Headscratchers / The Punisher (2017)

New entries go on the bottom.

Season 1

Rawlins' motives

• So how much of Rawlins' efforts to get rid of Frank were about getting rid of a witness to Operation Cerberus, and how much of it was him simply exerting petty revenge over Frank taking his eye from him?
  • He barely put any effort, he had Schoonover doing it who wanted to also kill competition in the heroin market or something and never bothered checking if Frank was dead. It's only when Frank started really gunning for him that he started being obsessed about it because he was scared. Makes sense too after becoming the Punisher, Frank lost a shit ton of credibility as witness and having his family murdered is punishment enough.

The cameras in David's house

• Did David install the cameras in his house after he faked his death or were they always there?
  • Maybe when he started feeling threatened about the black ops he found. He probably had them all wired in before he faked his own death. Would be kinda hard to go back into the house afterwards if there's lots of time where Sarah and/or the kids are home.

Colonel Bennett's base

• So how did Russo and Rawlins conclude that Colonel Bennett was where Frank was going to strike next following the firefight with Gunner?
  • Bennett was the only lead that Gunner and Frank would have been aware of, and Russo and Rawlins knew that.

Billy in the loop

• Did Billy Russo already know Frank was alive before Dinah informed him or not? Seems to me that since those were Russo's men that were used to go after Gunner, Rawlins would already have informed him about Frank. Did Rawlins keep Billy out of the loop or is Billy just playing along?
  • Rawlins only tells people things if it benefits him directly. Chances are he kept Billy out of the loop.
  • Billy starts trying to radio Frank with the old unit calls before Madani tells him Frank is alive. Based on Rawlins' reactions, he didn't know Frank was alive until seeing him on the Anvil mercenaries' helmet cameras. The mercenaries were sent to the forest to kill Gunner. They went in there expecting that Gunner was going to be alone but prepared to fight back (and they'd lose a couple before they took him out). They got wiped out because Frank coincidentally happened to decide to hunt down Gunner and luckily was there in time to help Gunner tag-team the mercs, with David's air support with the drone. Most likely Rawlins told Russo that Frank was alive after the attack in the forest. That in fact is what Russo is talking about when he tells Madani he had a shitty day: he's having a shitty day because he's learned Frank is alive and Frank just killed nine of his men. So between trysts with Madani, Russo tried making unit calls to Frank. Madani later let him know once she identified Frank's blood from the forest, so Russo learned the same thing almost at the same time from two sources. Then Russo went to Curtis because he figured that Frank wouldn't stray far from his home roots and was getting help from someone he knows, which equals Curtis because he's someone Frank and Russo know very well.

Frank's fake death

• The series seems to imply that the world thinks Frank died on the exploding boat in Daredevil Season 2, despite appearing afterwards in public and sniping the Hand ninjas. One of the pages on this wiki says this is a retcon, but Frank is wearing the Punisher outfit he was using for that specific ninja scene, which he never wore again in Daredevil. Did only Karen and Matt recognize the skull-chested sniper killing ninjas in that scene?
  • Well for starter no, Matt did not see the skull and he never wore a skull during season 2 until the last episode so even if someone did see it, they wouldn't know it's the Punisher logo. Karen only knows Frank isn't dead because he saved her from Schoonover. From that distance no one recognized the sniper except Matt (which again sounds like a headscratcher in itself, he likely guessed it was Frank or a strong wind carried his smell over to Matt.)
  • After Frank took out the ninjas, he said, “See ya around Red.” Matt then gave an understanding nod so he did recognize Frank's voice.
  • He is still across the street while Matt was punched in the head and Elektra died, how could he focused on hearing that?
    • Matt's superhuman hearing was good enough that when he was rescuing Frank from the Kitchen Irish, even with heavy gunfire going on, he heard Frank whispering "penny and dime". Directing his hearing toward the sniper fire after everything is said and done seems to be within his ability.
    • Yes when Matt was actively looking for Frank not when he was out of a final battle with one undead ninjas.
    • I’m not sure what the headscratcher here is. Matt has superhuman senses that are not physically possible which means they are limited to the writer’s imagination. If he can sense Frank during a fight, then that’s what he does. After all, he sensed a gunman from the next building over right before Reyes' office was shot up. In the climax, the fighting stopped for a few moments after Elektra died. When Matt stood up to continue the fight, that’s when Frank made his first move. Matt turned in the direction of the shot and either detected him via radar or picked up on through other means described above. Additionally, from Matt's perspective, if someone were sniping bad guys on a roof, it would have to be Frank. Well, that or an ESU sniper. But if it were an ESU sniper in the vein of the one who shot Detective Blake and those other cops, well, Matt would have heard the radio chatter of him communicating with his supervisor.
  • Karen thinks the shooter is Frank, but I think that's partial visual confirmation and partly contextual. No cop says on their radio, "It's Frank Castle. It's the Punisher!" and nothing less than a one on one confrontation with the cops or photographic evidence would be able to confirm for them that someone they previously believed to be dead is alive.

Frank and The Hand

• The Hand just let Frank walk away from helping take down Nobu? They don't seem to have given him any trouble between the few months between Daredevil Season 2 and The Defenders? Are we supposed to assume this is Fanfic Fuel and leave it at that?
  • Do they know Frank was the sniper? Who saw him? And if so why didn't he also tell the leader what Matt looked like when Nobu knocked his mask off? Would have made Defenders way more different. Also keep in mind that to everyone but Matt, Karen, and Curtis, Frank died in a boat explosion before the hostage takeover.
  • The Hand would have no idea who Frank was. Even if they did, Frank faked his own death, so they would have no reason to pursue him.
  • Frank's death was faked before Elektra died and Frank took out the ninjas. It just seems odd that the Hand would let that slide.
  • The Hand have no reason to investigate Frank, because he's supposed to be dead and there's no one anywhere nearby that can identify him as the sniper.
  • Also, even assuming they knew it was him, he's not really a threat to them. He clearly did it as a favor to Matt and then went on his way and about his own business. Trying to take him out would probably cause more problems than it solved. Frank's not interested in the Hand, they don't want to give him a reason to be, he's not messing with them anymore so they leave him alone.

Dinah and Billy

• How did Dinah figure out that Russo was the fifth guy that got away from the shootout and also the one who killed Sam? Sure, Madani read that report showing the other four guys having past affiliations with Anvil, and she comes to talk to Russo while he's providing security for Karen and Senator Ori, but how did she connect that Billy was the fifth guy?
  • She didn't; the 4 of them being ex-Anvil made her suspect Anvil was dirty, and that by extension Billy Russo was as well... she didn't actually know Russo was the fifth shooter until the hotel episode...
  • It wasn't a huge leap. The four guys weren't just connected. Because despite Russo's line about them likely working for all sort of groups, their history almost exclusively points at Anvil. Russo's guarded difficulty, the odd behavior of the fifth man (he shot one of his own men, and you could say that even in the midst of a heated firefight, she'd notice the one pushed out), lined up coincidences about information she gave Russo and the activities against her (she figured out her office was bugged from simply looking at the timing between when she learned about Gunner and when Gunner was killed). She also noted Sam's expression of surprise, as if he'd recognized the man who killed him.
  • Also, when he's talking to her about Sam's death. . . how did he know Sam was stabbed? Wasn't reported to the press.
  • Given how he said that in a previous episode and didn't react to it, it's possible she told him about it off-screen. And how detached he was about the whole thing probably tipped her off.

Curtis and Billy at Frank's Trial

• Why weren't Curtis or Billy called by Nelson & Murdock as character witnesses at Frank's trial? I know that the Doylist reason is because The Punisher hadn't yet been written when Daredevil season 2 was written, but what's the Watsonian reason? The only witness Nelson & Murdock had to Frank being a good person was Colonel Schoonover, and while he did provide a good witness for the defense, Russo and Curtis both would have been better.
  • Reyes fast-tracked the trial to prevent Nelson & Murdock from mounting a decent defense. Obviously, in real life, a case of Frank's magnitude would take at least one to two years to get to trial. Long enough for Matt, Karen and Foggy to assemble and vet a proper team of witnesses. With this in mind, both Curtis and Russo were probably out of town. Russo was probably doing working overseas with Anvil, and Curtis was probably at an insurance convention or doing something else.
  • Alternately, Frank deliberately was trying to isolate himself, and only gave them Schoonover's name under pressure, and deliberately left both men out of it. Curtis says directly he wasn't aware of Frank's crusade until after the fact.

Homeless guy meeting

• I sorta get why Frank's way of approaching Karen is to sit on a sidewalk dressed as a beggar and wait for her to come by. But how would he expect that to work? Why would she stop to give change to this one homeless guy that (kinda rudely) asks for it, when she probably said no to a bunch of other homeless people right before this? Frank's plan of approach would've fallen apart if Karen had just ignored him.
  • Yes clearly he can't speak or make her recognize in any other way if she doesn't give him money, it's not like he can't say hey Karen and people will see it as just a homeless guy recognizing someone of his past life. The disguise is not for her, it's for the people around that might recognize Frank as the guy who shot a hospital a year back. He was just playing the role a bit to make it look more casual than "it's me, Frank, disguised as a hobo to not get arrested".
    • I think the point is 98% of people would probably ignore the homeless guy. If Karen simply was like "Nope, not giving you money," and didn't stop at all, then Frank's plan is blown. How would he have approached Karen then if that attempt to speak to her failed?
    • He would just have to say "hey Karen remember me?", people tend to look at you if you call them by name even if you are homeless. The "do you have change" was just easier to not make her go "Frank Castle long time no see" when she replies.

Curtis and O'Connor

• Why did it take so long for Curtis to do some research on O'Connor and discover he's a Stolen Valor fake who joined up after Vietnam and never saw combat, despite being very disruptive and dismissive of everyone at the veteran group therapy sessions. Especially O'Connor claiming to have earned a Silver Star should have had Curtis look into the matter, unless he was just being trusting enough nobody would be so low to try such a thing.
  • It was probably exactly that. Curtis was intent on creating a safe space where everyone could talk about whatever they needed to, and probably felt O'Connor just needed a forum to vent his frustrations. Once he saw that O'Connor was becoming a Toxic Friend Influence to Lewis, a kid Curtis has become very invested in because he's the most obviously-damaged person at the group, Curtis did some digging and learned the O'Connor really had no place being in that group at all, and was using it and its members for his own ends. Unfortunately, it was too late for Lewis.
    • In fact, Curtis didn't have any real reason to look into O'Connor's background before Lewis started going off the rails under his influence. It's a support group that's supposed to foster an atmosphere of trust and confidentiality. Performing background checks on people to decide if they're 'worthy' of attending isn't the right way to achieve that. He probably looked into O'Connor's background to see if there was anything that would convince Lewis that O'Connor didn't have his best interests at heart.
  • Curtis also covered for Frank, who put cartel members on meat hooks. He probably tolerated O'Connor's behavior because it's not the worst he saw returning soldiers act like.
  • He also likely did check O'Connor's records at first...but just to verify he actually served at all. It wasn't until O'Connor went too far, that he did a deeper check. The questions "Is this person a vet?", and "Is this person telling the whole story?" are not always hand-in-hand. Until Lewis, he was nothing more then an annoyance...and, quite frankly, O'Connor might have helped by providing a Devil's Advocate, or someone for the group to focus a bit of constructive anger/annoyance on. If they start sounding like O'Connor? They know to back off. It's not until Lewis, that the group had someone who was incredibly messed up.

