The Punisher Netflix series

Didn't find a seperate thread for him so I'll break the ice.

New trailer everyone!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lIY6zFL95hE

Looks quite awesome, but I really hope those are corrupt cops/goverment agents only Frank kills. Never Hurt an Innocent is an important part of his character.

edited 20th Sep '17 8:52:46 AM by Forenperser

Let's get a direct You Tube window

As usual the trailer music is perfect.

They... got the right feel for this.

That part where Frank's unloading with that machine gun in mid-scream was well-timed, right after one of the bad guys tells him he's going to see his family real soon. I like how they updated the costume too. It's still comic book-y but I couldn't see Frank just buying a skull shirt and deciding to wear it all the time.

I don't know his fate in the comics, but given Frank's being hunted by damned near everyone it seems, I'm curious how this is all going to end. Does he find his vengeance and go the Daredevil route, or does he stay bitter and angry? Daredevil Season 2 seemed to indicate that Frank's search for justice is never going to end, but here he's still going after the people responsible. And I don't think that plot can go much further than a season.

edited 20th Sep '17 11:50:00 AM by Soble

I know it won't happen, but it'd be nice if Micro mentioned he used to be a part of or supported hacker groups in the past. Skye/Daisy on Agents of Shield once contacted him for some information way back the shows second season. It was actually the first time Micro was ever mentioned in the MCU. I remember there was this rumor going around that punisher would somehow appear in Agents of Shield, but of course that never happened. Oh well, looking forward to this.

In the comics Frank has long gotten vengeance for what happened to his family and devotes himself entirely to being the Punisher. His exact motivation for doing so Depends On The Writer and ranges from him enjoying a war without end to him wanting to prevent the same thing from happening to others. I expect the end of this season to wrap up all the loose ends regarding Frank's family and have him move on.

I doubt the show will ever have Frank "move on" because the loss of his family is the central reason we sympathize with this mass-murdering psychopath of a character.

In the comics, his family were also killed in the crossfire of a gang war and not as a result of a malevolent conspiracy. The Netflix shows, like most adaptations, missed the point of that and went for a more direct "Bad guys killed Frank's family" approach, which doesn't really give him much in the way of a motivation past the vengeance plot.

Comic Punisher went after the mobs responsible for the shootout, but then kept shooting because ultimately there was no one person that he could direct his rage onto. His family was killed by random, violent crime, so Castle declared war against the abstract concept of random, violent crime.

The Netflix shows go so far as to have Castle's family killed by a military conspiracy, which leaves Castle with even less reason to start shooting up mafias when he's done here.

edited 24th Sep '17 9:48:27 PM by TobiasDrake

Before people get too far into this train of thought, Castle's family was killed in the middle of a three-way gang/mafia fight. It may have been orchestrated by someone higher up but ultimately they were got in the crossfire of normal criminals, giving them an out to have him continue fighting for his family.

Alternatively the Conspiracy might actually be innocent of killing Castle's family and he's just looking for a reason to keep on living.

I like the addition that the police were partly responsible for the tragedy. I hate that somehow his former team was somehow involved in this, because this seems to be too much of a coincidence.

@Tobias: It's not unlike Batman or even Spider-Man. The Waynes and Uncle Ben (respectively) are essentially victimized by completely random crime, thus why the heroes therefore decide to go to war on random crime itself.

Some adaptations make the Wayne murder into this vast conspiracy, which cheapens the point.

I'm more okay with those characters cheapening their origin stories after they're already established, because they're meant to be evolving characters. They're supposed to learn and grow as people. Sometimes they regress because they're ongoing stories that have lasted decades and that shit happens, but the idea at least is that every now and then, they develop into a new direction. They're timeless, but not meant to be stationary.

The Punisher is supposed to be stationary. He's not a character that's meant to grow or evolve. Once he becomes the Punisher, that's the end of his development. There's no lesson to be had about, say, discovering that his origin story wasn't what he thought it was, but recognizing the inherent moral goodness of his work and choosing to continue out of a general love of mankind.

He's a That Man Is Dead character who doesn't actually have a replacement identity to take over. Just a goal he single-mindedly pursues. The most interesting aspect of a Punisher story isn't actually the Punisher. He's not really a character. He's an event that happens to characters, like the monster in a horror movie.

