By request: Captain America beats up the Punisher... and lets him leave.

[starwolf_oakley.insanejournal.com]

Upon request from wizardru, here's the CIVIL WAR scene of the Punisher killing two villains right in front of the Secret Avengers. Frank gets a pass on this, even though Cap beats him up and Frank feels he proved something to Cap nevertheless.





Goldbug was a Luke Cage foe obsessed with gold. He also was part of the Bendis SECRET WAR series that never really caught on. The Plunderer was Ka-Zar's brother. However, he re-appeared in MARVEL COMICS PRESENTS #5–6 (March–April 2008), explaining the man who had died was his "American representative."



What's worse: the Punisher killing these two or Captain America willingness to work with them?





An A+ parody of this scene and the rest of CIVIL WAR can be found here:
http://mightygodking.com/index.php/i-dont-need-your-civil-war/
Oddly, the parody seems to have a more in-character Spider-Man than the actual CIVIL WAR story.

Matt Fraction put his own twist on this in PUNISHER WAR JOURNAL #2 and #3.





It is unusual that no one else in the room, given their powers, can do *anything* to stop the Punisher.



The direct order seemed to be regarding lethal force. Of course, that non-lethal force had been against police officers.

I'll pause for a moment to reflect on a line said in a podcast reviewing CIVIL WAR #6. It was either a Marvel podcast or a Marvel-themed podcast, but I remember the line very well.

"Now, the Punisher's crazy. He's a killer. But he's not an idiot."



This is intercut with a flashback to Frank at boot camp, being asked by "Captain America" to hit him. Frank refuses. This is one of the "alternate" Caps, and probably the "Crazy Cap" from the 1950s.



The Punisher is deliberately provoking Captain America. I'm starting to question the "crazy, but not an idiot" idea.



"I got to doin'." As someone said in a review of this issue, Frank Castle isn't Mal Reynolds (from Firefly and Serenity).

Captain America wanted the Punisher on the team to do the dirty work? Well, it's pretty much the same reason they wanted Wolverine in the New Avengers, so it isn't that OOC. Meaning the Punisher is right, although I doubt Cap had "executing villains that want to help out" in mind.

Cap doesn't understand why the Punisher won't fight back. Perhaps a flashback might help:



Scenes of Frank Castle's earlier life often show that he had something wrong with him. It just wasn't "kill all criminals" wrong until his family was murdered.





So... the Punisher killed two super-villains and then let Captain America beat him up just to prove a point? Anyone know the point?

And none of the heroes do anything to stop the Punisher from LEAVING. I usually criticize Spider-Man for doing that, but this was a WHOLE ROOM of superheroes!

Comments

[tavella.insanejournal.com]

Especially since they generally consist of creating cartoonishly evil villains for Frank to revenge-fantasy on and magically allowing him to be always right and never have accidental casualties no matter how much lead and explosives he throws around.

Now, superheroes often have the last quality of fantasy, in that people often toss around cars and the like without killing bystanders, but a) they don't do so as consistently -- there's generally some acknowledgement of casualties when the Avengers have big epic fights, while Frank supposedly has never ever ever killed a single innocent -- and b) it's at least in support of trying to save other lives, not enacting perverted revenge fantasies.

[punishermax.insanejournal.com]

Cartoonishly evil? So, Doctor Doom is evil presented well while Slavers (which exist in reality) are just too much to even take seriously?

And Frank's never killed an innocent because he always goes into things knowing what he's gonna do. He doesn't fight in the streets with rocket launchers and he doesn't fight guys with particle rifles, he fights them with normal guns and does so in areas without any innocent bystanders, usually within the confines of the enemies' lair.

I'm sort of offened how you seem to be implying how people who enjoy the comic are enacting perveted revenge fantasies, like we masturbate over the book to the gore.

[kagome654.insanejournal.com]

I think it's a little silly that in a book that's supposed to be fairly down to earth and realistic Frank has NEVER killed an innocent civilian (are we sure he hasn't? I vaguely recall him angsting about something like that at one time or another, though I could be thinking of something else). Trained professionals have been known to clip some poor sap who was just in the wrong place at the wrong time, I think it would be fair to assume the same thing might happen to Frank on occasion. Personally I think Frank brutally murdering an uncover police officer or something would make for a fairly compelling story. Even someone like Frank makes mistakes, and when you routinely use deadly force those mistakes are likely to have deeply regrettable consequences. It's a risk you take when your form of justice is irreversible.

[kagome654.insanejournal.com]

*uncover=undercover

Dur.

[punishermax.insanejournal.com]

They did do the murdering an Undercover cop in the Punisher WarZone movie. Too bad the acting was nightmarishly bad.

He did have a scare back in the Girls In White Dresses arc where he thought he killed a little girl in the crossfire. It was later proven to be another bad guy but he still angsted and nearly committed suicide.

Frank understands the risks he takes, but the reason MAX works so well is that it's more realistic than 616. The Punisher is the one Marvel character who only works well without other heroes. MAX is mainly realistic in the sense that super heroes don't exist, it still follows comic laws like the hero has great aim and the bad guys don't and so on.

[lynxara.insanejournal.com]

Well, really, the Punisher was created based on the old Bronson "Death Wish" movies from the 80's. Based on that, you have two possible ways for him to react to hurting a civilian:

1) He feels momentary regret, but the world is a hard place and he can't stop pursuing the greater good.

2) Frank is so driven by trauma to eradicate criminals that he's incapable of perceiving "civilians" once he gets his guns out. He will rationalize that everyone he shot had it coming somehow or another.

[wizardru.insanejournal.com]

FWIW, the Punisher first appeared in February 1974 in Amazing Spiderman, which was the same year that the first Death Wish came out....in JULY. So the Punisher actually pre-dates the movie by more than half a year (assuming at least a three month lead time for the comic).

[lynxara.insanejournal.com]

Well... I didn't want to get OCD about this, but yes, Punisher is actually based on the genre of men's adventure novels that gave rise to Death Wish.

Men's adventure has since utterly dried up as a publishing genre, so it's easier to explain the cultural zeitgeist that gave rise to Punisher by referencing Death Wish.

[wizardru.insanejournal.com]

I bow before your wisdom, sir. I didn't know that.

[lynxara.insanejournal.com]

If you're interested in exploring the whole men's adventure idea, the Mack Bolan (http://www.mackbolan.com/) series is a good place to start. Being conversant with this genre is especially interesting in light of Garth Ennis's work, as he seems to draw a lot of inspiration from it.

Most bookstores don't sell this stuff anymore but men's adventure tends to flood thrift stores and second-hand shops.

[the_jeff.insanejournal.com]

I read a fair amount of Mack Bolan and Phoenix Force novels in the 80s. It's easy to see the inspiration for the Punisher there, heck the old War Journal comics were so similar in tone it's close to plagerism.