Final scene

• At the end of the last episode, Frank attends one of Curtis' veteran support group meetings, sharing his point of view with the others attending. At this point, Frank Castle is still officially considered to be at large. Are the other people there all aware of who he is? If so, what's keeping any of them from pointing the authorities his way (not knowing that certain people in power just let him off the hook)? Certainly, Frank couldn't explain the whole situation without spoiling his end of the agreement to start his life anew.
  • One assumes he uses another alias and it’s likely veteran support groups often have vets who cannot divulge classified information about their service so a person being cryptic about a past mission or war is common. His face being visible is a bit of a plothole however but it’s probably safe to say Frank won’t stay in the group for long.
  • He has the CIA on his side, so if someone asks, he's Pete Castiglione. The Punisher is dead.

Gait recognition

• So when we see David running the gait comparison on the footage of Frank leaving the poker game shootout, what's the source of the footage that David is running a comparison against?
  • The hospital camera, the trial, maybe even earlier footage.
  • That footage is from when he tried to go after Grotto and Karen at the hospital. Specifically, him entering it (he has short hair, a blue jacket, walks past a parked ambulance, etc).

Karen's inconsistency

• So why in The Defenders (2017) was Karen initially so opposed to Matt putting on the Daredevil suit again to go after the Hand, yet here she says nothing about wanting Frank to quit killing?
  • Karen is currently struggling with her views on how crime should be handled, and her inability to articulate a cohesive view seems to be pretty rational, considering that she killed James Wesley to protect Matt and Foggy, yet rightly believes that large-scale criminal operations can only be taken down cohesively by the use of the law. She not only hates what Frank has become, she also has just recently lost Matt, and so is increasingly aware of the hazards of half-measures. Of course, Karen also correctly points out that the general chaos of Hell's Kitchen allows Daredevil to exist, and Matt's activities in turn allows Frank to flourish with justified arguments against Matt’s methods.
  • A lot has been shown across Daredevil (2015) to highlight how Matt and Karen have quite a lot in common. One thing Karen has in common with Matt is that she doesn’t often actually talk about her feelings with other people, whether that be Matt, Foggy, Ellison, Ben, or even Frank. When was the last time she told someone how she felt? She’s guarded in that way. She primarily questions other peoples' beliefs and/or actions, or she states her opinion on how others are likely to end up based on their actions...and the audience is left having to infer her personal beliefs based on how she navigates that clandestine role. In The Defenders, Karen doesn’t really state that Matt needs to stop being Daredevil because it’s immoral, but because it’s hurting Matt’s life and will get him killed. Same with Frank during The Punisher: even when she asks Frank “where does it stop?” it is framed as a question about Frank, not his actions. And in The Punisher, Karen's definitely looking like a woman in mourning: wearing dark clothes all the time, less likely to snark at people she’s with, less assertive with Ellison, doesn’t do anything badass until Lewis takes her hostage, etc.
    • In general, Karen seems to be more reckless when things are falling apart in her personal life. Her decision to provoke Lewis comes at a time when she's mourning Matt, and it's much like her decision to visit Fisk in his penthouse in Daredevil season 3 following Dex's attack on the Bulletin to kill a bunch of her coworkers and discredit her).
  • She actually tells people a lot about her feelings, I mean she talked about her relationship issues with the freaking Punisher in season 2, a bit of her past with elena Cardenas and how scared she feels with Trish that the Hand is alive. Likewise, there may also be a factor of the fact that the last time she opened herself up to Frank, he used her as bait in a restaurant.
  • Karen does tell Frank, "when does it end?" and it's clear that she wants his revenge crusade to stop at some point. It's part of Karen's character to believe that some people truly deserve it, given everything that happened with Kevin, Todd, and even Wesley.
    Karen wasn't that pleased about Matt resuming Daredevil stuff because she didn't like him getting hurt. But that didn't stop Matt from getting "killed" in Midland Circle, so Karen's best bet is to latch on to the next available law breaker, and support him in the hopes that this one survives. Her not liking Matt going back out at night is because she loves him. It is thus strongly implied that Karen is only going along with Frank because of her guilty feelings over not being more supportive of Matt in the first place.
  • She is just overprotective of Matt since for a good while she saw him as a blind guy that get bruised, she doesn't care much if other people like Urich or Frank put their life on the line for her or greater things, she even asked Turk to activate his bracelet in the hostage takeover even though that would make the Hand butcher him.
    • Before Karen knew Matt was Daredevil, she was supportive of his actions. It was only after she found out Matt was a vigilante that she tried to get him to stop. She didn't see it as a moral issue. She simply didn't want her friend/ex-lover to die. With Frank, it's a bit different since she never knew him as anything but a vigilante and even then, she questions when his war will end and shows concern for his safety.
    • She wasn't supportive, she kept asking what the hell he was doing and thought he was cheating on her at one point.
    • She was supportive of Daredevil. Thinking Matt as cheating on her with Elektra doesn’t really factor in to her support of vigilante justice.
    • Karen's attitude towards Matt and Daredevil is very in line with how she acts in the comics. In the comics, she supports Daredevil 100%, and she also supports Matt 100%. When she learns Matt and Daredevil are the same person, she flips out and wants him to stop Daredevilling, because she's in love with Matt and fears losing him. While The Defenders didn't really explain it well, that also appears to be how the show's version of Karen handles it, and is also how Foggy is handling it. Obviously, Karen has yet to tell Matt that she's in love with him, or anything about James Wesley for the same reasons, but she has essentially put Matt on the shelf while they 'figure things out'. She's pushing Matt to embrace a normal, settled, safe life even as he's walking out of the precinct to go back to Midland Circle. It's that last-ditch effort where Karen is trying to stop him from going, when she knows full well Matt is capable and can save lives out there but is trying to hang onto him. It's both super selfish and super understandable, as almost any spouse or relative of someone who participates in occupations with a high-risk of on-the-job injury or death like soldiers, police officers, and firefighters would tell you.
  • Karen knows that whatever she says to Frank won't matter in the end, because he's going to do whatever he has to do. Matt's pretty much the same way, but it's a different story with Matt because Karen is in love with him, which means there's that emotional attachment. So Karen's been with Matt almost every step of the way, unlike Frank, with whom she's only had brief interactions in comparison. Mostly, Karen is just going along with Frank due to guilty feelings for not being supportive of Matt in the first place.
    • Technically, one would think Karen would be a lot more against vigilante justice no matter the price here, given what happened to Matt. Not just "100% against, except when there's a bad guy."
  • Karen is more worried about Matt as a person. She’s hoping Matt doesn’t wind up dead, in prison, maimed, psychotic or disbarred. The best Frank can really hope for is “not dead yet.”

Frank saying he faces his enemies

• Frank screams at Lewis that he faced his opponent upfront and doesn't use bomb but that's not true at all, he did use explosives before and wasn't above threatening a whole chop shop with a grenade. Plus his damage control isn't that great and rely on no innocents being around getting hit by a stray bullets yet he acts like he has a high ground because he faced his enemies when most of the time he just ambushed them in the dark. And it's not like the show calls him out on it everyone who doesn't agree about his rampage being righteous and safe for the public are protrayed as bad guys like Senator Ori with Karen's only objection is that he should expose the bad guys before killing them.
  • Lewis never faced his enemies. He bombed innocent people instead. Additionally, there are multiple instances of Frank going right out in the open to shoot his enemies (like when he went after Grotto at the hospital, or used Karen as bait to lure two of Schoonover's operatives to the diner) and he even wears the skull emblem for the explicit purpose of having his foes see him coming. Even the grenade scene at the shop involved him walking up to the thieves, only a few feet away and using a dud as opposed to setting a bomb and leaving the scene. As for the morality of his actions, Frank is very much an Anti-Hero whose actions are never fully justified.
  • Lewis shot people and fought Curtis hand on, plus his speech about trying to make people scared only makes them more united and stronger means Frank mostly made the Irish Mob stronger when he bombed them. That he guns for Lewis because he is a criminal is fine but that he takes a moral high ground on that (with other characters agreeing despite knowing him as the guy who fired a shotgun in a hospital) and all Defenders have darker endings and their methods failing, while Frank's actions never backfired on him kind of remove the whole "his actions aren't fully justified" if only positive stuff came out of his actions.
  • Frank is basically drawing the line between terrorist and vigilante as he sees it. He actively targets those society at large generally would consider criminals, but who have mostly escaped the consequences of their actions through corrupt means. In short, when he uses fear and/or indirect methods, it's targeted at those who have convinced themselves they no longer have to worry about fallout, and who he is trying to trace or work towards: and, they very quickly know who is gunning for them and, more specifically, why from almost the start, since he tells them (even when he should still pretend to be dead, he talks directly to the body cameras on the mercenaries who targeted him in the forest). Even if their unhappy goons may not have a clue who is handing out the knuckle sandwich with complimentary sides of bullets and death, of them know that doing shady shit has risks, even if they hoped never to meet them. When Frank gets a bystander killed, it's usually an accident or honest mistake (which, granted, doesn't undo the carnage). Lewis, however, doesn't make this distinction from the get-go: anybody associated with those "against" him is a valid target in his eyes. He hits as many people as possible with indiscriminate means to sow fear in those who have not done anything actively illegal by any measure but his own and/or who simply have a job or opinion he doesn't agree with. And, he hits people who have no reason to see him coming without warning. Remember that his anonymous manifesto to Karen happened after the fact. It's a fine distinction and YMMV on how much is due to delusion, but it's Frank's.
  • Frank isn't being literal here. He's being metaphorical. His targets are generally people who already have a general idea who is targeting them and why. Lewis is more indiscriminate about who gets hurt.

Why didn't he shoot him?

• Why didn't Stein immediately shoot Billy on sight (seeing as Billy had just headshotted another SWAT officer mere seconds beforehand) or actually pat down his arms for weapons?
  • Even if he thought of patting the sleeves pretty sure Billy would just use the fact that he extended his arm to pat him down to take the advantage as well as when he took advantage of Stein's shock. Also given Billy surrendered when he said freeze he can't shoot him in the back just because Billy just killed a few cops, otherwise he might as well shoot him after handcuffing him from Internal Affairs. Also keep in mind Sam would prefer have him alive and answer questions than trying to shoot him from a somewhat long distance.
  • Because law enforcement officers and agents are not executioners. Their job is to arrest suspects to allow due process to run its course, not determine guilt or innocence in the heat of a single moment. Billy was not an immediate threat to Sam (that Sam was aware of), and he had the opportunity to arrest him without killing him, so he was legally required to attempt to do so. Now, if he had seen Billy shoot that officer, maybe Sam would have shot Billy on sight. He also should never have gone close to Billy in the first place without first waiting for backup to arrive, but that's a different trope.
  • This was also foreshadowed in Russo's introductory scene: When Sam and Madani were training at Anvil (as part of Madani's BS lie spun up to have an excuse to speak to Russo), Sam freezes over the charging hostage. He locks up in tense situations, and Russo knows it. So he exploited that.
  • Legal matters aside vis-a-vis Officer involved shooting and "Execution" vs. "Good shoot"... the whole point of that operation was to find out who was after Frank, and to question them about Kandahar... the other four died in a firefight, couldn't be avoided. Shooting the last man, when you don't 'have to' defeats the purpose of the whole operation... had Russo gone down alongside of the others, it would have been a 'good shoot' and they'd have had to make due following the paper trail his involvement would have generated, but that was likely not plan A.

Karen is in mourning?