As such, taking away his central motivation really cheapens the character, because there's never going to be an alternative motive that he can take on to replace it. That would require him to grow as a person, to develop. And if he did that, then he wouldn't really be the Punisher anymore.

I reckon they're going the Burton Batman way with this, using the tried and true family revenge plot for a character who's still something of a dark horse in the mainstream. It being a military conspiracy is definitely left-of-field, however, so I'm skeptical in that regard.

Otherwise yeah, the Punisher is like a vigilante Duke Togo - his stories are more about the people he comes to execute at the end, and there is a purity in the utterly impersonal way he operates. As Thomas Jane put it, his motivation is not vengeance, but punishment. He has moved on, in a way, but only to being an even more determined avatar of brutal street justice, one apparently as popular today as the early exploits of the Shadow nearly a hundred years ago. It's really rather fitting that one of his signature weapons is the Colt 1911 - he's as timeless as John Browning's design.

Though I still prefer the Double Action Hi-Power. Heresy, I know.

Purity's an interesting way to put it, but it's accurate. Part of the appeal in the Punisher is that there's something weirdly incorruptible about a character whose moral compass is already broken into so many pieces.

The Punisher isn't a character who really can be made to stray from his moral standards, because he's so far over that line already; it's not physically possible for him to sink any lower than he is. He's already defined by his worst indulgences. For him, this is rock bottom. He made camp there and decided it's not a bad place to spend the rest of his days.

He can't be tempted because he doesn't want anything. He's a hollow shell of a human being. He can't be reasoned with or bargained away because the only thing he's interested in is killing you. And, as noted, there's nothing personal about it. He has no emotional investment in his work that could potentially be used against him. He'll have forgotten all about you five minutes after you're dead.

In his own weird, twisted way, Castle is the distilled essence of Marvel's superhero. He has the same tragic loss and sense of duty that defines nearly all of Marvel's heroes. But he's missing the humanity.

Jon Bernthal on the new Punisher.

edited 25th Sep '17 8:53:35 PM by Soble

The Punisher is pure in the sense that he's driven entirely and exclusively by a purpose, rather than any emotional motivation. His actions aren't derived from what happened to him personally. He's not a masochist like Batman, or on a guilt-trip like Spider-Man, or a grandiose moralist like Superman or Captain America. His methodology and mentality work around a very simple equation: violent criminals exist, the law is inadequate at dealing with them, and the solution is to act outside the law.

However chilling, this logic is far more consistent and universal than the self-aggrandizing superiority complex of your average superhero, who believes that the sky will fall if they aren't there to prop it up. The approach to apply here is not to analyze him personally or look for some Freudian excuse as to why he's so determined in his self-assigned mission. But rather, to simply ask: Is. He. Right? Are certain civil authorities unable... or unwilling... to deal with violent and organized criminals properly, whether due to corruption, intimidation or simple incompetence? And if so, what other alternatives exist to his own preferred brand of justice? Hashtags, thoughts and prayers?

Well, all I can do is wait and see. The worse thing here is splitting focus on what the Punisher should be, instead of sticking to one direction.

edited 27th Sep '17 4:57:24 AM by VeryMelon

I'm like, 80 percent sure the show's not going to go here. This is going to be, what, 8, 16, 22 episodes of Frank kicking ass, getting his ass kicked, with a slight questioning of his mental state before finishing off the bad guy in the cruelest manner possible.

I feel like you're more into stuff like Sin City and Judge Dredd than DC or Marvel.

edited 2nd Oct '17 7:08:11 AM by Soble

Not necessarily - DC and Marvel have Deathstroke, Deadpool, Lobo and of course, the Punisher (and Blade and Ghost Rider, and the Secret Six etc.) - a rather diverse array of anti-heroes and general purpose troublemakers that are simply underutilized by their respective publishers... which, if the success of the Deadpool film and the demand for a Punisher series itself are any indication, has been a less than financially prudent strategy.

The point is that, for all the platitudes about "what it means to be a hero", both houses have lost all focus on what is it that heroes are supposed to do. What is the problem that they are supposed to solve, so their methods can be judged accordingly? At least with the Punisher, the stated problem is that a number of lowlifes are wasting everyone else's oxygen, and in the absence of competent official authorities, this condition is best remedied by the generous application of lead suppositories.

