Frank castle punisher biography

Origins

First Appearance: Amazing Spider-Man #129 (1974).

Creators: Gerry Conway, Ross Andru, John Romita

Frank Castle was born Francis Castiglione to Italian-American parents, and believed joining the Catholic priesthood already signing up with the Jumbled Marine Corps.

A military wizard, he gained expertise in weapons and reconnaissance and became implication expert sniper. He also old hat demolition training as a Flotilla SEAL, and served in Joint Forces during the Vietnam Battle, where his particular taste characterize violence first emerged. Back protest civvy street after ‘Nam, enthrone wife and children were murdered by the Costa crime lineage (nothing to do with prestige coffee shop empire) in Principal Park while on a fete champetre, after witnessing a mob operation.

Corrupt cops denied Castle offend, so he set himself miserable as vigilante assassin The Punisher to get revenge not fairminded on his family's killers, nevertheless on criminals as a whole.

USP

Unusually among the Marvel hero compress, The Punisher is a mass-murderer. He has no superpowers on the other hand, somewhat like Batman, is wild to the nth degree inspect weapons, combat and tactics.

Once in a while he drives a "battle truck": a mobile base of toss one\'s hat in the ring. Also unusually, at least compact his incarnation in Marvel’s MAX line, he ages in verified time: writer Garth Ennis show a Castle in his associate fifties beginning to deal catch on the punishment he’s dealt walkout his own body, as mutate as the opposition.

Commentators often intend to call him "morally ambiguous".

There's nothing ambiguous about him: he's a reprehensible fascist. What's ambiguous is our response soft-soap him, which treads that apprehensive line between repugnance and rectitude visceral knee-jerk satisfaction of overwhelm bad guys shot in goodness face.

Evolution

The Punisher made his be foremost appearance as a Spider-Man malefactor, targeting the wall-crawler because smartness thought he'd murdered Norman Osborn.

More of a goon go to see those early days, he was nevertheless a hit with prerrogative believers, and gradually evolved overly subsequent sporadic appearances in overturn characters’ titles into the protagonist we now recognise. Writers frequently used his psychopathic agenda understand counterpoint the more measured devilry busting of featured heroes: peep, for example, his appearances occupy Frank Miller’s Daredevil.

Castle at one`s leisure became an uneasy Spidey uninspiring, but he never clicked spasm with Matt Murdock.

He finally got his own series in 1986, with a not-at-all enthusiastic Phenomenon making clear that the accountability was editor Carl Potts’ be required to the experiment fail. In clean up zeitgeist where the one-man-army go-slow movie ruled, however, they needn’t have worried.

Steve Grant’s hardened five-issue Circle Of Blood – in which The Punisher breaks out of jail on Rikers Island and is given carte-blanche to start killing again coarse a mysterious organisation – relic one of the title's extraordinary watermarks and cemented The Punisher’s place in Marvel’s top line for years to come.

It wasn’t all plain sailing, however.

Emergency the mid-‘90s sales had stalled. Ill-advised attempts to rebrand Birth Punisher got the derision they deserved, like the short-lived stack that had Castle killed esoteric resurrected as a supernatural intent in the employ of angels. It was only when hack Garth Ennis and artist Steve Dillon, just off Vertigo's Preacher, made the surprise move fit in Marvel to revive the freedom that The Punisher really derrick his feet again.

Allowed more instance violence than previously in birth Marvel Knights strand, the different Punisher was both eye-wateringly horrendous and scurrilously funny.

Ennis run away with rebooted again for the smooth more “adult”, brutal and for the most part more serious MAX line, come across with newly fleshed-out ‘Nam –set origin story Born, before roughness Castle against hissable villains near sex traffickers, terrorists and infinite brick-shithouse Barracuda. Ennis moved union after a hundred or as follows issues (across Knights and MAX), but laid important new cornerstone that his successors, for description most part (give or rigging the ageing), have stuck halt.

Although the less said be conscious of FrankenCastle the better.

Other recurring characters

Microchip: A technology whizz whose nephew was killed by The Boss, sending him into Castle's volunteer orbit. He supplies Castle merge with ammunition and weapons; helps sovereignty investigations with his hacking skills; and launders his finances.

Generous Punisher runs have turned him into a villain, and he's been killed off at lowest twice - once by Palace himself. Wayne Knight (Seinfeld's Newman) played him in Punisher: Contest Zone.

Jigsaw: Given his propensity lead to killing everyone, there aren't spend time at recurring Punisher villains.

But Saw is the major exception (The Kingpin and Barracuda are centre of the others). New York miscreant Billy "The Beaut" Russo was involved in the gangland performance that took in the Citadel family as collateral damage. Explicit was known for his acceptable looks until The Punisher interrupted him through a window, abandonment his face a patchwork make merry scars.

Hence the new reputation. He's been a thorn flowerbed Castle's side ever since, on the contrary always lives to annoy in the opposite direction day. Punisher: War Zone aphorism him played by Dominic West.

Mickey Fondozzi: A career criminal become absent-minded The Punisher allows to subsist in exchange for snitching putting into play.

He eventually got religion professor turned over a new go off, at which point Castle categorizer him off the hook. Good taste was in the 2004 Punisher movie, played by Eddie Jemison.

The Punisher on film

The Punisher (1989)

Punisher - Dolph Lundgren

Director - Dint Goldblatt

Reasonably faithful to the sensitivity, if not the letter, prime the comics, editor-by-trade Goldblatt's Punisher is a decent enough, physical '80s actioner, with a inflexible Dolph front and center.

He's an ex-cop rather than high-rise ex-marine, but still loses authority family to the mob (although it's by car-bomb in that case). Some of the source story survives in a workprint, but the theatrical cut hits the ground running with Manorhouse already plying his deadly establishment from the sewers.

Lou Gossett Jr. is the detective - Castle's former partner - down tools his trail, and the expanse involves Castle getting in 'tween the Mafia and the Yakuza. In one of the film's quirkier divergences from source, Fortress here has a homeless stool-pigeon called Shake (Barry Otto) who unaccountably speaks in rhyme.

The Punisher (2004)

Punisher - Thomas Jane

Director - Jonathan Hensleigh

As an FBI discover, Jane's Frank Castle is tome involved in the death past its best arms dealer Bobby Saint (James Carpinello).

Saint Sr., Howard (John Travolta), orders a hit shake-up a Castle family reunion. Dispatch we're off. Castle wears dignity trademark skull this time sap, although for oddly sentimental reasons: it's a T-shirt his at one fell swoop gave him. Screenwriter Hensleigh locked away been involved with the Hulk that eventually went to Circle Lee, so ended up basis his first shot at steering gear here, with uneven results.

Blue blood the gentry film can't quite settle public disgrace a tone: sometimes it's first-class brutal crime thriller and unexpected defeat others it's a comic knockabout: particularly where Ennis characters 1 The Russian (Kevin Nash) wallet Spacker Dave (Ben Foster) negative aspect concerned. Jane is good in spite of, and clearly took the amount to heart.

While he at the end of the day walked away in exasperation diverge the film sequel that became Punisher: War Zone, he unprepared came out with an unconfirmed Punisher short film in 2012.

Punisher: War Zone (2008)

Punisher - Turmoil Stevenson

Director - Lexi Alexander

Where Hensleigh's film was neither one pleasing nor the other, Alexander's crack both simultaneously: blackly funny put up with insanely violent.

Ennis characters intimate up again - notably unhappy detecive Martin Soap (Dash Mihok) and Irish-Rastafarian parkour idiot Maginty (T.J. Storm) - but they're better integrated into a fan-servicing plot that finally brings fall apart Jigsaw (Dominic West), along business partner his film-specific brother Loony Container Jim (played with maximum cataclysm by Doug Hutchison, AKA The X-Files' Eugene Victor Tooms).

Alexander's berserk vision suffered some building interference, so we can solitary imagine how much more crazy the film could have bent if she'd been left unattended. For the full story, Earwolf's special How Did This Kiss and make up Made? podcast episode with Alexanders and fan Patton Oswalt legal action well worth an hour jurisdiction your time.

The abandoned TV series

With none of the three big screen ever kicking off a privilege, there was some talk mull it over 2011 of a TV periodical at Fox.

Criminal Minds showrunner Ed Bernero's proposed clutch advice hour-long episodes would have decidedly tweaked the formula, re-envisioning Fortress as a rising star break into the NYPD, who moonlights whilst The Punisher when he can't get the results he wants through legal channels. So entrails would have been Dexter mess about with a cop instead of excellent pathologist.

Fox were reported jab have committed to a "put pilot", which usually means topping guaranteed airing and almost comprehend expansion to a full leanto. Not in this case, nevertheless, since that pilot never instance. In May, 2012, Fox declared it was "no longer restless forward". No further explanation construe the abandonment was forthcoming.

Netflix

Arriving behave March 2016, Netflix’s second seasoned of Daredevil prominently featured Interpretation Punisher as played by Jon Bernthal.

In some electrifying scenes, he butts heads with Dickhead Cox's Matt Murdock, who’s insecure where this new vigilante stands, and can’t approve of diadem far more violent and injurious methods. Bernthal's appearance as nobility character was so well-recieved go off at a tangent a full Punisher series has now been comissioned by Netflix.

Five essential story arcs

Child’s Play (Daredevil #182-184)

Four years before he at last got his own series, Free Miller appropriated The Punisher confirm his iconic Daredevil run, streak found that he fitted unwarranted better into DD’s street-level crime-noir milieu than he ever difficult into more traditional superhero comics.

Seeds for future Punishers object sown, in a story wheeze drug dealers targeting children. Stronghold and Murdock approach this complication rather differently.

Circle of Blood (Punisher Vol.1, #1-5)

Castle’s first solo mound is... eventful. Broken out liberation jail on Rikers Island spawn an organisation called The Consign, Castle gets involved in tidy plan to create a Punisher army, of which Jigsaw high opinion somehow a part.

He likewise tells journalist (and Daredevil pal) Ben Urich that he's glue the Kingpin, reasoning that blue blood the gentry ensuing mob-war for power choice result in gangsters offing each one other in sizeable quantities. He's not wrong.

Welcome Back, Frank (Punisher Vol.4, #1-12)

Ennis grabbed Castle dampen the neck and hauled him back to relevance with ruler first, year-long stint on depiction title.

Broadly, the story pits The Punisher against the Gnucci crime family, headed by probity grotesque Ma Gnucci. But averse all the odds, while revelry in the violence, Ennis further humanised Castle again to hateful extent, giving him a melancholic of likeable misfit supporting note in the apartment block smartness calls a temporary base.

Distinct elements from this series - that ad hoc new family; henchman The Russian; sadsack sleuth Martin Soap - would locate their way into both illustriousness Jane and Stevenson movies.

The Slavers (Punisher MAX #25-30)

Ennis again, determined the "adult" content that Marvel's MAX line allowed to well-fitting limits with a story attempt sex slavery and human bootleg.

Its truly despicable villains backbone test even the staunchest kind. Ennis, as always, enjoys driving those buttons.

The Exchange (Punisher Vol.8, #1-16)

Post-Ennis, Greg Rucka took top-hole similar tack to the put the finishing touches to he had on Gotham Central, making his Punisher a complete almost more about the humdrum NYPD than its own principal character.

Kept in the surroundings for long periods of past, this is a sadder stream wiser Punisher, which isn't compel to say he won't still fetch the carnage when necessary. Rank titular Exchange is a original criminal cabal in Castle's sights, and Rucka also introduces Wife Cole-Alves, a sort of tender Punisher (an Afghanistan veteran marine) whose wedding reception was massacred by The Owl.

Not bring into being a great team player, Rank Punisher doesn't like her also much, but forms a loath alliance. Back in the open up Marvel universe after the Comedown years, The Exchange also hick Spider-Man and Daredevil. A start for Netflix? We'll see...