• It's repeatedly mentioned on this wiki that Karen seems to be in mourning (judging by her clothes and actions). But I honestly didn't get that impression as she didn't really act all the different from the last we saw her in the Defenders. Can someone please clear this up for me? Maybe I just missed something? I mean it’s not a stretch by any means, but if its just an assumption it should probably go under the YMMV tab.
  • Deborah Ann Woll has said in several interviews that The Punisher takes place after The Defenders (2017).
  • I got the impression that Karen is getting more of a devil-may-care attitude after Matt's death. She invites the Punisher of all people into her apartment, and offers him alcohol. Knowing just how violent he is, and the fact that last time she did something similar she got shot at, she is remarkably blase about her own safety (Frank may be an ally but you don't offer someone like him booze). Her kindness is also an example of looking for a human connection after losing Matt. The last time she spoke to Frank, she literally told him he would be dead to her if he shot Colonel Schoonover, which he did almost immediately. Her reaction to seeing him on the street is a lot warmer than you would expect. With Karen's boyfriend having just died (the Empire State Building is still lit up in red in Matt's memory when Frank is working on the construction site), and Karen also being cut off from Foggy (it seems implied that Karen is going through some sort of depressive episode), she is looking for any human connection.
  • In Frank's interactions with Karen, Matt is basically the elephant in the room. It seems as if Frank is tiptoeing around the issue of Matt's death. For example, when he meets Karen, he doesn't say something like "How have you been?" or "How's Murdock doing? He still running in those red pajamas of his?" because he knows damn well that her boyfriend just died, and saying something like that doesn't show much tact. He also avoids subjects like her new job, because asking about it would lead to asking Karen why she left Nelson & Murdock (which inevitably would mean having to talk about Matt), or him asking Karen why she is being so nice to him after he was supposedly dead to her.
  • From a storytelling perspective, it kinda makes sense why Matt's "death" isn't discussed: The Punisher was designed to be a stand-alone story, and designed to not rely on viewers having watched the other shows. A show's writing needs to stand up on its own merit rather than its association with other big names. This isn't a Defenders story or Daredevil story, it's a Punisher story. Now, The Punisher wasn't entirely successful in that part, since Frank was introduced in Daredevil Season 2, and the Colonel Schoonover plotline from that show is what sets up the events of this show, but for the most part the show remains pretty isolated. The Doylist explanation is that the writers probably thought that mentioning Matt’s "death" would be too confusing for first-time viewers who hadn’t already watched The Defenders and Daredevil as prerequisite viewing. So they settled for small acknowledgements– the photo in her apartment, her state of sadness throughout the show, etc.– things that were meaningful to Daredevil fans without being overt.
    Furthermore, Marvel has a reputation for keeping scripts and plot details closely guarded. Couple that with the fact that The Punisher was being filmed at the same time as The Defenders^note And in fact, The Punisher started shooting a full month before The Defenders did, it's also possible that The Punisher writers and Deborah Ann Woll didn't know at that point in time that Matt would/was going to "die", and so couldn't account for it in their scripts.
  • Karen seems very isolated in The Punisher. This is further supported by the way she speaks about loneliness and how she pushes to remain in touch with Frank somehow. She seems to not even be in touch with Foggy at this point (though we're to assume Foggy likely called her to see if she was okay after the Lewis incident), so Matt's "death" certainly seems to have had far-reaching consequences that have a big impact on her later behavior in Daredevil season 3. Karen probably compartmentalizes her grief, but around Frank, she seems to drop the act. She's also emotional/tearful in the "Where does it end, Frank?" conversation in a way that very much speaks of raw emotions lurking under the surface.
  • A reason why Matt wouldn't be so much as mentioned is because these shows are character-driven shows first, and comic book shows second. Plus the tones don't mesh. It takes away from The Punisher world of a military conspiracy out to get Frank, if Karen mentions details about Matt "dying" fighting mystical ninjas. Plus, technically Karen's an outsider to the Punisher storyline, since she's got no connections to the skeletons of Frank's past.
  • While Frank wasn't sending Matt Christmas cards or anything, he did develop enough respect for Matt to try and talk him out of killing the Blacksmith, telling him you cannot cross that line and then go back. He also told Matt that he would have made a hell of a Marine, which coming from Frank is probably the highest compliment he would give someone. Also if Frank didn't care about Matt, why even show up at the end of season 2 to shoot ninjas? The Hand weren't on Frank's hit list. And Frank wouldn't need Google to know that Matt had died, or even ask Karen about it. He probably reads Karen's articles in the Bulletin and she almost certainly wrote about it ("Blind Lawyer Missing").
  • At the Punisher ACE Comic-Con panel in January 2018, Jon Bernthal and Ebon Moss-Bachrach suggested that a scene had been shot where Frank talked with Karen about Matt's "death" was discussed, but it was cut for various reasons.^note This possibly was either in between Frank approaching Karen on the street and walking into her apartment. But more likely, it was part of the conversation they have by the bridge in episode 5. That conversation has them discussing things like Karen wanting Frank to have an 'after', the need to keep each other safe, Karen's comments about being alone, etc. Thematically, making the conversation on her end be about Matt would slot in very neatly On the same token, though, it's possible that The Punisher couldn't discuss Karen's state of mourning due to outside factors. Namely, that since Daredevil is Karen's home show, her reaction to Matt's "death" needed to be saved for season 3 of Daredevil, not for The Punisher. I can see how maybe Lightfoot and Bernthal wanted to do that bit, ultimately the conversation about Matt was probably cut because it would risk having huge impacts on how Karen is portrayed in Daredevil season 3. From a writing standpoint, it makes sense that they could've explored it, but on a grander scale, it just had to be edited out. So that's why she never mentions that she's paying Matt's rent or anything.
  • The Punisher definitely takes place during the time period in between The Defenders and Daredevil season 3 where Matt is recovering in the convent. Karen’s general unhappiness in her scenes as well as the little shrine to Matt in her apartment are the two key things to look out for. Plus, if Matt were still around, there’s no way he would have sat idle once Lewis threatened Karen on the radio. And losing Matt would definitely color Karen's interactions with Frank. In The Defenders, she was worried that Matt’s vigilantism was going to ruin his life, and then (as far as she knows) it got him killed. So that’s got to affect her attitude toward any other vigilantes she knows and cares about.
  • Yes, it's a little odd that Frank didn't ask about Matt after everything they went through in season 2 of Daredevil, especially with Karen being around. But one has to remember that Karen's interactions with Frank in Daredevil were all told from Karen's perspective. If one were to look at these same interactions from Frank's perspective, Frank never really had any time to just chat with Karen. He only ever reached out to her when he needed to hit her up for information (like Micro) or when he was protecting her from some imminent threat (the Blacksmith and Lewis). Then there's that scene in the courtroom at Frank's trial where it's heavily suggested that Frank picked up on who Matt really is, but it was never brought up. This means that Frank might not know that Karen knows Matt is Daredevil. If that's the case, it would seem pretty odd for Frank to ask about Matt considering how Matt wasn't actually working on Frank's case as much as the others, instead being interested in helping Elektra fight ninjas. If anything, it would've made more sense for Frank to ask about Foggy.

Where does the Gnucci outfit fit in?

• Are they new or somehow Fisk, Alexandra and the three or four groups in Luke Cage that bought Cottonmouth's military hardware just let them be? Because New York is starting to get a lot of syndicates working alongside each other, even in the comics it's usually one taking over the others or getting wiped out by the Punisher.
  • Since all we saw of the Gnuccis consisted of one crew being robbed by low level thugs before being killed, it seems they aren’t that powerful as of yet. The New York underworld was in a state of disarray this point: Fisk is still in prison, slowly building up his FBI extortion racket and waiting for his leverage on Ray Nadeem to run its course, the Hand has been destroyed, Harlem's gangs that had been decimated by Diamondback are still regrouping (and new players are now popping up), and the three gangs involved in the murder of Frank’s family have been wiped out. There is always room for new organizations to rise up.

Super bulletproof vests?

• How are Frank's bulletproof vests so strong? In both the hotel shootout and the fight at the hideout, Frank takes multiple rounds to the torso, all stopped by his vest. In the latter fight he gets at least six at once. Bulletproof vests, even the most durable, are only good at stopping two bullets at maximum before their usability plummets, and wearers are still hurt by the impact. He's not even heavily bruised after the hotel fight. Even Matt's specially made armor still got pierced by a submachine gun bullet in the Daredevil season 2 finale.
  • That's actually somewhat false. Bulletproof armor doesn't lose its effectiveness after only a couple of hits, but it's generally recommended that you swap them out after they take multiple hits, since the Kevlar and trauma plates will be suffering steady structural weakness after repeated hits. That doesn't mean that they'll instantly fail once they've been hit a few times. Frank will likely swap out the armor once he gets to safety but it will still resist incoming fire. Note also that in the hotel shootout, Frank grabbed a corpse a la Total Recall (1990) and slung it over his back to absorb incoming fire.
  • He is likely wearing an improved outer tactical vest given he got it from Schoonover's military grade stash. Those are made to take direct impact of a bullet from rifles and have ceramic plates that can stop armor piercing bullets. For a base comparison, it's like the body armor the Ukrainian was wearing in Luke Cage season 1 to test the Judas bullets in the footage that Shades shows to Cottonmouth. Notice how aside from the initial shock, the guy was laughing until it exploded. Also Matt's armor was never made for guns, Melvin built it to resist blades and pipes.
  • Frank could also be wearing a double-layer. It's established in the comics that his torso is especially well-armored, and the skull is meant to attract his opponents gunfire there to let him shrug off injuries. Coupled with Frank being Made of Iron incarnate, it could be worse.
  • Considering Hammer is a defense contractor, Frank could very well be sporting armor that's infused with the same alien metal used in the manufacturing of the Judas bullets.

Could Lewis's downward spiral have been avoided?

