Posted in: Comics, Marvel Comics | Tagged: marvel, punisher

How Marvel Comics Changed The Punisher Today (Spoilers)

In July last year, Bleeding Cool scooped the news that Jason Aaron was to reinvent The Punisher for a new age, adding the headline story "Jesus Saiz and Paul Azaceta Join Jason Aaron on Punisher No More" In recent years there has been increasing criticism of the use of the Punisher skull by police, army, militia, white supremacist groups, QAnon events, and Sean Hannity on Fox News, even Trump Punisher pins have been popular. And then during the January 6th insurrection at the Capitol building in Washington DC, many Punisher skull insignias were seen. This also followed Black Lives Matter protests and a focus on real and fictional police behaviour, including the use of Punisher imagery by the police. Amidst calls for Marvel and Disney to cancel The Punisher as a character, Bleeding Cool observed that this may have happened already and that there had been no published or solicited Punisher comic books since November 2020. There was a collection of Punisher Vs Barracuda – but that series was never completed. It was initially postponed by the pandemic but then abandoned altogether, despite completed issues having been finished. Marvel announced that series for March 2022, no longer called Punisher No More, simply… Punisher. Showing us Frank Castle seemingly working with ninja group The Hand, sporting sais rather than guns as well as a new devil face logo rather than the traditional skull image. And published today.

So how is the change explained in continuity? The Hand was created by Frank Miller for Daredevil as an order of evil mystical ninjas who are heavily involved in organized crime and mercenary activities. The Hand covets power above all other objectives, are primarily based in Japan, but operate internationally. They were founded in the sixteenth century as a secret society of Japanese nationalist samurai but were soon co-opted by the Snakeroot, an ancient ninja clan that serves a primordial demon known only as "The Beast of the Hand". Members of the Hand are practitioners of powerful occult magic and can murder a person and bring that person back to life as a servant of the Hand, but a few are known to have reversed this programming.

The Punisher, Frank Castle, born Francis Castiglione, is a serial killing vigilante created by Gerry Conway, John Romita Sr. and Ross Andru who first appeared in The Amazing Spider-Man in 1974. A Vietnam veteran, he is driven by the deaths of his wife and two children, who were killed by the mob for witnessing a killing in New York City's Central Park, to wage a one-man war on crime using various weapons.

Now he is waging that war on supervillains using superhero and alien technology.

By a group who do bear similarities to the imagery by the militia group Molon Labe that Marvel Comics sued over their use of the Punisher trademarked skull. The skull that Marvel Comics is no longer using. Or at least, not much, anyway.

With The Hand providing Frank Castle with the vengeance he is more used to.

Which smacks of feeding goats to the lion, rather than letting him hunt them. Is this going to backfire? Because what other hold does The Hand have on The Punisher? Well, it all goes back to the nature of the beast. And just what powers they hold.

They brought back his wife. Maria Elizabeth Castle.

Complete with healed bullet wounds. This isn't the first time this has happened, The Punisher #10 written by Rick Remender back in 22009 saw supernatural hoodlum The Hood bring back his family from the dead.

But Frank Castle's reaction was a little less lovey-dovey…

With Frank Castle asked the question straight out by his sidekick Microchip.

What changed this time? Apart from the events of the 6th of January?

PUNISHER #1
MARVEL COMICS
JAN220863
(W) Jason Aaron (A) Paul Azaceta (A/CA) Jesus Saiz
WILL THE PUNISHER'S WAR END? Born of tragedy. Devoted to war. Unstoppable in his rage. As the Punisher, Frank Castle has become the most accomplished killer the world has ever seen. Now it's time for him to face his true destiny. What shocking secret from Frank's past will convince him to take the reins of the Marvel Universe's most notorious clan of assassins? And once Frank becomes the warlord of the deadly ninjas of the Hand, will it also mean an end for the Punisher? Or a whole new bloody beginning? Join the superstar team of writer Jason Aaron and artists Jesus Saiz and Paul Azaceta for an epic exploration of the dark and violent past and inevitable future of one of Marvel's most iconic characters. PARENTAL ADVISORY In Shops: Mar 09, 2022 SRP: $5.99

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