<span class="SFPTagline"> From SCIFIPEDIA </span>

The Punisher
Gender	Male
Publisher	Marvel Comics
Origin	Queens, New York
First Appearance	Amazing Spiderman #129 (1974)
Creator(s)	Gerry Conway, John Romita and Ross Andru
Alter ego	Frank Castle (born Castigilione)
Aliases	None
Abilities	Unparalleled skill at combat and strategy.
Affiliations	Marvel Knights

The Punisher is a fictional comic book character with a fanatical hatred for criminals, owned by Marvel Comics. Frank began as a Spider-Man villain, but has sustained a level of popularity over the decades that have made him the subject of several regular on-going series, many limited series, many graphic novels, and two live action movies. He is currently featured in two series. The first is The Punisher, written by Garth Ennis and drawn mostly by Steve Dillon under the “Max Comics” label, which indicates that it contains explicit content recommended for mature audiences. It’s a brutally violent comic book series, featuring Frank as a relentless killer of the criminal element. He also appears in Punisher War Journal, by Matt Fraction and Ariel Olivetti. This series depicts the Punisher character more integrated into the Marvel Universe, interacting with superheroes and murdering super-villains as well as organized crime types.

Undoubtedly inspired by the success of Don Pendleton’s Executioner paperback series, the Punisher is the story of a talented combat soldier who is destroyed by the murder of his family after a random encounter with organized crime. Feeling empty and traumatized, Frank throws his life and his career away on a relentless illegal war on the elements that he blames for his family’s death.

He is a former U.S. Marine Captain with SEAL training as well as Long Range Patrol (LRP) training and Underwater Demolition Team (UDT) training. He is a remarkably talented combat officer with a record of destruction and efficiency during his military service and was much decorated. He is a master at armed and unarmed combat, as well as strategy and tactics. He has single-handedly incapacitated up to a dozen or more well-armed experienced opponents and survived to tell the tale.

Beyond all this, what makes Frank particularly deadly is that he has nothing to lose. He really didn’t expect himself to survive his one-man war as long as he has.

He participated with Captain America’s group during the limited crossover series Civil War and has many run-ins with Daredevil, who particularly dislikes Frank’s brand of vigilante justice.

Character Origin

While on leave, Marine Captain Frank Castle takes his family on a picnic in New York’s Central Park. Entering Sheep’s Meadow, they happen upon the scene of a mob killing. Eliminating witnesses, the mob killers gun down Frank, his wife, and two children. It was then that they make a critical error. They unknowingly leave Frank alive.

When the law is unable to reach the mob boss responsible, a traumatized Frank goes to war with the criminal underworld. Since then, he has used every skill the armed forces and five years of combat in Viet Nam have taught him to kill hundreds of criminals. He shows no sign of tiring or stopping in the near future.

Portrayals

• Dolph Lundgren played Frank Castle in the Punisher(1989), his first (though never released to theatres) live action movie.

• John Beck voiced a softened version of the Punisher character in the Spider-Man animated series in 1994.

• Daran Norris took the voice role (along with several others) in the Spider-Man (2000 video game)
• Thomas Jane portrayed Frank in Punisher (2004) a more successful, but still not well-received, live action Punisher movie.

• Ray Stevenson is said to portray Frank Castle in the next attempt, Punisher 2 (2008).