• If O'Connor hadn't become such a poisonous influence on Lewis, could Lewis have gotten the help he truly needed and never have become the bomber that he turned into?
  • It's possible, but Lewis never seemed to really want help in the first place. Being betrayed by O'Connor, still being convinced by his lies, the cop on his 'power trip', etc, were definitely the perfect storm that sent him over the edge.
  • It's also arguable that Lewis's circumstances were a perfect storm:
    • First off, Lewis was not in a stable mental state and he wasn't really receptive to the group by the looks of things. This is the kind of thing that the Army should have realized when he was being discharged and gotten him help before he was let go.
    • Then there's his father, who REALLY should have put a call in at Veterans Affairs to get Lewis help, because when your son is sleeping in a foxhole in the back yard and shooting stuff in the house, that's a warning sign he needs help.
    • There's an old saying that "You can't help someone who doesn't want to help themselves". Lewis was giving into his dark side of his mind by digging the foxhole and skipping meetings. He was at a point where the noise in his head was "winning" and he could not think clearly.
    • There's even an argument to be made that Lewis might just looking out for an excuse to hurt somebody (because there are a lot of incongruities in his behavior and his rhetoric that show that he doesn't believe his own bullshit). This makes him eerily similar to Dex in Daredevil season 3, although Dex's downward spiral was one Fisk manipulated him into vs. Lewis who did it on his own.
  • Lewis's situation is definitely a combination of the factors listed above. He was unwilling to open up his mindset beyond that of a soldier taking orders in survival situations for a Greater Good, which in that mindset enabled him to so easily drift into this darkness and slot people into roles of Good and Bad once more. We see this when he targets Karen: he initially labels her as "good" because of her previous advocacy for Frank, but the moment she fights him on blowing up innocents, he labels her as "Bad" and designates her a ‘pawn’, the same as those other innocents he killed.
    The big thing with O’Connor serving as Lewis’ trigger was that O’Connor wasn’t charismatic at all. Most in the group ignored or dismissed him outright and Lewis saw this on at least several occasions, ever since he started attending himself. But, O'Connor was able to sell his angry, attention-seeking platform to Lewis because Lewis was desperate to find purpose back home akin to what he had abroad, and O’Connor was essentially the only one not telling him "no, you need to take a breath, step back, re-evaluate, and re-adjust your life so you can move forward". So, O’Connor enabled him to get worse, and as much of an asshole as O’Connor was, it’s another of those murky situations where he was a bad guy that didn’t intended that at all. He was also just another guy trying to give this lost vet purpose. He pushed his own agenda on him, yes, and wanted to use him for that, but he never intended to push the man to blow up buildings either.
    On top of that, Lewis was actually a lot more volatile than anyone O’Connor, Curtis, or his own father wanted to admit. For Curtis and his dad, it's understandable why they'd miss the signs. Once they recognize how far he’s spiraling and they try to control Lewis and force him to get more help, it's too late as the damage is already irreparable. He feels hurt and betrayed. Moreover, they had blinders up about how dangerous Lewis could be not just to himself but to others and really even didn't think that he could be dangerous to others at all. We, as the audience, see how close Lewis was to suicide, when he tried eating the barrel of his gun. I think that possibility is all that Curtis and his dad saw before it was too late. His dad, thinking that the only way he’d hurt others would be by accident (the way he almost died waking up Lewis from a nightmare) and Curtis, thinking that Lewis just now might kill himself in that foxhole when he dug it. That Lewis could pick up O’Connor’s political position to a terroristic extreme and kill others? Curtis didn't remotely recognize that until Lewis went and did it. And his poor dad… almost certainly found out from the news. What a terrible way.

Why kill the dominatrix?

• What exactly was the scene Billy was setting up by killing the dominatrix and putting her in the bed at the motel room, prior to killing Colonel Bennett? (As in, what was he intending for it to look like when the cleaning staff find the bodies?)
  • Likely her pimp/previous client showed up and killed them, although it's weird because she was part of ANVIL so her background might be at odds with that scenario.
  • Mutual killing; in that scenario it would look like one of them tried to kill the other, and fatally wounded their "aggressor" in the process.
  • She lays in a bed with her throat open without looking like she fought back and he was gutted like a fish a few feet away, also the knife disappeared.
    • You're running far too much on The CSI Effect here. Positioning of the body is largely not considered in a forensic analysis, since the bodies could have fallen in any number of ways, and if necessary Billy could have repositioned them. After the deed was done, Billy could have planted further evidence on the scene as well, including a bloody knife. It's not like housekeepers or police were entering the moment the body had stopped moving. The cops will come in, find a decorated military officer who died in the same room with a prostitute he was known to be engaging, both of whom had lethal wounds, with the former looking like she had been fatally injured in some BDSM that got way out of hand. Put a bloody knife next to her matching his wounds and it's open-and-shut as to what happened. Police detectives literally deal with this sort of thing every day; they aren't going to investigate it heavily when it's "obvious" what happened, unless they have a damn good reason why, like Bennett was somehow connected to another case or there was something very unusual about the death that raised red flags. If it looks like a duck, smells like a duck, it probably is a duck.
    • We see a similar case with Karen's article about Frank's massacre of the poker game at the beginning of the show: the NYPD clearly isn't looking into it any further than a murder-suicide because that's what the scene looks like, and there's nothing suggesting to them that they should look for an outside shooter.
  • Except Frank was found there by Micro and had he not erased the surveillance camera they would have found Frank a while ago and Frank at least killed the last guy with his own gun. Russo didn't do anything to look like both both killed each other. So if you compare the Gnucci shoot-out with the dominatrix killing they need also someone mentioning the video feed from nearby recorded no one entering or leaving the house.
  • That's playing with a lot of supposition too, first that the BDSM happened with Bennett fully clothed and his suitcase ready to leave, no one fighting back and Russo leaving the knife which we didn't see happen.
    • BDSM can happen fully clothed; that was what Bennett was getting when Frank broke into his quarters to attack him. As for the rest, we don't see what Russo did after the killing was finished, but it's fair to assume that he doctored the scene as needed before leaving, especially since he'd already killed the prostitute before he brought Bennett to the room. Leave a bloody knife, move the bodies a bit, toss some stuff on the floor, and between that and the known relationship between the two, the conclusions are obvious. Since we never see anything about a followup investigation mentioned later on aside from David mentioning it being reported in the newspapers, it's fair to assume that whatever the State Police found was sufficient for them to consider it an Open-and-Shut Case and move on.

Awful plan, Madani

• Madani knows they're going to be up against some extremely skilled guys who are equipped to take out someone like Frank Castle and their plan is to have like one SWAT team in a space like that with loads of hiding spots? Why not lure them into a more open space with no hiding spots and completely surround them with 20-30 armed SWATS (plus additional help from the NYPD), snipers and helicopters and all exits covered?
  • Because she knew there was a conspiracy around her and couldn't call in that amount of backup in without tipping her hand. She gambled that the surprise would be enough for her to take out the enemy team.
    • Perhaps a bigger question is why there's no one radioing "10-13! 10-13!" the moment the first officer was hit?
  • Helicopters and a large team would be spotted, especially when the expected force they were going to be using would be a smaller unit of DHS agents. The guys watching them would have noticed a larger DHS deployment than expected.
  • They were expecting whoever was trying to kill Frank to show up. So they would have to known it would be a highly skilled death squad.
    • A squad that they needed to lure into a trap. She didn't want to tip them off by having a large team on-site.
    • They weren't expecting a black-ops trained death squad willing to shoot it out with the police. Most criminals, when confronted with a fully-equipped tactical unit of federal law enforcement, tend to surrender. That and it's rare to expect an elite squad of mercenaries who are willing to fight to the death to operate on US soil; they were expecting a group of armed organized crime hitmen who might shoot back, not ex-military black-ops types. Madani said as much after the shootout. Also keep in mind that most of those guys in that group might have been willing to drop their weapons and surrender, as they hesitated and seemed ready to give up, but Russo decided the outcome for everyone by opening fire immediately.
  • It's worth pointing out that in-universe her plan isn't treated as great. Rafi has a whole speech later on about how flawed the plan was.

Sarah and "Pete"

• Once "Pete" shaved off his beard and cut his hair, why didn't Sarah (or even her kids) recognize him as Frank Castle? Based on the events of Daredevil, he was pretty famous (the newspaper had the headline "Trial of the Century"). Was it because he was presumed dead, or because Sarah and her family had their own problems regarding Micro's "death", that they failed to recognize him?
  • Frank Castle has been considered dead for about 11 months. In addition, first impressions have a big psychological influence here. When Frank first meets Sarah, he still has his hair grown out and his big "hipster" beard. He doesn't shave until after his first encounter with Sarah, before going off to visit Carson Wolf. Which means Sarah's first impression of Frank was the "hipster" appearance.
  • This is Truth in Television. It's really hard to recall faces, especially faces that were only shown several months back on some high-profile murder case that may have bounced across the news (and ultimately is small potatoes compared with deathbots trying to piledrive a city into the planet, an alien invasion, a major government organization collapsing, a building falling into the heart of Manhattan, multiple vigilantes running around town, and all the planet's superheroes tearing up an airport), while you're personally dealing with all the issues surrounding your husband's recent death. If Sarah thought he looked familiar, she would have passed it off as coincidence, like every other person probably would, because "Pete" is acting nothing even remotely like what the media was presenting Frank Castle as.
    • The fact that "Pete" acts nothing like Frank Castle also helps, because the context in which Sarah is meeting him also plays a big role. You see this a lot with celebrities: the reason many of them are able to go out in public without anyone noticing them is because many people won't recognize them unless they're wearing a ton of makeup, wearing nice clothes, and well-lit.
  • There are a lot of guys in New York City that look vaguely like Frank Castle. Nobody there wants to make eye contact with anyone. It’s been months since the trial, he’s supposed to be dead, and 99.99% of people in New York City don't care. Plus Frank deliberately kept a hood up and had minimal interactions with the public at large. Also, not everyone gets injected with a daily dose of news that they magically shelve in their brains, and even if they did, most of them wouldn't be able to recall yesterday's news if they had two hands and a flashlight.

Why no search for a body?

• Why didn't Wolf and his people realize Micro was still alive when his body failed to turn up in that lake? After all, we saw when Karen visited Frank's house in "Penny and Dime" that they were keeping tabs on that place in case Frank turned up, yet they never thought to keep tabs on Sarah and the kids just in case David tried to make contact with them again?
  • It wasn't a lake, it was the Hudson River. Bodies falling into moving bodies of water can be swept away. And Frank was still alive when they were keeping tabs on his house. Since they thought Micro was dead that isn't required.

Karen and Lewis

• I get why Lewis addressed his manifesto to Karen: because “she has championed the common hero before" like Matt, and later on, Frank. But why would Karen deliberately make herself a target for Lewis, by writing an article that provokes him? The guy had just set off bombs in office buildings, and he literally threatened a Bulletin reporter. Laying low would be a better option, Karen.
  • Because that's what Karen does, provoking people that could kill her. Defenders is the only series she doesn't paint a bullseye on her by either attacking a real estate scam run by Fisk or trying to investigate Frank's past despite the risk.
  • Karen's actions in The Punisher make more sense when her relationship with Matt is factored in. Matt and Karen have a very special connection with each other that is so unique that they don't even realize it. They both make the other feel vulnerable, yet at the same time, bring out the best in one another. They share a common light and darkness within a deep passionate love. Karen is Matt’s other half of a whole, they’re pieces of the same puzzle. They just don’t fit with anyone else. Karen is so head over heels for Matt, the way she looks at him so genuinely like she’s astonished by everything he is. She just can’t fool anyone but herself. And then the events of The Defenders happened, and all of a sudden, Karen's one true love has been ripped away from her in an instant. Remember how her conversation with Foggy at the church depicted her almost in denial that Matt "died", insisting that maybe he made it out of the pit (which is true, but Karen doesn't know that).
    Thus, when we meet Karen in The Punisher, she's still not over the pain of losing Matt, as Deborah Ann Woll has said in interviews. She's got a little shrine to Matt in her living room. She's clearly taken up day drinking. She's impatient and easily exasperated by Ellison, who she should be able to open up to, but can't because that would mean having to tell him the truth about Matt's identity. Hell, Karen doesn't even want to talk to Frank about what has been going on with her. She isn't speaking to Foggy. And it even extends to her recklessness regarding Lewis Wilson. In that moment, Karen isn't being rational, but she doesn't care what happens to her or anyone around her at this point, because she wants to feel something other than the loss she is suffering. She's intentionally putting herself in danger as an adrenaline rush, to ignore the pain she doesn’t want to deal with. Her heart still vies for Matt. She needs him as much as he needs her.
  • Because she was absolutely disgusted that Lewis thought she'd champion his cause, and because she who is silent is understood to consent.
  • A related question: why would Karen show up to the same location of Lewis’ only other target? For the article? Would Ellison ever let that happen? Would she be that obtuse? She knows shit can hit the fan faster than she could imagine. Karen's been shot at in the hospital, in Reyes' office, and even her own apartment. She knows that the police and/or hired Anvil security won’t be enough to prevent a very determined and resourceful person from getting to her.
  • She just made herself a target anyway after calling him a coward, so they would just have been a bomb put in the Bulletin, plus unless she read the script she shouldn't know ANVIL are just red shirts that can't stop a mentally perturbed man, that's usually the first thing security expect and prepare for.