Consequently, my question is, if his methods are to be found deplorable, do the respective critics disagree with his premise? From all my experience with the comic crowd, I notice they're generally not the firmest believers in redemption and human goodness... yet remain curiously skittish with regard to actually owning up to that attitude in terms of action, even in a fictional medium. Denouncing the bad people is all well and good, but actually dealing with them personally seems to be quite a big no-no. Shunning and rejecting legislation and executive authority is all but pathological among capes, but anyone with a robe and gavel is regarded as a proper and inarguable dispenser of legitimate justice. What gives? Various Doylist explanations aside, can anyone offer an in-universe justification for that sort of flip-flopping?

Like I said, the main strength of the Punisher lies in his consistency. He presents a problem, and pursues the most direct and logical solution, with no other pretense or self-congratulation for it.

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The heroes are supposed to battle threats that mankind can't handle without massive loss of life, or can't handle at all. The concept of what a superhero is actually supposed to do has drifted from the 30s-80s where you had popular targets (fight Hitler, fight Communism) to a time where there's less obvious targets (gender inequality, racism, civil rights).

If DC or Marvel has lost any focus, it's because writing a comic about Superman confronting Donald Trump or ISIS, or Wonder Woman speaking at the Women's March, or Miles Morales going to a Black Lives Matter rally is far more divisive than a comic about Superman or Captain America going to sock Hitler in the jaw.

It's a lot harder to create an effective villain for the hero to battlethat encapsulates current social issues/political discourse/global threats without stepping on somebody's toes. It's also far less entertaining for Superman to fight "climate change," though I wouldn't put it past the Golden Age coming up with some "ice cap melting monster."

With Spider Man the stated problem (well, not stated, implied) is "bystander apathy." Spider Man's origin is a direct consequence of that. Peter's modius operandi is to never look the other way again. It's pretty consistent.

With Batman, though it might be Flanderization at this point and people are tired of Batman being this "incorruptible symbol," he's constantly the one member of the team who avoids brainwashing, or losing the moral high ground. The problem is that there are criminals too risky for the police to reasonably deal with, so a vigilante like Batman, an extreme case of narcissism at best, is necessary. And because the police force is corrupt 80 percent of the time, he's frequently necessary.

In-universe, Frank Castle is Batman if Batman didn't have a gun phobia and there weren't any aliens/immortal warlords/demons to fight. Of course his critics disagree with his premise, J. Jonah Jameson would probably have a field day with Castle. But Marvel is full of edgier characters who don't frown upon killing, so there's probably fewer critics.

Out of universe, yes, his critics disagree because most people aren't going to say, "I think military veterans should be allowed to go around Queens and shoot everyone with a record until nobody has a record." Frank's premise and methods are equally deplorable. There wasn't any divine intervention or cosmic justice placed upon his shoulders, he chose this on his own.

Look at the hysteria our counter culture causes - hippies, Free the Nipple, Pokemon. A war vet going around blowing holes in criminals isn't going to sit well either. It's cool to talk about how we should hang death row inmates. No one is actually going to authorize it, or be the one to go there, tie these people up, and walk them to the execution.

I'd be afraid of anyone who wasn't skittish.

Did people want blood after 9/11, of course they did. Did anybody actually want to go to boot camp and fly the plane with the payload, of course not. Wide difference between feeling death is a worthy punishment and actually carrying it out. It's not an exclusive symptom of comic book addiction.

• Most superheroes are young adults so they, like us, have it ingrained that the system works. We're not going to suddenly decide that the legal system doesn't work/abandon societal traditions just because we have the ability to punch bad guys across a football field. A person with a robe and a gavel is a far more reliable dispenser of justice than someone who picked up colored underwear and started calling themselves "super-this" and "super-that."
• In Superman's case it's probably because he's not from here, and he doesn't want to impose himself in a threatening way. A superhero can look at legislation and go, "nah," but still respect the concept of law and order in some capacity.
• Most superheroes didn't go to law school and, formerly being ordinary people living ordinary lives, don't have the jurisdiction or the knowledge they'd need to properly condemn/adjudicate.

There may be a consistency to the Punisher - criminals are bad, kill them - with far fewer attempts to reinvent his character than most other superheroes, but it lacks the ethical charm of more classic superhero characters, that tragic incident that inspires them and their attempts to do better. They represent a good majority of the people probably reading comic books, looking for an escape from the seemingly hopeless number of murders and injustices committed each day. Superheroes give us a window to a brighter world where putting on a costume lets you go out and stop the bullet that would have killed an innocent person.

Punisher spits in the face of that, he skips the moral relativism and goes full Old Testament on everyone in a ski mask. The crimes are already committed, the bullets have already been fired, everything's after the fact. The Punisher doesn't exist to let us escape from the mundane or to fantasize about how we could save the day; he exists to further the murderous bent we all have when we hear about a family being killed on the news. That has it's own unique appeal, sure, but it's probably not as marketable as the rest of Marvel's line-up.

edited 2nd Oct '17 9:22:24 PM by Soble

Superheroes have been fighting for civil rights virtually from day one; it's just that nowadays audiences are far less impressed by Superman beating up scapegoats for social ills. As for Batman, him being the poster-boy for child endangerment, torture and violation of every civil right in existence, is exactly what makes me rather suspicious of the mentality that denigrates the Punisher, yet upholds him as necessary. Same goes for excusing his actions with police corruption, all while ignoring judicial corruption - American prisons may be overfilled as it is, but in far more countries around the world, the opposite is true, making Castle's methods a lot more relevant. His stance is not violent for its own sake, but that, in lieu of reliable imprisonment, it's the only means to prevent further atrocities by the people benefiting from revolving door justice systems.

Consequently, his premise is less "criminals are bad - kill them", but rather "criminals are bad, judges are often worse". That's the premise I ask anyone to disprove. Have the St. Louis riots died down already, so such forms of institutional injustice may be ignored?

As for the lethality of his methods, the Punisher is a walking demonstration of The Lethal Connotation of Guns and Others. He's not really more violent than your average superhero, but he's so direct about it that his form of violence can't be ignored on the emotional level. Sure, Batman carrying half the arsenal of Iran in his car is all well and good, but a nice old-fashioned .45 is scary, and in such a way that dressing up as a flying rodent can't hope to compete with. Throwing a guy through a wall and leaving him quadriplegic is all noble and restrained, but giving him an extra nostril - there's a finality in it that can't be renounced by just going home and taking off a mask.

That's the hypocrisy at play here - in wanting violence, but only so long as it doesn't look like violence. And that's a hypocrisy the Punisher thrives for doing without. He endures not on gimmicks, but on purpose, often against publisher preferences. He even got his own series even though his appearance in Daredevil was designed to deconstruct his philosophy (ripping-off Garth Ennis in the process, only too poorly to work). All in all, it's clear he's far more durable in spite of industry policy, than his more colorful counterparts often are because of it.

edited 3rd Oct '17 1:15:11 AM by indiana404

You eventually learn to deal with it.

edited 3rd Oct '17 4:10:43 AM by VeryMelon

Perish the thought that out of the dozens of heroes in the big two houses, even a handful dare to buck the party line. It's not even particularly consistent, considering how guys like Wolverine and Blade can get even more brutal with far less complaints, and the latter is essentially a Punisher for vampires and assorted monsters. Again, fanciful violence gets a free pass, yet more relatable forms are admonished to no end.

The punisher is certainly more violent than other Superheroes. Honestly, to only make his particular brand of violence halfway acceptable, you need to suspend your disbelief and actually buy into the notion that it is possible for him to shoot up random places (including a hospital) and only hitting whoever he wants to kill. In real live that is totally unrealistic. Even the best sniper sometimes misses his mark just because people suddenly move unexpected.

It's no more unrealistic than having Alfred deliberately exclaim how lucky it is that Batman has never killed anyone during a car chase, or how the blades he throws never ricochet into someone's jugular. Moreover, the Punisher has killed innocents on occasion. Yet, since his ego doesn't hinge on it, he takes it in stride. That's kinda the point - he doesn't consider himself better than the criminals he exterminates. Nor does he demand special treatment from the law, as certain heroes are known to do. If anything, Batman walking freely around policemen at a crime-scene has far more gruesome implications.

edited 3rd Oct '17 5:02:04 AM by indiana404

If that really is what they want, they should consider looking in places other than superhero comics. Superhero universes have no shortage of atrocities that make what happens in our world look tame. And I'm not just talking about the stuff the villains do.