That cover copy is so quintessentially early 90s to me. In that it’s trying to sound tough and edgy and ends up sounding very silly. We drop back in where we left off, and Frank realizes on page one that he’s made a mistake.
I took this kind of moralizing by Spider-Man to heart as a young person reading these comics. Punisher kills people and Spider-Man won’t tolerate it, period. Seeing all the 70s and early 80s stuff where Spider-Man and Punisher team-up and Spidey’s like “Hey, do your thing, man” has been truly shocking.
Frank finds himself under less stuff than Spider-Man, and is able to slip away before our hero bursts out of the rubble. Seeing neither Punisher nor Master of Vengeance around, Spidey just leaves, too. Arriving home, a weary Peter Parker gets out of his Spider-Gear, thinking about how lucky he is to have MJ, how a night like this almost makes him wish she’d make him choose between her and Spider-Man so he wouldn’t have the weight of Punisher’s future kills on his shoulders, but he brushes those thoughts aside, reminds himself life is good, and settles in for a good night’s sleep.
A good gag. McLeod loves his cheesecake, like so many of these guys. Elsewhere, ol’ MoV arrives home, furious about how badly things went, only more angry at Spider-Man now that his revenge has gone so poorly. Guy’s having a rough day. He tears off his Spider-Man costume and reaffirms his quest for revenge to an empty room. Later, Peter Parker is at The Bugle, barely awake, when he spots Frank Castle. He’s talked his way in as a visiting journalist needing to use the morgue, going by the name “Mr. Fort” (Hilarious). Frank is able to learn the history of Frank Baron and Barnett that we learned last issue, and figures the rest out. He almost catches Peter spying on him, but our man is too fast. As Frank leaves The Bugle, Spider-Man is on his trail. He gets a tracer on him, but doesn’t know Frank has made him in the process. Spidey hops on top of Frank’s subway train, but has trouble picking him out of the crowd when he departs. Returning to the street, he finds his trace, and the coat it was stuck to, in a trash can, with a note writing on it to look up, where he sees Punisher climbing onto a roof. Very convenient.
VERY convenient! While Frank says those bars will only hold Spider-Man 15 seconds, Frank has enough time to go to the hospital where Vicary is, impersonating a public defender (“Tower,” who knew Frank had so much fun in his job?), pumping him for information, and then we cut to Spider-Man escaping the trap. But Grant gives Spider-Man thought balloons to tell us he’s been scouring safehouses for 2 hours, even though McLeod clearly draws him crawling out of the same trap door he came in through. Miscommunication somewhere along the line. Further complicating things, Spidey finds Franks briefcase from The Bugle, even tho he’s been scouring the city for 2 hours and it would be right back at the trap building. Not great! But the notes inside give Spidey an idea of where to search. Back at his hideout, Master of Vengeance has whipped up a new batch of the chemical that gives him his power, to make him stronger than Spider-Man. He’s just feeling the unintended ill effects of his potion when Frank kicks in the door.
Spidey quickly takes down Punisher, eventually webbing him to a wall, and then he’s socked in the back of the head by MoV, thinking his Spider Sense was warning him about Frank. Our villain is only angrier that the guy he wants to kill just saved his life.
All set for a final showdown next issue. The letter page features a guy writing in to say Spider-Man 26 was his first issue, and he really enjoyed it, and to thank them for the recap of Spider-Man’s origin and how his powers work. Those sorts of things feel redundant when you’re reading thousands of Spider-Man’s, but in the old days, stuff like that was really helpful for new readers. Of course, these days, we have the internet, and only a lunatic would take up such an expensive and difficult to follow hobby as comics in the 21st Century…