Gunner's Body

• According to Micro, after picking up the critically wounded Frank, he called the cops and made sure that Gunner's body was recovered so that he could have a proper burial as requested. Later Madani hears of his death, and reconstructs the firefight near his cabin in Kentucky, but all of the bodies of the soldiers Frank and Gunner killed have been removed. This implies that Agent Orange sent a cleanup crew to recover them and leave no witnesses. However, this begs the question: Why did he leave Gunner's body for the police to find, and enough DNA evidence for Madani to identify Frank while getting rid of the other bodies?
  • A whole forest is hard to clean up. Getting the PMCs' bodies is as easy as breathing, since they had helmet-mounted cameras and likely trackers on them to find. Since Micro called the cops, they probably only had time to grab the bodies and run otherwise they would have followed Micro's vehicle if they had enough time to find Gunner's body. All they could take was their own men and their weapons. Everything else, like spent shell casings, had to be left behind.
  • In addition, Rawlins had no reason to believe that anyone would be out there looking for Gunner. If his body was found, it would be assumed he was a hunter who died from a misfire. Nine fully-armed commandos dying in close proximity, however? That's a Kentucky State Police investigation, bare minimum, and might get bumped up to the FBI or Homeland if their ties to Anvil were uncovered.

White mug, take cover!

• I get that Curtis was using the white coffee mug as a signal to Frank, and Russo realized it...but what exactly about the scenario made Billy realize that it was a trap?
  • Gut feeling. Curtis was acting weird by holding out the coffee as far as possible and having his arm in the middle of the window. Russo realized they were trying to lure him into a trap
  • Consider what Billy knows. He knows that Curtis and Frank trust each other completely, enough that Frank revealed he was alive to Curtis but not Billy. He knows that Frank will protect Curtis, as he did when Lewis was running amok, and indeed that's why he went to Curtis' house. He also knows that Frank is a sniper, and that he tried to take out Rawlins that way but failed only due to the bulletproof glass. So when Curtis makes a big show of opening the curtains and then tries to draw him into its line of sight with the coffee, he recognizes the trap just in time.

Criminal charges for Russo?

• With Russo in custody, what sort of charges is he likely facing (not that it really matters, given that everything he's done probably guarantees him a one-way trip to Florence, Colorado)?
  • Starting with the teenagers he took hostages pretty much everything Rawlins was about to pin on him with Marion.
  • Also at least a dozen murder charges due to all the DHS agents he killed.
  • He was a high ranking member of a criminal syndicate which was running drugs, interfering with federal investigations, and committing assassinations - several of which he did or attempted personally.

Billy's position at Anvil?

• Billy's leadership of Anvil seems to make no sense. Is he CEO? Owner? He's way too hands on to be any of these. The CEO would most certainly not be on site for the Senator's security. He also would not be running the DHS training either. He also wouldn't be the ones to personally hire the mercenaries for the attempted ambush of Frank that Madani set up. Any smart tactician would have set it up through an intermediary in order to have plausible deniability if something went wrong, so they could not identify him if caught. This is exactly why Wilson Fisk had James Wesley handle almost all of his business and Fisk himself only started getting more hands-on once Matt's and Karen's activities started causing cracks in the organization. Billy's leadership of Anvil seems to almost comically incompetent in comparison.
  • Russo is the founder and pretty much the only one running it, because surprisingly, there are not a lot of people you can trust when you recruit people to commit shady activities. That tactician aspect means jack shit if you can't find someone you're certain won't snitch on you. Plus Russo fits perfectly as The Face more than any PTSD ridden soldier he recruits to do wet work.
  • In his first scene, Russo tries to push Madani and Wolf hard for a State-side government contract, so it makes sense he'd want to be front and center, especially when he's so charismatic. The same can be said for Senator Ori; he's the kind of guy that Russo could similarly butter up personally. As for the mercenaries, Russo knew them personally and they needed convincing to take on the op in the first place, so it required the personal touch. Russo is also egotistical enough to think he can do this kind of thing anyway, along with having friends high up in the CIA to cover it up if needs be.
  • Since Russo founded Anvil after his discharge, and this was no more than two to three years ago, it's still a relatively new company. As CEO / Owner / founder, he'd naturally still be in a position to be glad-handing and preening to make the company look attractive... and he's still close enough to the field that his recruits (such as they are) would still see him as one of them. It would only be as Anvil gets larger and larger that Russo becomes less of a 'soldier' that he'd need a middle man on that side, and if Anvil doesn't have too many contracts, he'd still be able to manage them personally.
    • Plus, Russo is a sociopath and, like Frank, enjoys a good fight. He's the type who wouldn't mind getting his hands dirty even if it wasn't good business.

Why hire Anvil instead of Private Security? Or the Secret Service?

• I'm pretty sure if a US Senator receives a public death threat on air, then the Secret Service would immediately take over all security for said asset? On top of that, why hire Anvil? They turn out to be completely incapable of even basic security measures, like having two guards posted outside the door, or letting their CEO be on site. An actual private security firm would at least have been less controversial to the Senator's gun control voter base AND perhaps have been better prepared. Or a combination of Private Security and Secret Service?
  • Senators don't qualify for Secret Service protection unless they are the spouse of an ex-president/vice president (like Hillary Clinton), are the candidate for president in the electoral race, or per executive order of the President.
  • Anvil is a private security firm. That and the mistakes that they made actually mirror the kind of mistakes that other security firms like Blackwater have made in the past when guarding VIPs. This had been similarly acknowledged when Russo was hiring his accomplices for the shootout with Madani's SWAT team, as he told them "There's not much of anything I can do about a YouTube video of you guys opening up on a bunch of Iraqi civilians."
  • Senators do not typically get Secret Service. The exceptions are when they’re running for President, when they happen to have an immediate family who served as president/vice president, when they’re traveling overseas, or if they’re leadership (the Senate Leaders, etc). You could make a case that since there was indeed a threat against the Senator and Karen, hiring private security would not be out of the question or Secret Service would indeed get involved. You might even have the NYPD or the New York State Police on hand. If anything, what's unrealistic about the whole thing is that the private security they did hire were wearing uniforms. With the kind of money that's changing hands for a premium outfit like Anvil, and to have them in an environment where they are guarding and essentially staffing a high profile Senator who is sensitive about the appearance of hired security, those guys really ought to be wearing cheap suits (think the attire of Fisk's bodyguards in Daredevil season 1, or the Stokes gang members in Luke Cage season 2).
  • Senator Ori has probably declined the need of a Secret Service detail in order to keep up the public image that he is strong against gun violence and does not want to rely on guns as part of his message. The Anvil contract, that can be buried and, being a private organization, Russo can claim that the Bulletin hired him to protect Karen Page. And the low number of guards is intentional: Russo is treating this as a honeypot. He sets up Senator Ori as bait for Lewis, because he knows of Lewis's connection to Curtis and to Frank, and in light of Lewis's attempt on Curtis, he knows that Frank will go where Lewis will go. That will give Russo an opening to take Frank out. Once the dust settled, Russo was probably planning to unleash backup support for the Senator's campaign, but that didn't work out because Madani caught on to him being the leader of the mercenaries at the SWAT team ambush.

Are people aware Schoonover is dead?

• Because if they found his body and his looted shed wouldn't that tip off at least Rawlins or Russo that Frank is still alive? Did Karen scapegoat someone else for why she was stranded in the woods?
  • The shed wasn't located by his house. It was off the books somewhere in the woods several miles away. Schoonover made Karen drive to the shed in her own car (she heard Frank's favorite song on the stereo and it tipped her off he was there). So she wasn't stranded in the woods.
  • Immediately afterwards Frank makes a detour back to New York to take out the Hand ninjas, then begins systematically hunting down the Blacksmith's cartel, probably using information he got from the shed (it seemed to be Schoonover's command center as well). Russo and Rawlins probably assumed it was a gang war erupting between what remained of the Kitchen Irish, the Hand, and the Blacksmith cartel, and it was easier to let it play out then to get directly involved. Anvil had already been established, so Russo had a reliable source of income that let him live his lavish lifestyle, and Rawlins had been promoted to the point that he didn't directly need extra funding to oversee his pet projects. Thus the Blacksmith Cartel was simply an afterthought at this point, and it was easier to let it fall apart once they realized Schoonover was dead as he was the only one who could implicate them.

Dinah, there's a witness who can link Schoonover and Frank

• Why wasn't Karen the first person Dinah went to for questions once she dug up all the info available about Frank and Schoonover? If Schoonover's death is a matter of public record, then surely all the records show Karen was the last person to speak to Frank before the explosion at the docks, and the last person to speak to Schoonover before his death.
  • I doubt the police know Karen was the last one to talk to Schoonover before his death. Seeing as Karen and Castle were the only two people there, it may have taken a couple days for him death to be confirmed.
  • Did Karen ever disclose to anyone afterward that she went to Colonel Schoonover's place? It's possible that she did tell Matt about it after the fact (Matt would have noticed the cut on her face thanks to his senses), but we only see part of the whole "I'm Daredevil" reveal conversation in Daredevil season 3. We know on-camera that Karen told Ellison that she had an idea of someone she could talk to about Frank as a good person, to write about his personal/human-interest story first and the descent into The Punisher second, but she didn’t explicitly tell Ellison that it was Colonel Schoonover. Her car got wrecked, but it wasn't in his driveway. It's possible she didn't call the cops, since Frank was in the woods, but she would’ve had to call AAA or another towing company to get her car towed, which is a record that Madani wouldn’t have. And no one else was at home with Schoonover when Karen arrived, so no one else (aside from, again, Matt) knows she was actually there. There's a lot that happened offscreen that we didn't see. It's possible that Karen lied, and said she got into a wreck on her way to Schoonover's house, or got in a hit-and-run. Or maybe her car was able to start and she left in it and lied about her injuries occurring elsewhere when she went to the hospital (since she had to have at least partially dislocated her shoulder and all that) So maybe no one knows Karen had any presence anywhere near Schoonover’s death either. And she simply told Ellison that the lead didn’t want to talk to her or some other excuse without ever having to divulge that the person was the now-deceased Schoonover.

Why settle in New York City?

• So why would Frank choose New York City as his place to live incognito? Was it because it kept him with access to Curtis or were there additional in-universe reasons?
  • He's lived there his entire life. And with a city that size it is easy to disappear in the crowd, even if you were on the news recently.
  • When you live in one location for long enough, you can be said to have laid down roots there. It's like what Matt said when he visited Fisk in prison, the city is part of them, they can leave but always come back. It's the same thing for Frank, since this is where he lived when he had his family, and it's where he met Curtis and Russo.

Did Curtis make the right decision with Lewis?

