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Punisher: War Zone
149 Plays3 years ago
The Punisher's had three movies with three different actors, but none have really hit the target. But this week Ashley Stockdale returns to discuss the one that came closest, and that's 2008's Punisher: War Zone. They discuss the elements from the comics that made it into the movie, why the Punisher's such a hard character to adapt, and Ray Stevenson vs Tom Jane.
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Transcript
Introduction and Decline in Book Reading
00:00:00
Speaker
Hey, fellow superhero cenophiles. Did you know that almost 30% of adults say they haven't read a book in the past year? Primary reason why is a lack of time. Well, Audible's here to help with the gift of found time.
Superhero Audiobook Recommendations
00:00:11
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Thanks to Audible, you can listen to audiobooks like Marvel Comics, The Untold Story, or Slugfest inside the epic 50-year battle between Marvel and DC.
00:00:19
Speaker
Read up on the history of superheroes in comics and movies with Grant Morrison's Supergods. You can also check out Vanguard, my original superhero novel series, or try The Vrilagenda or The Adventures of Fortune McCall, both of which were written by our duly departed host emeritus, Derek Ferguson.
Benefits of Audible Membership
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Exploring Punisher's Character and Impact
00:01:31
Speaker
Listen, I just came around to tell you that I'm going out of town for a while. Out of town? I'm sorry. I never thought of the Punisher, you know, taking a long weekend. I'm not planning on coming back. So I take it things didn't go so well at the Donatelli home? Are you aware that Billy Rosati survived?
00:02:05
Speaker
Let the cops take care of him. You and I know they got nothing on him. Their hands are tied. This is where the Punisher comes in. This is why I believe in you, why I've supported you all these years. Do you want me to tell you when something happens to Mrs. Donatelli and her daughter? Because that's what's going to happen. You don't think he's going to go for revenge? It's not a question of if, it's a matter of when.
00:02:35
Speaker
Pull a couple of Berettas. For what? Three, two, one. Rosati's the last one. Then I'm done. From your lips to God's ears. You know where I can find him. I don't have a fix on him.
00:02:56
Speaker
You wiped out all of his associates that are known to me. I saw him with some new guys. Leader was black. Dreadlocks. Did some kind of acrobatic stuff over the roofs. That's McGinty and his urban free-flow gang. He's a mean motherfucker. He's on a constant meth high. Well, come on. You want to find this guy or not?
00:03:26
Speaker
You boys play nice.
Guest Introduction: Ashley Stockdale
00:03:31
Speaker
Welcome to the Superhero Cinephiles podcast. I'm your host, Perry Constantine. And I think we have the shortest turnaround between guests as we have today. Ashley Stockdale is back again. Ashley, how are you doing today? I'm good. How are you? Doing pretty good. So even though it's only been like two or three episodes since you were last on, give people a little bit of a reminder of who you are and how you got interested in superheroes and all that fun stuff.
00:03:55
Speaker
Uh, well, I'm an English teacher in Japan. Uh, I've been here about 20 years. I've been interested in comics since I, well, I mean, as a kid, I was interested in the TV shows and all that, but really got into comics, maybe mid eighties, uh, dropped out again in the nineties when I went to university and, uh, beer was more important than kind of got back into it in the internet age. I think I would say I returned to.
00:04:23
Speaker
comic book reading around the house of M. And then I got back into all the stuff that went the movies and things with the X-Men movies release, basically, was when I got into superhero movies again.
Analysis of 2008 Punisher Warzone
00:04:38
Speaker
Okay, cool. And today we're talking about an interesting little movie because this movie
00:04:48
Speaker
this character has just had such bad luck in movies. And this movie got crucified when it came out. But when I was watching it the other night and preparing for this episode, I was thinking that it's a lot better than I remember. And that's 2008's Punisher Warzone.
00:05:06
Speaker
Yes. Well, see, I might have the opposite response. I mean, there's definitely problems with it, but in terms of the Punisher movies, it's much better than I think it was originally, than I originally thought it was. Yeah, definitely. I would say I remember enjoying it a little more when I watched it the first time than the second watch. Okay. So before we jump into that, what was your, have you had any, what was your familiarity with the Punisher before this movie?
00:05:36
Speaker
Well, of course, from the comics. I mean, I think the first maybe comics I was really aware of with the Punisher was when he I was introduced either in Spider-Man or Daredevil. Spider-Man was his first appearance. There was a time when he went crazy and he was shooting jaywalkers and stuff like that. Yeah, that was in the I think it was in the mid 90s. Early when he had the
00:06:01
Speaker
the white boots on and all that stuff. And then the series I really remember most was the, it was a five issue limited series, I think by Mike Zach. Okay. Maybe around, I'm not sure late eighties. So yeah, that was probably, I think that was probably his first comic book.
00:06:20
Speaker
OK, was that miniseries? Yeah. And that was where I think Jigsaw was even the villain in that, if I remember correctly. Maybe that was the second one, then, because I think it's there. There have been so many different punisher miniseries and titles over the years. They all kind of blur together. But that may have been it may have been a second one, then, because I think the first one was about him hunting down the
00:06:45
Speaker
the gangsters that killed his family, I think. I'm not 100% certain of that. It's been so long since I read those. Yeah, again, I haven't reread them since then. And then, of course, I got into the Punisher Max stuff a lot. I probably read that whole run.
00:07:00
Speaker
uh with Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon was it Steve Dillon did the marble night stuff and then when when Garth Ennis brought it to Max um Dillon wasn't doing the art anymore it was like a few different artists here and there okay um Dillon never came back to no he did actually he did come back um he did come back to Max at the end of it during Jason Aaron's run and when they brought it I think it was um
00:07:26
Speaker
Was it Becky Cloonan was doing a fairly recent run on Punisher a few years back, and he was doing the art on that one again before he died. I think that was like the last thing he did before he died. When did he die? Fairly recently. It was just like a few years ago. Yeah, it was in the last five years anyway, I think. And then, of course, you know, I've had his appearances in all the crossovers and things like that. So 2016, that was when he died. He was only 54. Wow. Yeah.
00:07:55
Speaker
Yeah, he must have had an illness of some kind. Yeah, yeah. For me, like the first time I remember The Punisher was probably the Spider-Man animated series, which was kind of funny because the censors were ridiculous on that.
