Punisher (2009 series)

Punisher
Variant cover art to Punisher (2009 series), #1. Art by Mike McKone. A tribute to the cover of The Amazing Spider-Man #129
Publication information
Publisher	Marvel Comics
Schedule	Monthly
Format	Ongoing series
Genre	Superhero
Publication date	March 2009 – November 2010
No. of issues	21 1 Annual 1 " John Romita, Jr. (List one-shot)

Punisher, retitled Franken-Castle from issue #17 on, is a

After the events of "Dark Reign", Castle was dismembered and killed by Wolverine's son, Daken, and reassembled as a Frankenstein monster by Morbius and the Legion of Monsters.^[6]

Publication history

The story continued in Punisher: In the Blood.

Story arcs

"Living in Darkness" (#1–5)

After Norman Osborn positions himself as "humanity's savior" following the "

Going down his list of enemies to eliminate before ascending to, what he deems, "control of the world," Norman Osborn arrives at the man who made his list after attempting to assassinate him: Frank Castle. Devoting the entirety of H.A.M.M.E.R.'s resources to the elimination of the Punisher, Osborn is surprised at the vigilante's resourcefulness in evading H.A.M.M.E.R. ground forces. To remedy this, he dispatches Daken, the Avengers' dark reflection of Wolverine, to eliminate Castle once and for all. Finding him in a New York City sewer, a fight to the death ensues between the Dark Wolverine and the Punisher. The Punisher does well, and manages to fight on par with Daken, but the mutant's healing factor proved too much for Castle, and Daken eventually cut both his arms off before decapitating him.^[10]

"Dead and Alive" (#11–16)

Morbius and the Legion of Monsters reconstruct Frank as a Frankenstein monster. Morbius "re-composed" Castle, hoping his military experience, tactical mindset and leadership would help the Legion of Monsters overcome a society that has been hunting them down. However, Frank rejected the group upon waking up and left their base. He stayed in the tunnels, unaware the Legion was being slaughtered by the Japanese society. A creature who previously offered Frank food fled to him for help, but died at his doorstep. Frank joins in the fight to protect the innocent 'monstrous' entities being targeted by their enemies.^[11]

"Missing Pieces" (#17–21)

The series was retitled Franken-Castle starting here.

After being revived, Frank must find a way to live with his new limitations and make peace with what he has become. To do this, he hits the streets once again to punish the guilty, and begins to formulate a plan of vengeance against the man who killed him.^[12]

Daken, later seen at a nightclub, is attacked by the now monstrous Punisher, who is seeking revenge. After a brutal fight Daken is defeated but decides to hunt Franken-Castle to continue the fight and retrieve the Bloodstone integrated into Fraken-Castle's new physical form.^[13] After following Franken-Castle's trail, Daken encounters a series of devastating traps before meeting his foe again. After a second brutal hand-to-hand battle, Daken is severely injured and retreats. Franken-Castle finds him and, after damaging Daken even more, is about to throw him into a mass of concrete foundation (presumably to kill him). However, Franken-Castle is stabbed in the chest from behind, by Wolverine, who states he is intervening in his plans to kill his son.^[14]

Franken-Castle knocks Wolverine unconscious; however, Daken manages to slip away. Franken-Castle tries to avoid him, but Daken crashes into the vehicle and moves Franken-Castle's gem into his chest becoming invulnerable and attacks again. Wolverine and Franken-Castle are forced to work together to combat Daken because the effects of the Bloodgem on Daken's healing factor are disastrous. During their battle on the rooftop, Franken-Castle finally takes down the insane Daken. After Daken was defeated, Wolverine removes the gems from his son and gives it to Franken-Castle and the scene ends with Wolverine alone on a rooftop.^[15][16]

After his fight with Daken, Punisher returns to Monster Island and the Bloodstone seems to have returned him to normal but he starts growing insane and the monster within the Bloodgem is starting to take control of him. The Legion of Monsters decide to take him down and retrieve the Bloodstone from him with the help of Elsa Bloodstone. Though Manphibian attempts to talk some sense into the Punisher, Elsa decides to just shoot him and take the stone from him. This angers Punisher and he fights and defeats Elsa in a jungle but before he could finish her off Werewolf by Night intervened and saved Elsa. Then the Living Mummy convinces Frank to give up the gem and walk away.^{[17][18][19][20][21][22][23][24][25][26][27][28][29][30][31]}

Prints

Issues

The first 16 issues were simply titled Punisher.

As of issue 17 the series was officially retitled Franken-Castle.

Annuals

One-shots

Collected editions

Reception

The first 16 issues holds an average rating of 7.8 by 51 professional critics on the