• Yes, Lewis showed a lot of red flags with the foxhole in his backyard and nearly shooting his father, and I can understand where Curtis is coming from, but Anvil could have been the right direction for Lewis. He can ease his mind from the PTSD while keeping himself busy. I understand why Curtis thought that combat situations should be the last place for Lewis, but if someone has PTSD as severe as he did, maybe easing the transition back to regular everyday life would’ve been better and maybe Lewis could’ve accomplished that in Anvil.
  • His instability could get himself and his team killed. As Curtis put it, you don't want a guy like that watching your six.
  • Remember that Anvil is mostly made of dishonorably discharged soldiers so Russo can do wet work. Even if Lewis was competent it would have ended poorly for him.
  • Curtis was so against it because letting Lewis join Anvil would be slapping a Band-Aid on the problem. Rather than try to deal with what he was going through, Lewis wanted to just escape reality and go back to a war zone. So it's very likely Curtis was right to believe Lewis was too unstable to be able to “watch someone’s back”. It's also possible that Curtis was still convinced that he could help Lewis manage his PTSD, and the auspices of a sketchy PMC are not the most conducive.
  • Certainly, knowing what we know, it was a catalyzing event. But out of anything Curtis was able to know, of course it would appear to be the right call. Lewis' story isn't just about how the government leaves its veterans out to dry, it's also about what happens when someone doesn't accept help when it's offered to them. The only thing that would've helped Lewis is if he was institutionalized before he did any harm. But that's not something you can do til it's proven he's a danger to himself or others. Come to think of it, he kind of did when he had that nightmare and took a shot at his own father.
  • While prolonged exposure therapy is a valid treatment for PTSD, even that therapy relies on safe exposure to the triggers and is about reducing the distress caused by the trauma reminders. Joining Anvil would only work for Lewis in combination with some really extensive in-house therapy, in which someone like Curtis would be with him every step of the way. And that option isn't viable because we're talking about Lewis being in potential life-or-death situations and his emotional state is too unpredictable/volatile for that by far. He would perhaps put other people's lives at risk with his responses...and that is just the best case scenario in Curtis's opinion.

"Secret training exercise" bullshit

• Covering up Frank's intrusion on Colonel Bennett's base as a "secret training exercise", I can buy, but how does that bullshit lie explain away the soldier in the tunnel that Frank shot and wounded?
  • They either killed him or bought him off.
    • They couldn't kill him. That'd make the FBI interested, that a random soldier turns up dead not too long after Colonel Bennett's death.
    • Having a wounded soldier talking about being shot by Frank Castle raise FBI's attention too.
    • A wounded soldier talking about Frank Castle would raise eyebrows, but a dead soldier would be cause for active federal investigations by NCIS/ACIS, which would be much more damaging. The soldier can talk about who he met all he wants, but without video evidence it's just the hearsay of a wounded kid who was frightened and might have been imagining things.
  • Misfire. You'd be surprised how often that tends to happen during live-ammo training.

Clearing Frank's Name

• Why did everyone think Frank was working with Lewis? Wouldn't Curtis have told the police that Frank came there to kill Lewis and wound up talking him down to save Curtis's life?
  • Police likely wasn't into giving Frank the benefit of the doubt and if Curtis insists they'll start asking questions on how well he knows him to say he wasn't working with Lewis. For most of the world Frank is the one that shot Reyes and other police officer involved in the Central Park sting so they really don't know what he can do.
  • Curtis could say whatever he wanted, but he's a battered and injured man in a house with a corpse and had a bomb wired to him. The police are very likely going to treat anything he says to them as having dubious credibility due to sheer trauma, and will be hunting for Frank regardless because he is a known criminal vigilante. Even if Curtis gives a shining testimony to how Frank saved him, Frank is still a known mass-murderer, and the police will be after him if only to bring him in and straighten out the story.
  • The NYPD, and law enforcement in general, are bureaucracies. This has been pretty well established by Daredevil and Luke Cage (which both heavily involved the NYPD through their respective uses of Brett Mahoney and Misty Knight) and is peppered throughout Dinah's storyline on The Punisher: inner department politics matter. You say something against the narrative, and you're done. So many of the officers that were on the scene are probably going to either lie about it or not talk about it. Like the 'death' of Karen's boyfriend, the truth gets buried because the NYPD would rather the public believe a lie than admit a hard truth.
  • Remember that Brett was skeptical of Karen's account of what happened at the hotel, and he's friends with Karen, given his close association with Nelson & Murdock. Curtis was Frank's friend, so it makes sense. Plus, all we know is that Frank was wanted for questioning into the bombings after he was seen on a squad car's dashcam attacking two police officers before stealing one of their cars. The newspaper headlines could have just been sensationalized. Either way, Frank's actions at O'Connor's house would render him Public Enemy Number One status.

Why Tell Curtis But Not Billy?

• So Frank decided not to tell Billy he was alive for his safety. Okay, but why tell Curtis then? Isn't he in as much danger as anyone else who'd know Frank was alive?
  • Curtis has medical training. Frank would need someone like that in his corner to help him when he gets injured. He also runs the group sessions, so he's also a better person to give Frank advice.
  • Because if he keeps telling no one he is alive he'll end up dead in a ditch or shoot himself out of despair. Curtis was the better choice even if he compromise him because he tries helping people like Frank while Billy is running a mercenary company.
  • Nothing would have really changed if Frank had let Russo know he was still alive. Russo wouldn't have made any moves against Frank until the firefight in the forest.

So who was that in the van?

• In "Penny and Dime," Karen was forced to abort her snooping in Frank's house because of the van that pulled up outside. Who was in that van? Was that David (trying to get in touch with Frank; which is possible because he says he planted the CD in the house for Frank to find) or was that a bunch of Anvil operatives coming for Frank?
  • David. It's a Mythology Gag about the Punisher van likely.
  • It was Russo's men. There were multiple people in that van.

Spotting the fake cop

• So what cued in to Sarah that the police officer was a fake?
  • Considering that her husband was supposedly shot and killed by men wearing DHS uniforms, it makes sense that she's inherently suspicious of cops at this point.
  • They weren't fake police uniforms, her husband was shot and "killed" by Carson Wolf, the Special Agent in Charge for the DHS field office for New York City. Sarah was suspicious because the Anvil operative was acting a little off, asking questions about who's home and so forth (so he can determine if all the Liebermans are in one place). And with everything going on, she'd be stupid not to be a little suspicious.
  • After Sarah denied making the call, the fake cop kept acting like he knew that Sarah knew Frank. Then he started asking about her daughter, which is not something that would be relevant if he was only following up on a tip about Frank. Him also acting like a predator didn't help his case.
  • Wolf was also accompanied by fully armed DHS SWAT officers when he shot David. It doesn't matter which alphabet soup agency it was that shot him, it's going to make her inherently distrustful of law enforcement in general when one shot her husband.
    • And Sarah saw Wolf shoot David after shouting "he has a weapon". She knew David didn't have a weapon and wasn't threatening anyone. Not to mention that the reason why David was shot in the first place was because he uncovered very dangerous information, so Sarah has good reason to be skeptical of law enforcement at this point.

Just following orders?

• Is it me or does Frank's inner conflict over the soldier he shot escaping Bennett's army base (because the soldier might just be following orders) seem kinda odd? I feel it does given Frank's willingness to kill Russo's PMCs who attacked him and Gunner in the forest, or who he lured to the lair in episode 11. Sure, one could argue "well they were there to kill him (and Gunner), so they are part of the conspiracy." But are they? Do we know that? Or are they just following orders, like a certain someone was when he shot Ahmad Zubair?
  • The PMCs were conducting an assassination mission on US soil in both those cases. Even if they didn't know the full reasoning, they were clearly conducting illegal raids. The soldier was trying to lock down the base to stop what he thought was an intruder. The fact that Colonel Bennett was dirty and the intruders were trying to uncover that corruption would be unknown to him.
  • Frank was also aiming to not kill the soldier, while he was actively working to kill the mercenaries coming after him. Frank is skilled enough that he could shoot a man nonlethally if he chose to.

"Didn't you ever learn not to hurt a woman?"

• Frank yells at Lewis, "didn't you ever learn not to hurt a woman?" and everything in the show reinforces that this is part of Frank's code. Except, if that's Frank's code, then what was that bit in Daredevil 2x12 where Frank crashed a car into Karen and walked away from her when she was bleeding, and made pretty clear his priorities didn't include her medical needs?
  • She wasn't that injured and found out she is with the guy responsible for his family's death, priorities are being shifted here. Plus was he supposed to just wait until Schoonover kill Karen? He didn't ram the car to hurt her he did it to hurt the guy that wanted to kill her.
    • Even if hurting Karen wasn't his intentions, it doesn't change the fact that he did hurt her, or that he used her as bait at the diner. Frank had an obligation to check on Karen just as much as he did when he pulled Dinah from her Mustang.
    • He has zero obligation he is not a knight or even a police officer. He took his sweet time to make sure Micro was off with his guns and ammo before taking care of Dinah and didn't treat her wounds aside pulling her out something that is on fire. It's like saying he has an obligation of treating her eardrums when he shot near Grotto in the first episode, if he sees a woman can walk he is gonna focus back on punishing his family's murderers.
  • Also, Frank in Daredevil is in a different place, mentally, compared to where he is in this series. That and, let's be real here: irrational and inconsistent shouting in the heat of the moment isn't unique to Frank Castle. I'm pretty sure when Frank yelled that at Lewis, he didn't rationally think of the one time he accidentally hurt Karen half a year back while trying to protect her from killers and reflect on how that is inconsistent with what he's saying to Lewis. He's yelling at a stupid kid that he's being an asshole in a dangerous and high-stress situation.

Hacker girl

• So what happened to the hacker girl on Russo's team?
  • She was paid and sent off with a warning not to talk to anyone about what she saw. Russo's ruthless, but he's not stupid enough to waste talent.

Was that cop in the right?

• So was that cop that arrested Lewis in the right or not? Or were both parties at fault?
  • He wasn't, even if you don't want manifestation around you can't fake charges to arrest someone (Lewis wasn't going for his gun).
    • But he was right that you do need a permit to protest. Lewis should have just done what the cop told him to do, and go somewhere else.
    • Two people handing out pamphlets is not a protest, and as shown with he whole "break his arm he is going for my gun" the cop was just being a dick.
    • Doesn't matter if the cop was a dick, Lewis had to comply. If an officer tells you to do something, you do it and he has the authority to do whatever he has to to get you to comply. If Lewis just did what the cop said and went elsewhere, he would never have been arrested. Or he should have disputed the citation and charges in court. As the saying goes, "Fight that shit in court, not on the street."
    • If a cop tells you to suck his dick you don't have to comply. Cops don't have the power to harass you and turning handing pamphlet as criminal charge because you inconvenience them. As Lewis explained he was allowed to do that and the cop just bullied him. "Pay a lawyer and waste your time in a hearing so you don't bother ourlife" is a shitty saying too.
    • Police officers are allowed to "harass" (read, detain) people if they feel they're disturbing the peace. Your example of forcing a blowjob doesn't compare here, because that's committing an outright unjustified crime, but ejecting a person who is causing trouble is acceptable. Now, what the cop did there was outside of the line, as Lewis wasn't disturbing the peace and the cop was making up serious charges on the spot, but legally, yeah, a cop could cite disturbing the peace as a reason to eject an individual from a public place.
    • It's also important to note that, in this case, Lewis and O'Connor were purposely using a "letter of the law over the spirit of the law". Really, the problem wasn't what they were doing, but where they were doing it. Handing out pamphlets is not technically a protest...but, for all intents and purposes, they are making a political statement, on the steps of a courthouse. That's the sort of place where, in order to make a political statement and handle such things, you are required to have a permit, and how Lewis and O'Connor were doing it was in an obtrusive and obvious manner. The police officer was a prick and probably was having a bad day, and getting arrested was one of the crucial factors towards Lewis's downward spiral. But, generally? What Lewis was doing was one step short of the "sovereign citizen" stuff you see activists try to pull all the time at traffic stops. Police have broad discretion to at least detain someone, and in some instances "being an asshole" can be reasonable enough suspicion. This is one of those situations where both parties were in the wrong. This officer was, quite frankly, a Rabid Cop...but, arguing "You can't arrest me" to a cop...in many instances can, in fact, be grounds for arrest. Quite frankly? Lewis should have sucked it up and grabbed the permit. And "disturbing the peace" is also explicitly something that police officers have broad discretionary power. And Lewis and O'Connor were being loud and obvious...which again, is exactly why permits are required for such things. Yes, it was just two people, but those two people were intentionally making sure everyone could hear them. You may have "freedom of speech" and "freedom of assembly" in the United States, but those two things do not come without restrictions.

What if Donny didn't bring his wallet to the heist?

• Had Donny left his wallet in the car when the crew went to the poker game or not brought it all, how differently would things have unfolded?
  • They wouldn't have tried to kill Donny and Micro would have found Frank when he killed another gang for fun.
  • Donny having a fall-out with the other guys was probably inevitable at some point, but it would've taken far longer and perhaps would not have happened in Frank's presence.
  • It's not like Lance was a gangster. He was just a moron desperate to repay the Loan Shark he borrowed money from. After the heist, he and Donny don't even have to talk to each other or have a fall-out. The only reason he wanted him dead is the threat of the Gnuccis tracking him down and torturing him into giving up Lance and the others, which we saw them preparing to do when Frank caught up to them.

"I'm gonna help you but not if it's gonna get someone killed"

• When Karen meets with Frank by the river in episode 2 to give him the information she uncovered about Micro, she says she'll help Frank but not if someone's gonna die because of the information she gives him. I can definitely buy that Karen would be concerned for Frank, and want him to find some peace, out of her guilt over losing Matt. Yet, when they meet up again in episode 5, why does Karen say nothing about the fact that Frank used the information she gave him to find and kill Wolf, after she specifically told him she would help him as long as her help didn’t get someone killed? It seems very out of character that Karen would let that slide. Either that, or she knew when she gave him the info that he might use it to kill, despite her objections, and she just…decided she was okay with that. Which doesn’t seem like her, either.
  • Frank didn't leave saying yes ok and it would be kind of dumb Karen thought giving info to the Punisher won't lead to people getting killed, even if she is really biased toward Frank. Chances are she just halfheartedly tries like with Matt and Urich to change their idea even when she knows it's pointless.
    • Except she should be kinda/sorta mad at him for how he basically turned her into an accessory to murder. I mean, I do buy that Karen would still have enough sympathy for Frank that she would be willing to help. I can definitely believe that she would be concerned for him, and want him to find some peace. It's just that the show doesn't really pay more than lip-service to the fact that she has some misgivings about his methods.
    • Well Frank sort of saved her boyfriend in Daredevil season 2 finale. That might have redeemed Frank in Karen's eyes in that he was there to provide backup for Matt once Elektra was taken out, assuming Matt told her the exact details of what happened on the roof. Karen has used people to fulfill her goals (including Frank, in the course of trying to redeem herself for killing Wesley) and other people (like Fisk and Frank) have used Karen as a pawn in fulfilling their goals, and those usually ended up getting people killed. She is also probably in a perpetual state of anger and sorrow that she's been since losing Matt.
    • Karen is relieved to see Frank because it’s been a while, and she’s glad at least he’s still alive, unlike Matt. Despite the unpleasantness of their final interaction in Daredevil Season 2, Karen still cares about Frank on a personal level, and she mourned him when she thought he’d died in the boat explosion. Her relief here isn't one of “Oh yay, I get to work with Frank again!” it's actually one of "I'm relieved that, unlike Matt, at least Frank hasn't gotten himself killed since I last saw him." It's also worth noting that Karen is fairly cold and distant throughout most of their initial conversations, clearly wary of getting involved in whatever he’s up to. It’s only when she learns Frank has been compromised that she agrees to help him. All risks and former unpleasantness aside, Karen will never hesitate to help people– whether that be Frank, Matt, or anyone else she cares about– and that character trait is in full effect here.
  • It's surprising that Karen didn’t get angry at him about Wolf, because she clearly knows he did it. But at the same time, she also knows by this point that talking Frank out of killing people is like pulling teeth, having now dealt with it twice (with Schoonover, and with Wolf). She’s sad, disappointed, but probably not actually surprised. And that, coupled with her own grief over losing Matt, is another thing that factors into her “I want there to be an after for you” speech. She knows there’s no way to stop Frank from killing now, while he’s still seeking justice, but she desperately wants him to stop eventually.

Timeline issues

• So when exactly does The Punisher take place? The most they imply is that it takes place in November (given Curtis mentions the month when he finds Lewis's foxhole) and the last episode sees Frank turning down an invitation to join David's family for Thanksgiving dinner. So when does The Punisher take place in relation to the other shows?
  • It’s hard to be sure exactly how long after The Defenders that this show is taking place. It’s about 11 months after the end of Daredevil season 2, depending on how long it took Frank to find and finish off those last few stragglers from the gangs. But then again, they never said exactly how long after Daredevil season 2 the events of The Defenders took place. Less than six months, definitely, based on the outdoor scenes. Daredevil season 2 ended at Christmas, and neither The Defenders nor The Punisher look like they're set in the summer. In The Defenders, it clearly looks like autumn in Luke's first scenes with Misty, while we later see snow on the ground when Matt and Jessica are walking to John Raymond's brownstone.^note This is a side-effect of The Defenders, despite being set over a three or four day period, being filmed over the span of five months In The Punisher, there's also snow on the ground when Frank tries to assassinate Rawlins at the mansion, while Lewis’s dad and Curtis both make remarks to Lewis about how cold it is outside.^note Curtis mentions it's 40 degrees in the middle of November when he finds Lewis in his little foxhole in the backyard, while Lewis's dad mentions it being "colder than a winter's tit" when Lewis comes home shirtless from killing O'Connor It doesn’t seem like it should still be winter, but it also doesn’t seem like it should be the next winter already, either.
  • The only thing we know for certain, when correlating this with the other shows, is that The Punisher takes place between The Defenders and Daredevil season 3, during the time period where Matt is presumed to be dead following the destruction of Midland Circle. This can be deduced from Karen’s general state of mourning and wardrobe choices^note Primarily blacks and blues, the colors of sadness and mourning, as well as the fact that if Matt were still alive and kicking, there’s no way he would have sat on the sidelines once Lewis publicly threatened Karen on the radio.^note Remember that he was tipped into freakout mode when the Hand kidnapped Karen, his immediate reaction to Sowande threatening the heroes' loved ones was to immediately run to Karen's office, or the fact he immediately dropped what he was doing and headed to the church when he learned Fisk ordered a hit on her How long after The Defenders that the events of The Punisher take place, though, is harder to tell. At best, it's probably a few weeks, since the Empire State Building is lit up in red during the first episode when Frank is working on the construction site (much like it was in Danny's last shot in The Defenders), while in episode 2, Ellison can be seen holding a newspaper that's headlined "Chaos Under the Streets." And in Daredevil season 3, it's not really established how long it's been since The Defenders, although it's very likely Ellison's attitude with Karen for investigating Fisk against his explicit instructions not to is the result of ongoing tensions from what happened with Lewis.
  • 11 months appears to be the time gap from Daredevil season 2 to The Punisher season 1, given Madani's remark in the first episode about Schoonover's death and the boat explosion happening "last year", the November setting of The Punisher, and Daredevil season 2 ending at Christmas. It probably took until about April for Frank to finish off the gangs who were at the park, which means he spent about four months of time on the road hunting down targets (especially factoring in all the days just dedicated to cross-country driving and staying in cheap motels that must have happened) and then retired to work on the construction site.

Lewis's ability to master explosives

• Was it ever explained where Lewis Wilson learned how to build bombs or not? 'Cause for a guy to go from PTSD veteran to mad bomber just like that is hard to swallow.
  • Before the Oklahoma City bombings, Timothy McVeigh served in the Gulf War and spent his free time reading up on various military topics, including explosives. This was probably also the case with Lewis.

Lewis's attack on Senator Ori

• Why didn't Lewis kill Senator Ori? He is consistently depicted as a ruthless Terminator who kills without hesitation, and killing this Senator is literally the only motivation left he has in his life. He spends every minute of his waking life after the radio threats plotting this murder, and he finally gets the Senator in front of him with a loaded gun and he... has a crisis of conscience? He didn't have a crisis of conscience two seconds earlier when he head-shotted the bodyguards at the door. Was this because that segment was an "unreliable narrative" and it wasn't depicting how it actually happened? This was during Karen's account, and I can't see why she'd lie to make Lewis look better.
  • Partly unreliable narrative, and partly Lewis knowing that once Ori is dead nothing will change and that he's a dead man once it happens. Lewis didn't want to die, we saw him struggle with that a couple times. Lewis is a guy who, following his Army discharge, is looking for some sort of purpose in the world, and once he's killed the Senator, that purpose has to be re-evaluated and he doesn't want to do that.

Did Russo really care about Frank?

• Also why he wanted to kill him so badly after everything they've been through?
  • Russo did care about Frank and his family at the beginning. He just cares about himself more. When he found out that Frank was going to have to be eliminated, he removed himself from the situation rather than risk everything he’s earned trying to stop it (if he even could). He had already sold his soul, there was no going back now. When he found out Frank was alive, he knew it would only be a matter of time until Frank found out about his involvement. And once he did, Frank would not stop until he killed Russo. So Frank had to die.
  • And Frank being alive, it’s just a constant reminder of what a piece of shit Russo is. He likes to think of himself as the victim of his own life no matter what he does because of his childhood (this from the scene where he talks to his mom on life support in the hospital). Frank reminds Russo that no matter what his childhood was like, he is just a bad person, willing to do whatever is needed to improve his own situation.
  • Russo cared but he has his way of caring. He's more Mercy Kill than joining with him. It's already lucky Frank got away with all the murder because the CIA wants to smother the whole thing. Russo probably didn't see fighting Rawlins and the whole corrupt system viable and preferred playing ball, feeling they would just get killed anyway and Frank not being able to take it is regretful. For most of the last episodes Billy feels betrayed that Frank couldn't just die or let it go since Billy lacks too much empathy to see why Frank can't just stop his crusade.

How long has it been since Frank's family died?

• How long has it been since the Central Park shootout?
  • The Punisher takes place after The Defenders, and from dialogue is implied to take places about 11 months after the events of Daredevil season 2. As Senator Ori said on the radio, “It’s barely a year since this city was terrorized by the Punisher!” According to the articles that Karen found in the Bulletin archives in Daredevil season 2, the Castle family was killed in April of 2015. So it's been about a little over a year and a half.

Gun control messengers

• Call me crazy, but isn't it a bit out of character for Karen to be in favor of guns? I mean, she suffered extreme PTSD just from using one to kill Wesley.
  • Her PTSD comes more Wesley kidnapping her and knowing she likely marked her and her friends to death if Fisk finds out. She even said to Wesley she has been using guns before to know when one is loaded.
    • Yes, it makes sense why Karen would want to have a handgun: because this woman is involved in life or death situations every other week. Therefore, Karen should do whatever she needs to do to protect herself. But considering the extreme trauma Karen went through just from killing Wesley, plus the fact that realistically, she should have been severely traumatized and suffering extreme PTSD from all the violence that was inflicted on her in Daredevil season 2^note Which for the record included getting shot at three times, in the hospital, in Reyes' office, and her own apartment (of course, in TV world, gunfire harms no one unless they’re actually hit by the bullets); witnessing Frank brutally kill those two men in the diner, him crashing a car into her and then executing Schoonover despite her begging him not to, and then getting kidnapped by the Hand, them killing a hostage, and threatening her at gunpoint it makes no sense for Karen to support gun rights in general. Especially when you consider the fact the gun control debate is primarily about assault weapons, not handguns.
    • Why does she get to do whatever she needs to defend herself but other people don't? Bystanders in Marvel New York have an even worse time than her on a general basis. Compared to the average bystander, Karen at least has a bunch of superheroes or an ex-Marine with a bunch of guns there to save her if something happens to her. Besides PTSD is really pushing, she recovers fast seen with her chatting with Foggy after he just saved her from the thugs at Elena's place, she was friendly with hobo Frank despite their last reunion ending with him executing a guy and she even wrote an editorial about how strong people in New York are after being kidnapped by ninjas. Not everyone breaks down in real life either. The character who keeps supporting the Punisher is gonna be against guns unless you are a reporter that deliberately provoke criminals because she used guns before? Yes it's kind of crazy to think that Karen is suddenly a Shrinking Violet when she willfully risks her life for the truth no matter how many time people got hurt for it.
    • As I said, by real-world standards, Karen should have severe PTSD from all of the above incidents. She certainly had it after killing Wesley (because there's no other explanation for why she'd be having nightmares of Fisk coming to kill her right after the shooting). The way she acts, though, is probably chalked up to the fact that in the world of fiction, characters are supernaturally resilient to trauma so that they can continue to be active participants in the plot, that is, unless the PTSD is crucial to the plot or a character's personality (like with Frank or with Jessica Jones). It's just like Matt recovers from nasty knife wounds and concussions rather quickly, or Frank's ability to keep fighting despite all his injuries here, and we all accept it. As for the gun control debate, well, that's a whole can of worms to be saved for elsewhere.
  • Here's the thing about her stance: Karen literally argues that Frank killing is okay, he's not a home grown terrorist because he's only killing bad people, and then two minutes later she also says terrible things happen to people every day, it doesn't make them kill people. Which was Matt's argument to Frank during Daredevil season 2.

The radio show debate

• Question about the radio debate: why have Karen be the opponent to Senator Ori here? As far as I know, usually a senator debates another politician of the opposing cause, so why would the radio station managers decide that Senator Ori's debate opponent should be a smalltime journalist? Why not bring in the Mayor or a city councilman?
  • It wasn't supposed to be a debate about guns, it was a discussion about a recent terrorist act. Karen was likely invited because she deliberately provoked Lewis in her paper, while Senator Ori wanted to be there to use the event as a soapbox for his anti-gun campaign (and the station manager who oversaw accepted because bringing a politician on the air, especially one who's up for reelection, draws in crucial demographics). While you could make a case that the announcers would likely try to rerail the conversation about the original subject, the Netflix series take artistic license when it comes to media or public speech.

Schoonover's history with Frank

• During the trial, Colonel Schoonover mentioned he’d known Frank for nearly a decade, most of his military career. Then later, we find out he taught Frank to shoot at 18, so he must have known him his whole military career. Was Schoonover lying about how long he’d known him? Or is a possible explanation that he was an instructor who trained Frank, then Frank was deployed under someone else for a few years, before Schoonover formed his own unit and he’s referring to how long he “really” knew Frank - ie worked with him?
  • The "eight years" thing refers to how long Frank had been serving alongside Russo.

What if Frank had maintained contact with Russo?

• So, in the last episode, Curtis mentions how Frank wanted Russo to think he was dead because he thought he was protecting Russo in doing so (understandable, given Frank didn't know Russo was in league with Schoonover and Rawlins). But what if Frank had stayed in contact with Russo in addition to Curtis, following the boat explosion?
  • It wouldn't have changed much, if anything. On Russo's end, he'd feel nothing to worry about so long as Frank thinks he's punished all the people who killed his family. It's entirely possible Russo would have made a mention to Frank about Madani asking about him well before episode 6, and he certainly wouldn't mention to Rawlins that Frank was still around. Like in the actual story, Russo would have been forced to start making moves against Frank once the gunfight in the forest happened.

“We must not tolerate those who use violence to communicate"

• That's what Karen writes in her op-ed about Lewis. Why does that critique not extend to her old pal Frank, but does apply to Matt? Also, weird how Karen approves of Frank going on a homicidal rampage of revenge but wasn’t ok with Matt beating bad guys up and leaving them for the cops.
  • Lewis is using violence to communicate a manifesto. Frank isn’t trying to communicate at all; he’s trying to kill specific people who he knows hurt him. Both are bad, but Frank is not actively targeting innocent people and tries to minimize collateral damage, whereas Lewis has no regard whatsoever for collateral damage. As for the apparent hypocrisy on Karen's end regarding Matt, she did not want her boyfriend to end up like Frank. As much as Karen cares for Frank, she knows there’s ultimately no coming back from where he is—she’d hoped Matt could stop before crossing that event horizon, but then he apparently got himself killed in Midland Circle.
  • Karen holds Matt to a higher standard, because she misses being the girlfriend of a lawyer, which, even when taking Matt's double life into account, probably felt healthier for her than being the gun moll of a vigilante.
  • Karen is not okay with Frank being a mass-murderer. She certainly does view Frank as justified in wanting revenge, but whenever she witnesses the results of Frank going full Punisher on some poor, evil bastards, the results terrify and appall her: the two guys he killed at that diner, and his confrontation with the Blacksmith being prime examples. Besides, you can't really apply logic to Karen’s thought processes. She’s a traumatized person who’s been to hell and back, who also killed Wesley, and at the time of The Punisher is also secretly having to hide the fact she's mourning the death of her boyfriend (and she can't openly mourn Matt because the NYPD covered up Midland Circle). She can cover it up with a nice smile, but she’s as deranged as Matt and Frank in her own way. The only 100% normal person across the Daredevil and Punisher series is Foggy.
  • Karen was a lot closer with Matt than with Frank, not to mention being on the verge of starting a relationship with Matt. She knew Matt as Matt Murdock, considered Matt's lawyer life as his real life, and saw how being Daredevil was ruining that. Frank has no real life. And Karen doesn’t fully approve of what Frank does anyway. She would prefer Frank be doing something else, but she's kinda resigned to the fact that it's pointless to try convincing him that. Even then, she’s more worried about Matt as a person. Karen is just hoping that Matt doesn’t wind up dead, in prison, maimed, psychotic, or disbarred, whereas the best-case scenario that Frank can really hope for is “not dead yet.”
    • Deborah Ann Woll's rationale as explained in a post-Daredevil season 3 tweet for this is as follows: "Karen is absolutely NOT ok with Frank killing people. I think in DDS 2 there was some confusion because of her history and how it aligned with Frank's, but by the end of that season she realizes that's a dangerous path. Every interaction since then has been about saving Frank's soul."
    • Another thing to consider is that Karen has spent enough time with Matt and with Frank to know they are totally different individuals. Frank is a killer and has been for a while. Karen met him this way. Matt has never been a killer, not when he met her and not now. Even teetering on the edge has shown Matt goes dark and pushes everyone away. It will eat at his soul if he crosses that line and make him question if not completely lose his faith, the thing that helps him stay grounded, and that’s obvious to Karen (and everyone). To put it another way, Karen's line of thinking is "treat people according to what you believe is best for them rather than just apply blanket morality to every situation". It’s also pointless to argue with a guy like Frank, while Matt can still be reasoned with.

Gunner under the radar

• So how were the Cerberus plotters led to think that Frank was responsible for sending the Zubair assassination tape to Micro? How exactly did Gunner slip under the radar?
  • From the Kandahar flashbacks, it looks like they were led to think it was Frank because Frank expressed the most vocal opposition to Agent Orange. Given the way he protested against carrying out a mission that he knew was a death trap, the way he flipped out and punched out Rawlins' eye after said mission inevitably went south, and both Agent Orange and Schoonover would have every reason to think that Frank was the likeliest member of the team to snitch. Gunner, on the other hand, kept his mouth shut and didn't confront anyone with what he saw when he saw Schoonover and Colonel Bennett stuffing the KIAs with drugs. It's possible he didn't say anything because he wanted to tip off Madani once he had something airtight that was irrefutable proof of Operation Cerberus's illegal existence, without raising any suspicions from the plotters. He got something when it came to the Zubair assassination. Given Rawlins' callousness and general lack of regard for the men under his command (up to and including Russo), he obviously didn't care enough to know which soldiers were which. Frank, on the other hand, was aware that the tape couldn't have been made by him because he was the one shooting Zubair, and he'd connected with Gunner early on, so he knew right away where Gunner was standing, and where Gunner was standing lined up with the angle of the footage.
  • It's never said out loud, but the show seems to strongly imply that Rawlins assumed Frank leaked the video because of their personal conflict. If Rawlins' judgment was clouded by his bitterness toward Frank, it might also explain why he didn't realize someone other than Frank had filmed it since Frank is in the video. Or there had been so many tortures and killings that he couldn't recall the specific details of that one, and didn't look at it closely enough to see who was on screen. No one in the government who saw the video recognized his voice either, despite his prominent position in the CIA, so evidently the masks and yelling were effective disguises.

Does Anvil pay that well?

• Apparently every single employee of Anvil, including the desk-bound computer geeks, gets such a fat paycheck that they are perfectly okay with committing murder, arson, kidnapping, assault, torture, trying to set a woman and her child on fire, impersonating a police officer, killing cops and federal law enforcement agents like it ain't no thing... Seriously, one wonders if even Bill Gates could buy that kind of loyalty.
  • You're seriously underestimating just how depraved Private Military Contractors can get.
    • Excellent point. However, unless someone is in it strictly For the Evulz, that kind of depravity doesn't come cheap. Anvil either has seriously unlimited bank, or they've got a hiring process that selectively targets psychopaths who are looking for work and don't care about the size of the paycheck as long as they get to break the law and kill people. Look at the woman who was trying to hack into Micro's computer while Frank was being tortured. She's perfectly okay with being an accessory to murder, she's trusted to keep her mouth shut and not be a loose end that needs to be cut, and keeps on working while Frank is being brutally tortured. Again, either a complete psychopath, or she's getting paid so much she just doesn't care. Which is another sign that she's a psychopath...

Season 2

Marlena's fate.

• Why did Pilgrim kill Marlena outside the jail?
  • Throughout all of his pursuit of Amy, Pilgrim made perfectly clear that he did it because he believed it was necessary, not because he wanted to do it, or because he enjoyed it. Marlena on the other hand had just said that she very much wanted to kill "Castiglione" out of personal revenge. This probably made her a sinner worthy of death in his eyes.
    • Also possibly because she had called attention to herself and become a loose end? The rest of her crew was dead, but people were becoming curious about her and might find out more if they exerted themselves, becoming a risk for Marlena and his community. She'd acted without asking for permission, as she said, and these were the consequences...
  • The police at the station had run her through the system and confirmed her identity. Even if they eliminated the officers, it would still be logged in the system that she was one of their last three checks right before they went silent. She was a loose end that could potentially lead back to who she was working for. If they discover her body then there's no point in the Feds looking for Marlena.

Madani's final decision

• Perhaps I wildly misunderstood her arc, but why would Madani choose to join the CIA after what's happened to her? Her entire plot in the first season shows how the CIA in this universe is morally bankrupt and horrible. When Mahoney offered her the gun and badge and she declined, I thought she was going to go off fishing or something, not start running black ops.
  • "A few agents did bad things" does not equate to "the whole CIA is morally bankrupt and horrible."