00:08:13
Speaker
on that show. And like if they had really crazy, the creator, when he'd go to like conventions and stuff, he would read out some of the notes the censors gave him. And one of them, the most memorable one was when Spider-Man lands on a roof, make sure that he does not harm any pigeons.
00:08:35
Speaker
So the publisher had to have orange tips on his guns and stuff. I was like, it was all energy weapons, right? Because that was the thing like the none of the that in the X-Men show to like none of the guns could fire real bullets. They could only fire energy blasts. They could never say they could never say the word kill. They could only destroy and just stuff like that.
00:08:55
Speaker
Yeah, I didn't watch any animation during that whole period, probably the censorship I remember or not really censorship, but the adjustment that they made that really famous one would have been the human torch being taken out of Fantastic Four. And actually, that's actually a myth. That's actually an urban legend. That was really Yeah, that was actually it was actually a rights issue. Okay. Yeah. Oh, the torch was not available for the rights.
00:09:21
Speaker
Yeah, the rights to the human torch were wrapped up with some other project that never happened. But then this urban legend started up that, I think it was Hanna-Barbera did that show, that they couldn't use, they didn't want to use the human torch because they were afraid kids would light themselves on fire. Right, well, I do remember there was an issue of the comics way back where a kid did light himself on fire. I think that was done in response, yeah, I think that was done in response to the urban legend.
00:09:51
Speaker
OK, yeah, it's really hard to tell what comes first now. Yeah, yeah. But but my first experience actually reading the comics with Punisher was probably.
Garth Ennis's Influence on Punisher Comics
00:10:01
Speaker
I read a few stuff here and there, but first time I started reading regularly was was with Ennis and Dylan's run and OK. And that really just was like and I've gone back and I've read some other stuff since then, and it's just like nothing before or after has ever really reached those heights that Ennis achieved, especially on Max.
00:10:21
Speaker
Well, I think he's kind of the Punisher is a tough character and they often try to they try to bring him into the superhero world and it just it doesn't work. There have been so many weird, weird iterations of the Punisher over the years. You know, Franken Punisher or Punisher goes to hell.
00:10:41
Speaker
There was that one time where he teamed up with Dr. Strange and made a magic sniper rifle or something to shoot Mephisto or something like that. The Matthew Rosenberg run of a few years back was pretty good and that was spinning off of the Secret Empire story arc. That one was really good and that's the one that started with him in the war machine armor.
00:11:06
Speaker
Yeah, and right when that went some really interesting places and the the Franken castle stuff it sounds ridiculous, but it was actually pretty good. Yeah, it's just kind of it's hard to what a what I want to say.
00:11:21
Speaker
It's hard to reconcile the character back to like a street level mafia punishing guy after he's been an angel or. Well, I mean, they managed to do it though. I mean, they done it. That's what that's what Dennis did after when he got it. Because that was right after the the and the Heaven's Hitman story arc stuff. Well, yeah, I mean, you just don't really think of it as being continuity, I guess, you know, and it's just a character that's dropped into
00:11:47
Speaker
whatever situation he's needed for. And this actually did, it had a pretty good way. He addressed that in the first issue of his run. Like he, it was like this little voiceover and he said, I've seen heaven before. And he says that, you know, the angels wanted me to be their killer, tried it, didn't like it, told him where to stick it. And then they told me that my punishment was to stay on earth and be away from my family. So that was kind of the very simple way that he got rid of it.
00:12:12
Speaker
Yeah, I think the last thing I read with the Punisher and it was recently like Savage Avengers or whatever. Oh, I read some of those, those are pretty good. Trek to cross the Savage line with Conan the Barbarian. That was interesting. But yeah, but what you're saying is like the Punisher is one of those characters he is hard to get a handle on. And I think one of the reasons is because the Punisher himself is not really much of a character.
00:12:39
Speaker
He's much more of a force of nature. And that's why I think that was the strength of Ennis' max run is that Frank Castle was almost never the central character in those stories. He was always there. He was always involved in the story, but he wasn't the character that the story was really about. It was always about these other characters. Right. Yeah. I was kind of wondering that myself, you know, with the Punisher films or television series or whatever.
00:13:08
Speaker
They always have to introduce some kind of character that he needs to save or somebody he needs to take care of, some kind of downtrodden, marginalized character that he needs to protect in some way.
00:13:24
Speaker
But that's, to me, that's not really the punisher. You know what I mean? Yeah. But I understand that it's not like a series wouldn't really work if he was just murdering gangsters. That's the problem. Yeah, because you have to, he's not at all a sympathetic character. Yeah. I mean, he's, you know, he's a straight up serial killer. So there's, so it's not like Dexter because Dexter has an actual personality that goes along with it. Right. Frank doesn't really have a personality. He's just very,
00:13:54
Speaker
he's very single-minded. And I think that's what the Netflix series realized and which is why they actually gave him even, cause that's why John Bernthal's version of The Punisher is so different as a character from everything you see in the comics because you can't do a story about, you can't do a regular series with that guy as your central character. Nobody's going to be interested in it. Nobody will follow it. Yeah.
00:14:20
Speaker
Yeah, I don't know. I wonder if they would be able to make a movie where he was just kind of a mysterious kind of boogeyman that we never really see, following, I don't know, a cop who's tracking him or that kind of thing.
00:14:35
Speaker
I mean, it'd be, it'd be weird to have a movie like that. Cause everyone knows the Punisher and everyone's expecting him. So I think if you did something like that, well, we'll see because apparently that's what Todd McFarland wants to do with his spawn reboot. So, okay. So we'll see how that works. And I imagine it probably won't work too well. It should mean spawns not going to be the central character. No, he's just, he's, he's going to have very little, it's mostly going to focus on the detectives and it's just going to be a very background, minor character. Huh.
00:15:05
Speaker
That sounds like doing Gotham with no Batman. Exactly. Yeah. Which was successful, you know, for some reason, I don't know, but I know you have feelings about that. I did not. I only watched the first season. So I don't I eventually got all the way through it. But man, it was just it was so bad. Yeah. But anyway, what were your have you seen the other Punisher movies? So there's the one with Lundgren and the one with Tom Jane.
00:15:34
Speaker
I definitely saw the Dolph Lundgren one back when it was released in 1989, was it? I think so, yeah. And then, you know, probably thought it was not very good at that time, went mainly based on the name of the character. And it was one of the first Marvel movies ever, I think. There were other ones before that, but this was probably the first theatrical one, I think.
00:16:02
Speaker
Right. Because everything kind of a cool, edgy character. Yeah. Which they didn't didn't really use at all. As far as I remember, it was basically just let's slap the Punisher name on this straight to DVD kind of movie we made. Basically, yeah. With a giant Dutch guy, giant Dutch kickboxer. Yeah. And he didn't and he couldn't and he didn't have the skull on the on his costume. So just it was just a standard 80s action movie, basically. Right.
00:16:29
Speaker
Well, and then I watched I watched Warzone on Thursday, maybe Wednesday, Wednesday. And then yesterday, I was just before I went to bed, I was like, I'm going to check out Thomas Jane's Punisher again, just because I don't really remember it. So just to kind of compare the two. So I've watched both of the major theatrical releases very recently. What were your thoughts on the the Tom Jane one?
00:16:57
Speaker
Yeah, I don't like the changes they made to his backstory. Like Frank Castle as an FBI agent. I don't know. I think Thomas Jane, I really like Thomas Jane as an actor. I think he's like a very good to watch. I like him in a lot of other things, but I don't really think he makes a particularly good Frank Castle. He's a little too good looking, if that makes sense. And then
00:17:25
Speaker
Yeah, again, they just, it wasn't a really, it was a kind of a paint by numbers kind of. Yeah. It's hard to explain. No, no, you're right. It was, they, they spent way too much time dwelling on the origin and it's like, and just like all that time with his fan, his extended family in Puerto Rico and all that was just. Well, yeah. And I was, I was very surprised to see, I didn't remember that Roy Scheider was his dad. Like, yeah. Yeah. No.
00:17:54
Speaker
That's an iconic film actor right there. He's just, you know, a cameo appearance, essentially. Yeah.
Thomas Jane's Punisher and Other Roles
00:18:01
Speaker
And then Travolta, I didn't, you know, his character didn't really have much going on either. I thought he was okay. If comparing all the villains in these movies and the Punisher movies, I think he was definitely the best one of the bunch.
00:18:14
Speaker
Yeah, I just would expect like with this kind of a movie, probably because I had just come out of war zone, I was expecting Travolta to chew up the scenery a little more. I like that. Everyone was expecting that and dreading that. And so I'm actually glad they did not go that route. Yeah. And the guy who played his who played Quentin in that movie, I can't remember his name right now, but he's Will Patton. Will Patton. He was really good. He's always good. Yeah, I think he did a really good job in that.
00:18:43
Speaker
Have you seen the short film that Thomas Jane made later? I was about to mention that, Dirty Laundry, yes, yeah. Yeah, I just watched that today and that is really good. Yeah, I was actually gonna say like, watch Dirty Laundry. And also, Tom Jane was in this, if you can find it, because it's like really hard, I think it's been out of print for years now. But there's this, there's this indie movie he made, I think it was like in the mid late 90s called Thursday.
00:19:11
Speaker
and it was with him and Aaron Eckhart was also in it. And you watch him in that movie and you can, he's the Punisher basically in that movie. He's Frank Castle. It's- So it was, that's kind of a revenge story? No, no, it's not a revenge story at all. Like he plays this guy who used, it's very similar in story beats to a history of violence where he's this family man who has this criminal background. Right, right.
00:19:40
Speaker
And what happens is Aaron Eckhart's like his old criminal partner. And now he's left the crime business, he's reformed, he's living with, I think it's his wife or fiance or something. And his old buddy comes with him with this,
00:19:58
Speaker
it's like stolen goods or something and asked him to hold on to it for a day and and it's like all these like these three assassins come to his house trying to find trying to look for me it just has to take care take them out and okay he's very very much like like after i saw that movie i'm like oh that guy should play the punisher someday so when he got cast i was really excited so this is even before 2004 this was before 2004 yeah wow
00:20:25
Speaker
I can't even think of the first time I saw Thomas Jane. That was the first thing I saw him in. Well, I mean, there's some other stuff I seen him in before that I found out later that he was in. But this was the first thing I actually knew who he was in. But so yeah, but his I think he was I think he was robbed of a good Punisher movie with that one because there's an extended cut that's much better. And OK, but it still has some it still has some of the same problems with like the family and all that.
00:20:54
Speaker
And it's just basically a straight up revenge movie. But he- You know who was the director of the first, the 2004 Punisher? Jonathan Hensley. Okay, has he done anything else? I think he did the third Terminator movie as well. Okay. Is that a good Terminator movie? I don't remember. It was Terminator 3, Rise of the Machines. That was the one with- The female Terminator?
00:21:21
Speaker
Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. So yeah, that was red leather one. It was, it was all right. It wasn't anything special. Right. But that's pretty much been my feeling of pretty much all the Terminator movies, except for salvation, which I fell asleep every time I tried to watch. I don't think I've seen the last probably three that they've made. Are there six now? I think there's, I think so. Yeah. Because it was,
00:21:49
Speaker
Yeah, because salvation was the fourth one. And then they did Genesis, which undid salvation and Terminator 3. No, they kind of undid all of them. Christian Bale was in the fourth one? Was that right? Yeah, that was salvation. And then Genesis was when Arnold came back, and then Mark Fate was the one where Linda Hamilton came back.
00:22:15
Speaker
Now is dark fate supposed to be not too bad actually? I mean, I Genesis and dark fate, I thought they both had, they both had their moments in it. Like neither, neither of them was really necessarily good, but not necessarily bad either. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know. I think it was pretty hard to follow Terminator two really. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, the first Terminator was such a great movie for what it was at the time. Like.
00:22:41
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. And anyway, and also the Sarah Connor Chronicles was really good too. The TV show. Yeah. I watched the first season of that and then somehow fell off probably had kids or something. And then couldn't watch serious TV anymore. Just too many episodes.
00:22:58
Speaker
Yeah, it was three seasons, I think, in total. But anyway, back to this movie, this was, so I was biased against this movie when it came out because I really wanted to see Tom Jane come back and when they said they were replacing him, I was really, that really kind of,
00:23:14
Speaker
gave me a negative impression of this movie going into it. So I had that from the start, but rewatching it the other night, I was realizing this is actually probably the closest we've gotten to the comic books for The Punisher. I would say so too, yes. So anyway, where should we start with this? What are some things that stood out to you?
00:23:37
Speaker
I don't know, characters, I guess. Well, let's start with Stevenson then. He's now the third guy to play the Punisher. And like I said, I think he's the closest to the Punisher we get in the comics. Well, I think so. He's got the size. He's got the age that we need. I think he's not as pretty, like I said, as Thomas Jane. Right. I think John Bernthal is a little small for the character.
00:24:05
Speaker
So I kind of when I picture the Punisher, I picture a very kind of tanky, you know, Bruce Wayne sized guy. Right. Like someone like chisel out of stone type of thing. Sure. Sure. Yeah. Yeah. Like the covers of all those max issues and stuff. Right. Right. Yeah.
00:24:20
Speaker
And then prior to this, I don't know where, cause I think I knew who he was when he was introduced, but I don't know where I knew him from. Cause I looked at his IMDB and I didn't really recognize any previous roles. I think the biggest thing he had done at this time was Rome. Yeah. That's what I read. I never watched any of that. So I, so I hadn't, so this was the first thing I had seen him in. Yeah.
00:24:45
Speaker
Yeah. So he's got, he had the look and he had the, he did obviously did the work to try to get into punisher type shape. And he was stoic and dower enough for most of it. The tone kind of changes halfway through, I think.
00:25:04
Speaker
I thought he stayed pretty consistent though. His performance stayed pretty consistent all the way through. He had a little like zingers here and there, which I was fine with because I'm rereading the Marvel night stuff now. And Ennis had Punisher do that in his run. So that seemed, that was actually, Stevenson got that idea after reading the Ennis run. Right. Yeah. And then he's now one of the,
00:25:30
Speaker
the elite company who's been two Marvel heroes or Marvel characters. Yeah, yeah, he was, cause he was this and then, and then he was bullstag in the Thor movies. Yeah. And then I, one thing I kind of found, I didn't really like about the, the, the costuming and stuff was his bulletproof kind of vest thing that was really, really high. Yeah. Yeah. I felt the same thing.
00:25:57
Speaker
The only thing I could think about every time I see it is unhelmeted Darth Vader from Return of the Jedi. I kept thinking it looked like he had a neck brace on. OK, yeah, that too. So I don't know if that's like it must be a legit tactical vest or something, but it is because the director, which is also I want to mention the director, Lexi Alexander, who
00:26:19
Speaker
you know, female director tackling this, which you don't see very many female directors tackling action movies. So, and I thought like, as far as the direction goes in all these movies, it's definitely the best one of them. And she's a former stunt woman too, and like a martial artist, so she knows what she's doing.
00:26:36
Speaker
Yeah, I read that she did all the training with Stevenson together when they were preparing. Yeah. But I agree with you on the costume. I think the costume is definitely the weakest point. In fact, Alexander did not want the skull symbol on at all. And there was backlash.
00:26:52
Speaker
Yeah, if you think about it, if you take a look at it again, the only time I noticed the skull was in the very first scene where he attacks the mafia party. Yeah, the compromise she made with the producers was that she'd had the skull, but it would be like faded. Right. So that was the compromise she made.
00:27:13
Speaker
not sure why they're so afraid of the skull. I don't know. It's, yeah, it's so iconic. And especially in this movie, when you've got so much other bizarre stuff going on, the skull seems like the weirdest thing to kind of dig your heels in. Yeah, I can understand, you know, don't put white belts and the white boots on them, like in the 70s. Right, right. Yeah.
00:27:35
Speaker
But the you know kind of T shirt with the skull imprint logo just under a trench coat or whatever that's cool. Well, that's what I think you know Tom Jane looked great in that in that costume in the in the 2004 version.
00:27:48
Speaker
even though he was they were seemed to be like, yeah, let's not have it for too long. Because he kept taking it off. Yeah, but they they kept it on for most of the time. And one of the problems actually when they first showed it in like promo pictures, it was just pure white. And people had complained that it looked ridiculous. So then they decided to kind of grunge it up a little bit after that.
00:28:12
Speaker
Um, but I think the Netflix series actually had the best depiction of translation of the punisher's outfit because it was like this bulletproof vest, but it still had the skull snake symbol on it. So I thought they did a really good job of it. Yeah. Well, I think the, that skull symbol has its own, uh, baggage with it now too. Cause there is the, uh, I've understand that it was kind of spray painted all over Iraq and stuff like that. Yeah.
00:28:38
Speaker
Just before filming this movie, there was the Virginia Tech massacre. That's right. And apparently the shooter there had a Punisher poster in his room. Yeah, something I read. And yeah, in fact, because of that.
00:28:52
Speaker
because she had seen that footage of his room with the Punisher poster right before she went to meet with the producers. And so then she had decided at that moment that we're going to make the violence like as over the top as possible so that it looks more cartoony and people don't think it's like, people don't try to mimic what happens in the movie. Yeah. And it was cartoony, but I also found it a little inconsistent, the violence.
00:29:18
Speaker
Cause there was a, you know, there's the chair going through the guy's eyeball. Yeah. That was fine. I mean, it's semi-realistic, but then like the parkour guy. Well, the parkour guy, she was actually, she did that as a, as a nod to a fellow stuntman because he had complained about parkour being overused in movies at that time. So she had this parkour guy get blown up because of that. Yeah. But he like, there's not even any meat left. It's just missed.
00:29:47
Speaker
And then, of course, punching his fist right through this cocaine guy's head. Yeah. Yeah. They definitely go. I think that's that is in line with the the end of stuff, though. So I think that worked pretty well, especially the Marlin stuff. But. Yeah, I think the overall, he was he was good in the role. The costume was really the biggest sticking point I had.
00:30:14
Speaker
I thought Wayne Knight as Microchip was brilliant casting. Like I thought he was exactly what I expected that character to be. Yeah, I think they could have given him a little bit more to do, but yeah, I agree. And it's, I think unfortunate that they, I mean, obviously they're not continuing with that, but they didn't need to kill him, I didn't think. Yeah. No, no, I was kind of disappointed that he died as well. Cause he was a really good addition to the cast and cause actually,
00:30:44
Speaker
They thought about using him in the 2004 one. But- That's what I heard. The director hated the character or something. Right. So then he, so he got him written out of the script. And it was interesting what they did with him in the Netflix series too. Well, that's another thing too about the punisher is having to kind of always update things. Yeah. So yeah, I don't really know like what in the NS stuff in the max run, was he still a Vietnam vet?
00:31:14
Speaker
Yeah. In fact, he had aged in real time in the, he was like in his sixties. Yeah. He was like in his, yeah. He was like in his sixties when he went during the time of that. Cause yeah, that gets tougher and tougher with trying to update that stuff because they've really kind of fixed a castle's backstory as being a, you know, a returning soldier. Yeah. So it gets harder and harder to keep the same idea. I mean, obviously like the Vietnam vet has that kind of, uh,
00:31:44
Speaker
the PTSD kind of Rambo situation going on. That's a well-established trope. Whereas these more recent wars, I don't think they really have the same kind of the jungle warfare kind of idea. I know they've adapted it and made it Afghanistan and things like that before in Iraq.
00:32:02
Speaker
I think it gets harder and harder as we move into the future. I think it actually works pretty well with Afghanistan because they had a lot of the same kind of insurgent tactics going on that the Viet Cong use. So I think with Afghanistan now, it works really well. Yeah. And I think that was, and that's what they did in the Netflix show. They had, I think it was an Afghan veteran. And in the 2004 version, they had mentioned it very briefly, but he had been a veteran of Desert Storm, I think.
00:32:32
Speaker
Oh, okay. Yeah. And then in this movie, they just said he was a special forces trainer. I think he was a special forces instructor. And I think, but he, when they showed him in uniform, right? He was wearing like the Marine uniform. So I think that kind of, that left the door open to him having served because he mentioned that they mentioned he had only been active for like six years. Right.
00:32:53
Speaker
Yeah, I do remember there were there've been a few miniseries where they go back to like his wartime career or whatever. Yeah, the Punisher's wartime career, just a six or eight issues or whatever. And I always enjoy those. Yeah, there was a born was probably the most memorable one. Right. And was that Vietnam? Yeah, that was Vietnam, because that was the max one. So that stayed that stayed in the same continuity as Max. But they also
00:33:18
Speaker
they kind of gave themselves a loophole with the angel thing because they forced him to stay on earth. So that is kind of loophole they left. Although now they have, Mark Way did a comic book recently, can't remember the name of it, but it had set up this kind of like fictional war that can move with the rest of the Marvel universe. So now there's like this fictional war that always exists in the backstory of the Marvel universe that can move along the timescale. That's interesting.
00:33:47
Speaker
Yeah, so that was where Frank Castle was involved in that. Nick Fury was involved with that. Reed Richards and Ben Grimm, all of them. Professor X and Juggernaut, because they were originally in Korea. OK, right. And Logan, of course. Well, and Logan doesn't matter, because, you know, age is all right. True. He can fight in the civil war if he wants. Yeah.
00:34:12
Speaker
But I think my biggest problem with this movie is Dominic West and Doug Hutchinson as the villains.
Villain Portrayal in Warzone: Over-the-Top?
00:34:21
Speaker
I get that the over the top thing is something that Ennis does a lot, but I don't know if it was these actors or the writing or what, but they just felt completely ridiculous, not a place in this movie. Well, that's what I mean about the tone.
00:34:36
Speaker
Yeah, the first kind of 30, 40 minutes or whatever is like kind of a straight, dark, gritty. And then it becomes like, you know, a mid 90s Batman movie. Yeah. Yeah. And then, I mean, I didn't think they were. They got to choose one or the other, I think, because I think that Dominic West's performance was not not too bad, but it was very, very cartoonish and over the top.
00:35:04
Speaker
and it doesn't really fit the tone of the Punisher, the Ray Stevenson's character. Like they kind of, it's a very big clash. Yeah. Yeah. I felt he was way over the top, both him and especially once he was, Dominic West, I think was okay up until Doug Hutchinson comes in. Well, that's when like it really amped up. That's what I mean about the tone changing halfway through is like suddenly it became this,
00:35:33
Speaker
the crazy brother combo and the scene where, you know, Looney Bin Jim is jumping around the hotel lobby, smashing all the mirrors and, you know, they're just laughing with each other. And, you know, it was, yeah, it went way, way over the top. Yeah. It kind of felt like they thought they were in a parody of a Punisher movie and nobody told them that they weren't. Well, speaking of parody, like, I mean, all of the, uh, the accents,
00:36:02
Speaker
of the actors were just like so, so, so stereotypical. Yeah. You know, that whole scene where they meet the, uh, right in the beginning where, you know, Billy the beaut who later becomes Jigsaw goes to talk to the boss or whatever. And then, you know, the boss is like,
00:36:22
Speaker
doing that very stereotypical Italian, I punch at your face. And then, you know, even Carlos had a very stereotypical, you know, Latino accent. Yeah. Julie Benz was in and out of her Italian Bronx accent.
00:36:45
Speaker
So very inconsistent with all of that, so. I didn't notice them as much. I definitely noticed the mob guys. Like Julie Benz, I didn't pick up as much on as the mob guys though. Well, she didn't have much to do, so I didn't blame you. I thought, and you know, this is kind of, and I thought, especially when you look at West and Hutchinson, you compare him to like Dash Mayak, who played Soap, because he's, Soap is,
00:37:15
Speaker
such a total buffoon in the comics. Is he? It's just ridiculously over the top buffoonery. Okay. And they tone it down a lot. Like he's still kind of like, you know, he's still kind of off his game a little bit. He's, you know, kind of, you know, this kind of like, aw shucks guys, but okay.
00:37:33
Speaker
But he seems realistic. I can't remember him from the comics. Is he young in the comics? He was in the Marvel Knight stuff. He was part of the Punisher task force and just like had the worst luck. And doesn't know how to use his gun and stuff too? Yeah, he was just like completely inept.
00:37:54
Speaker
Yeah, because I thought he was quite cartoonish in this as well. That's what I'm saying. Compared to the comic books, I definitely thought he was much more realistic. He was like a realistic version take on that character, especially because he's working with Castle, that you kind of get the sense that he's acting buffoonish
Comic Influences on Punisher Warzone
00:38:14
Speaker
as well. I think that was still a good part of it.
00:38:17
Speaker
Yeah, well, see that was I found that kind of storyline confusing a bit as well, like with his whole because when he's first introduced, he says he's going to take down the Punisher. And then it seems like his partner believes that that's honest because his partner punches himself in the face to help the
00:38:34
Speaker
Punisher escape. And then the task force, he seems to be like the joke of the office and they're sending him down to the basement like Mulder on the X-Files style. Yeah. Well, that was the thing in the comic books too, because the whole, the crime boss that he was going after in the Marvel night series, the cops were in her pocket. And like the mayor and the commissioner told the,
00:39:03
Speaker
the police captain that you have to have a Punisher task force, you have to bring in the Punisher. And these other cops are just like one of his lieutenants was like, nobody's going to want to go after the Punisher. Everyone in the department loves him. They think he makes our job easier. And he says, well, we have to do something to at least put up appearances. And they said, oh, well, let's give it to soap them. OK.
00:39:23
Speaker
And so that was kind of- How is that? That seems a bit more than they do in the comics though, no? No, that's exactly what they did in the comics. Oh, did they really? Yeah. Every cop was basically on board with what the Punisher was doing? Pretty much, yeah. At least in the Ennis stuff, yeah. Okay. Yeah, I got to go back and reread some of that stuff. Because it seemed like that was the, you know, the one cliche that wasn't in that whole thing was the way that the cops are kind of against Castle.
00:39:52
Speaker
Yeah, yeah. And that was in, and eventually, he was against the Punisher in the comics for pretty much the entire run of Ennis' first run, which is the 12-issue series. And then when Ennis did the ongoing, Soap had become Castle's informant, basically.
00:40:11
Speaker
Okay. So they they had mirrored that pretty close. In fact, I was surprised how much stuff from the comics made the jump into this movie, like a lot of characters, pretty much every single character in this was a character in Ennis's run. The only exception was Angela. Okay. But like, Budiansky, Colin Salmon's character, he had a he had a part in, in one of the Punisher Max arcs. Okay.
00:40:35
Speaker
Ink and Pitsy, Jigsaw's henchmen, they were in the comics as well. Even McGinty, the Irish guy. Yeah, yeah. Oh, I remember that part. And he was. Christu and his father, they were also in the comics. They were in the slavers arc, which was the best one of that one. Okay. Looney Bean Jim was a creation for the movie, though, wasn't he? I believe so. Yeah, he was created for the movie. Uh-huh. What do you think of Colin Salmon's part in this?
00:41:06
Speaker
Yeah. I mean, he was a bit of like a cliche at first. And I, again, like he's the guy who is very, very familiar to me, but I do not know where I've seen him before. He's been in a ton of stuff. Yeah. Well, I know I checked his IMDB and he's 200 credits deep, I think. He was in the Pierce Brosnan movies. He was in those. He was part of MI6. Okay.
00:41:31
Speaker
He was the black guy who was like M's bodyguard in those movies. In fact, when Brosnan was taken off bond, he had actually said that they should get Colin Salmon to replace him as the first black James Bond. He was also in Layer Cake, I think. And he was also in the first season of Arrow. He played Oliver's stepfather.
00:41:57
Speaker
Ah, right. Okay. I did watch that season. And then he was on Krypton too, wasn't he? Um, I'm not sure. I never saw Krypton. Oh, I think he might, he might've even been General Zod. Oh, okay. I saw the IMDB, right? Anyway, he's apparently a very highly respected British actor. Yes. Yeah. He's, he's been in a lot of stuff. Basically the whole cast was British, except for Doc Hutchinson. Yeah, pretty much.
00:42:23
Speaker
The main guys, anyway. I guess not. Oh, Wayne Knight, too, I guess, too. Yeah. And then Dash Myhawk is American, I guess. What does he do these days? Have you seen him around? I'm not sure. I know he's got such a unique name, so I know I've seen him in other stuff. Yeah, I just I remember him appearing on like Felicity way back when. And he was also famous as Alanis Morissette's boyfriend. Oh, OK. He's apparently on Ray Donovan, the TV show. OK.
00:42:53
Speaker
That's another show that I hear is very good, but I do not have time to get into. Yeah, I haven't seen it, but I have heard it's really good. He was on Gotham too, apparently. He was a flash in a few episodes. Oh, really? Yeah. One of the detectives? Yeah, yeah. Yeah, that makes sense. And then Julie Bend, like,
00:43:19
Speaker
I mean, she was okay. It was interesting to see her in this because- Yeah, she was okay, but again, she doesn't really have anything to do. Right. It was interesting to see her in this because this was before like Dexter where she had probably is now most people probably remember her from Dexter, but for me, it was always Buffy and Angels that I remembered her from. Okay. Yeah, I remembered her from that and also from Roswell. Oh yeah, yeah. She was like, was she an FBI agent? I can't remember. Something like, it's been so long since I've seen that show.
00:43:49
Speaker
But yeah, I mean, just the, you know, she didn't really have a lot to do. She was just the grieving widow that kind of quickly forgave the man who killed her husband. Yeah, I mean, that's kind of the way it works with this kind of story. Yes. I think that's one of the problems they were trying to do too much in this movie. Like they're trying to have this whole him, you know, questioning his existence as the punisher, him.
00:44:15
Speaker
and the grieving widow thing, as well as this whole stuff with jigsaw's origin and bringing in the nuclear bombs and all that. I think it was just- They never explained what that was, did they? Not in any sort of really satisfactory way. Some biological weapon that the Russians were selling? Yeah, the Russians were selling to Islamic terrorists. Oh, right. There we go. Okay, of course.
00:44:45
Speaker
But I think that's the biggest weakness with this movie is that it feels like it's two movies. Like you've got the more serious one with Ray Stevenson and Colin Salmon and all those characters. And then you've got the more outlandish stuff with Dominic West and Doug Hutchinson trying to sell a biological weapon.
00:45:06
Speaker
between the bizarre recruitment ad type stuff thing. Yeah, well, that was very weird at the end. It just made, it was just, and especially cause he's, and it's funny you mentioned that it feels like a 90s Batman movie because at the end, you know, Dominic West basically becomes a 90s Batman villain, right? He's like cartoonist, he's over the top. He's even got a special outfit and everything. Right. Well, I mean, he really looks like kind of animated Too Faced in a way. Yeah, yeah.
00:45:36
Speaker
so yeah that whole stuff was yeah it got a bit nuts for sure yeah that's what i mean i think i wonder because there are three uh screenwriters credited i'm wondering if like each person wrote different parts that actually did happen um kurt sudder was actually the original writer the guy from sons of anarchy and
00:45:59
Speaker
Then the other writers who came in, they brought a close, more in tune with the comics and Sutter was so annoyed by that that he had his name taken off the script. Right. So yeah, I wonder if he just put together the basic structure or. I think, I think that's what happened. And then, but yeah, it's, I think one of the problems is just the timing of this movie because like you said, the whole Virginia Tech thing. Yeah. And, and
00:46:28
Speaker
Yeah, this movie, but I think that timing was really bad for it. Also, I think just at the time, this kind of movie was not something that people wanted, right? It's not something that people were willing to sit through. Whereas now, I think, after Deadpool, and I think if this movie had come out now, it would be a lot more well-received. Yeah, well, I wonder about the timing for sure. And also, did this come out before or after Iron Man or The Dark Knight?
00:46:58
Speaker
I believe it came out after. Okay. So which also worked against it because those were much more grounded serious things. Yeah. Yeah. That's what I mean. This was like, it was somewhat grounded, but then like the action sequences were not at all. And you know, the over the top characterization of the villains was out of place. Yeah. It's just, it's a movie that doesn't really know if it wants to be, you know,
00:47:27
Speaker
full-on comic book style or if it wants to be more serious and it has this weird middle ground between the two. Yeah and I mean I know the comic books have been kind of over the top, there have been over the top characters but I don't really feel when I read the comics that it's jarring in that way somehow and I don't know if that's just because it's the print medium
00:47:51
Speaker
It might be because I mean, they had, when they brought the Russian back in the Marvel Knights, he had grown breasts and he was like hard cyborg. So they went pretty over the top in that. Right. Yeah. But when he went to, when he went to Max, then he got very grounded. Right. Yeah. That's what I mean. Like the Max series is not even like
00:48:15
Speaker
connected in any way to the Marvel universe, is it? No, no, they had completely separated it out. And so it was just, there were no superheroes, although Nick Fury and S.H.I.E.L.D existed, but in a much more like Cold War spy agency fashion. Right. And they did bring in King Pain, Bullseye, and Electra at the end, but they were still very grounded versions of those characters. Yeah. Yeah, well, it'll be interesting to see what happens going forward, I guess, with the character.
00:48:45
Speaker
Yeah, well, there are rumors that they're bringing back some of the Netflix stars. So like, Charlie Cox, Vincent D'Onofrio, John Bernthal, Kristen Ritter. There's rumors that they're bringing them back and they're going to have them in new series.
00:49:06
Speaker
Yeah, I wonder, I'd be interested to see it. But also, there's just so much stuff. Yeah, yeah. But we'll see how true those rumors are too, because, you know, a lot of these sites just make their money off of people posting up nonsense. Yeah, it was exactly. It's all just clickbait. Yeah, yeah.
00:49:27
Speaker
I keep seeing all these headlines on the internet of, the actor who replaced Iron Man, blah, blah, blah. And I'm like, oh, it's the voice actor from what if? You know, so. It's like they have the, they go out of their way to make it sound as ridiculous as possible so that people get outraged and click it in anger, in anger basically. Sure. Anger clicks and it clicks a good click. Yeah.
Origin Story Approach: 2004 vs Warzone
00:49:52
Speaker
One of the things I think this movie also did really well though is it didn't dwell on the origin. And I think that was probably the biggest flaw of the 2004 one was just that all that time spent on the origin story. And it's just unnecessary, especially with the character like the Punisher. You don't need that long to tell his origin story. Right. Yeah. Well, I think in 2004, it's a good 40 minutes or something, isn't it? Yeah. Yeah. It's ridiculous. I mean, I guess they felt like if
00:50:21
Speaker
And it sounds like studio executive thinking, right? Like, well, you know, they killed his daughter and his wife and his kids, doesn't he have other family? I think then that's probably the thinking they had. And so they're like, well, let's have a family union where he kills everybody then. I don't know, maybe they did that so we would feel more sympathy for him because we actually see his kids getting murdered. I guess, but it just felt,
00:50:51
Speaker
By the end of it, I was just like, you know, so burned out in that story. It's like, I don't even give a shit anymore. Wasn't it part, if I remember correctly, it's been years since I read it, but in the Max series, wasn't there a particular arc where they kind of showed that Frank actually didn't really care much about his family? There was, yeah, that was a, it was a running thing throughout it. And that, this idea that when he had come back from Vietnam,
00:51:17
Speaker
Right. He had he had missed the war so much that he was, you know, becoming kind of a neglectful husband. And he was actually very distant from his kids and right. And he was getting ready to leave his wife, actually. OK, right. That was in that was in Jason Aaron's run, if I'm correct. Right. Jason Aaron took over that book, too. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Because I think I mean, that's an interesting would be an interesting take as well, I think, if they just went very, very dark.
00:51:46
Speaker
with the Punisher and said, like, actually, he didn't really care about his family. It was just an excuse. I don't think that would work, though. Like, no, that's the problem. I mean, it is one of the biggest problems with the Punisher is he's such an unsympathetic character. And if you take that away from from the in the movies, like you're taking away the one thing that people have to sympathize with him about. Right.
00:52:09
Speaker
So I don't think that would, I mean, you can do that, you can get away with that in a mature reader's comic book, but I don't think you can get away with that in a movie or a TV show. Yeah, I guess it's just because it's a totally, it's a different medium. Yeah, yeah. They've just got a short time to tell it or whatever, and it's not spread out over years and years. Yeah, and when you're doing it in the comic book, like I said, especially in the Max comic, you know, most of those stories Frank wasn't the main character.
00:52:36
Speaker
Right. I mean, he was just very much almost like a supporting character. He's more like a he's more like a force of nature than anything else, actually. Yeah. Yeah, he's just a like a boogeyman type character. Yeah, yeah. Like those are some of the in the.
00:52:53
Speaker
you know, in that first, and it's his first arc, it's like, it's all about microchip and, and the other CIA operatives. And then and like the slavers arc, it's all about the the social worker and the two cops who get involved. It's very little is about Frank, other than just like being used as a weapon, essentially. Right.
00:53:13
Speaker
Yeah, I'm going to have to go back and read some of that stuff. I remember liking the Barracuda character. Barracuda, yeah. Yeah, I just reread the Mac stuff. And now I'm in the process of rereading the Marvel Knight stuff. OK. So all of this is pretty impressive. Barracuda was like a Michael Clark Duncan looking guy? Yeah, yeah. Very much so. Yeah. Giant, giant black man. Yeah, yeah. OK.
00:53:41
Speaker
Anything else you want to mention about this movie? Uh, no, I mean, I, I had to laugh. Like, like I said, with some of the, uh, the violence, like the over the top stuff, especially like in the first opening sequence where he comes into the party. And the first thing he thinks is I'm going to hang from the chandelier. So dumb. Yeah. That kind of took me out of it. When I was rewatching this, would that chandelier hold 250 pounds? I doubt it. You know,
00:54:10
Speaker
Also, how do you aim when you're spinning around? It looks cool, but you know. One of my favorite parts though was when they're in the house and Budyanski is like, well, I got to call this in and get him arrested. And then Frank just picks up the shotgun and shoots the guy right in the face. Right. As he's holding a little girl, right? A little girl who like for no apparent reason thinks he's her new dad.
00:54:40
Speaker
Yeah, that's another thing that got really weird. It's just like this, I get why they did that, right? They wanted to show, that was their way of showing that at one point he had been a good father. I guess. I think that's what they're trying to do is they're trying to make that emotional connection between the audience and the character by showing that, you know, well, look, someone thinks he's a good guy, someone, and I think that's also the same thing with like Micro's mom.
00:55:10
Speaker
Right. Because, you know, he asked, you know, how she doing and all that. Right. Yeah. Well, that kind of, that was what I noted as well was the, uh, the kind of the brutality of some of that. Like I didn't think it was necessary for us to see micro's mother's head exploded in front of the cooking show. Like that was gratuitous. And I think also the ax murder of Carlos was really necessary. So there were a little too much.
00:55:40
Speaker
I was also wondering like after Frank did that whole massacre at the house or whatever, and then he's just walking down the streets of New York in his tactical gear into the subway. Yeah. I mean, that's the other thing that I couldn't understand about like going with that outfit. It's he stands out, at least in the comics or in the 2004 one, right? He's got the trench coat over it so he can close up the coat. But you're walking around with a full tactical gear with a skull on the front. It's kind of hard to miss. There's got to be cameras in the subway, no?
00:56:10
Speaker
Yeah, and then there was that silly moment where Jigsaw looks out the window of his room and sees this tourism ad in a Jigsaw thing and gets inspired to have his name. Yeah, I mean just about everything with Jigsaw I thought was kind of ridiculous in this movie. I was interested to note the little cameo from
00:56:33
Speaker
The guy who was the doctor, the plastic surgeon, he's the, uh, pilot from the expanse. I don't know if you watched that show. I saw the first season like forever ago. Yeah. He's a, uh, Canadian actor and I just get surprised to see him there, but he's, uh, been me too recently. So he's persona non grata and not going to be in season six of the expanse. Okay.
00:56:56
Speaker
Yes. Now the violence actually, I didn't mind the violence at all, but I'm much more partial to like over the top stuff like that. So I thought the violence is actually really well done in this for me. Okay.
00:57:10
Speaker
Then, uh, yeah, I think the, I mean, the ending fight was, was kind of, uh, interesting in the building, you know, that kind of thing with, uh, very reminiscent of like the raid or dread that I was. Yeah, I was thinking, and I did definitely get raid flashbacks when I was watching that March. Now it was dread after this. Oh yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Cause I think, I mean, dread is an example of a movie where it's just in a fixed location and it's just.
00:57:39
Speaker
like endless, endless violence and battling. Yeah, Dred came out in 2012. I think the Punisher could work in that kind of a circumstance. Probably. I don't know if he needs to be a sympathetic character because we don't know anything about Dred in that movie. We do have the psychic though. She kind of takes a lot of the character development in that movie. Right. I think he obviously couldn't do it now because it would just be stealing that story. Yeah. Well, I mean, Dred basically stole the raid, so. Right.
00:58:09
Speaker
Yeah, well, it's easy to steal from foreign countries, isn't it? Yeah. There are a few good lines. I had to laugh when Budiansky came into the police station and called them all Krispy Kreme motherfuckers. That made me laugh. I thought that was the only time I thought he got
00:58:29
Speaker
That was the only time I thought his acting was kind of bad. He felt like he was forcing it in that scene for me. I mean, it was a funny line, don't get me wrong, but. Yeah, there were a lot of forced things. I think that the scene with Frank in the church with the priest seemed like just added in for no real good reason at all. I think that was done as also to the nod to the comic books, because in the comics, before he joined the military, Frank was in the seminary. He was trained to be a priest.
00:58:59
Speaker
Right. Well, that's what I mean. That's what you're saying. I guess is they're just like, Oh, this scene is cool. This scene is cool. This scene is cool. Let's just stuff them all in. Yeah. Yeah. You know, give no backstory. And then right at the very end, I thought was quite tasteless. The final line of the film, which is, Oh God, now I've got brain splattered all over me. I thought that was great. It's just so like,
00:59:26
Speaker
just such a throw away. Well, I think that's, I think that's what's great. Cause that's, that's a total Ennis thing. Like I could definitely picture Ennis putting that one in one of his books. Right. And I guess it's also cause soap was such a goof. Like, yeah. Yeah. So I thought that stuff was very much in line with like Ennis, just like very much like the boys type stuff or a preacher. And I, I, I wish the movie was actually more of that. