher on the cover of this comic, is the classic Punisher, silly white gloves and boots. I like him that way. But to start, we’re looking at Garth Ennis’ “realistic” Punisher. Punisher’s op is interrupted by the sound of huge impacts outside.
This Fulvio guy just kinda looks like a pile of skin. Ariel Olivetti often made… unusual choices.
Checkov’s Light Anti-Tank Weapon! Punny proceeds to put 1 of his bullets in Stilt-Man and the other in that Fluvio guy and call it a day. Well, then, GW Bridge and his guys are raiding Frank’s hideout. Bridge, it must be noted, was invented by Rob Liefeld, looked like a black Nick Fury, didn’t wear anything like a SHIELD uniform while working for SHIELD, and was generally pretty lame. Fraction has made him a potbellied old man, past his prime, but sharp and dedicated. A reinvention. Castle makes short work of the SHIELD agents while internally grumping about how badly registration has messed everything up. Then he decides he better skip town for awhile.
Bridge is a good foil for Castle in this series. Castle, meanwhile, has hied himself hence to Stamford, to a candlelit vigil for the lost, where our old friend Phineas Mason, the Terrible Tinkerer, is present. We last saw him chronologically, I think, in the Dead Man’s Hand special, and on the blog in… sigh… Chapter One #6. Punny steals his van and kidnaps him, because he’s heard he upgraded Stilt-Man and others.
This book walked a weird line between absurdity and brutality that really seemed to fit a crazy guy like Frank Castle. Frank finds the former Rampage playing Godzilla with a bunch of little robot Iron Men (Kinda ironic what with Fraction now in the Godzilla business).
“Kill him, my awful little men!” is such a Fraction line. Still makes me chuckle.
Meanwhile, Bridge has his guys deducing Mason set up the new Stilt-Man only to find out Mason is now dead. Punisher is one step ahead of him. And he’s also…
Back in the suit, as promised. Dress like a superguy to fight superguys. He goes looking for Stark-tech guys, and while he’s combing the city, he finds some of Cap’s safehouses, tying back to how he’s been following the heroes, and he more or less adopts this goofy dude as his “new Microchip,” as in the guy called Microchip who used to be Frank’s “man in the chair” in the 80s and 90s so he had someone to talk to. After a lot of stalking the city, Frank’s thingie that tracks Stark tech gets a big ping.
And there you have it. So Frank mows down those losers, as we saw, and we get a new perspective on Spider-Man’s very strange reaction to him, as we saw, and then we get more info.
A+ Spider-Man. We stop for 2 pages of GW Bridge quitting SHIELD so he can chase Punisher on his own terms, and then…
Alright! You might think this coulda gone in an interlude, as little of it had to do with Civil War or Spider-Man, but ol’ Frank’s about to really be in it, so this makes sense to me. Next post: ASM takes on Spider-Man jobbing out to those dorks.