Punisher Annual #1 Review

Don't stare too long at the Tie-Dyed Shirt!!

Welcome to the Punisher Annual #1 Review!

Okay, this issue was not for the faint of heart. This annual spins off from the ongoing Punisher series where the Hood leader resurrects dead villains that had been killed by the Punisher or so these villains were made to believe by The Hood.

That said, these guys have 30 days to kill Frank Castle or it's back to the grave to them a 2nd time.

I never liked stories where a character dies and comes back to life, and it's been done to death. But I guess in order to keep a story going, it can make things interesting I suppose by continually bringing old characters “anew”.

I've been following the regular Punisher by Remender since #1, and I have to say I am impressed, esp. liked the whole deal where Punisher tries to assassinate Norman Osborne and Sentry puts a stop to it, it was amazing how much Frank Castle was taking a beating (beating himself up) when just trying to avoid such a super hero and actually, for a mere mortal, was able to escape Sentry's clutches.

All that nice military training works even against super heros.
Eventually this landed him with the computer geek named Henry that started to help Frank out, which lead them to The Hood's hideout when they started the whole resurrection with the old villains as some kind of long winded method of keeping this story-line drawn out a little while longer.

I was kind of turned off by it. I don't like it when some comic books try to get into magic and crap in a plot. I like more believable plot lines. It's enough we have “Jason Returns” or “Michael Meyers Lives Again” related movies, we just don't need them in the comic books.
Anyhow, in The Punisher Annual #1, they decide to even continue said story in the friggin' annual....I wish they would've left that one alone.

Anyway, these to ladies/harpies Letha and Lascivious find a way to lure Frank Castle out from wherever he is by killing war veterans in a rather gruesome manner that I didn't are to look at, I mean, it's a comic book for cryin' out loud! A beautiful smashing a man's head getting brain matter on her pretty little outfit left a disturbing image for me....what is this Punisher MAX??
Eventually, down the road the Letha, Lascivious and Frank Castle run into Spider man. When Frank tries to kill these to ladies, Spider-Man, being the “just and honorable” super-hero that HE is....tries to stop Frank, considering Frank likes to kill first and ask questions later.

During this tassel, one of the ladies decide to influence Spidey in killing Frank Castle. When him and Spidey go at it, and Frank tries to circumvent Spiderman, and eventually escaping and reacquiring Letha and Lascivious, the latter lady (I still don't' know the difference between the two.

Bear with me, I'm trying to more or less “summarizing” these initial blogs), makes Spiderman “fall in love” with Frank with her own superhuman powers in a more or less, “Pepe Le Pew” kind of way, thus holding them both off until the two ladies make their escape. Frank, over time, has acquired technology used by other Marvel characters to help him in his job(s). In this case, he uses a “Doc Ock Arm” to put Spidey in submission while Frank C. gets a head start and trying to capture (and kill) the ladies who put an end to a Veteran intervention.

The story was “okay” but, I did enjoy the Spiderman and Punisher meet-up. I always enjoy that kind of thing. Especially when their stories rarely cross-over, but then again, cross-overs have always appealed to me.

Now it's back to reading the continuing saga of The Hood situation in the regular issues.
Hope you enjoyed the review, I have to apologize, I more or less rather flew through it because I was anxious at getting it up and at 'em! See you later when I review the next “Invincible Ironman” and the Rick Remender Punisher series!!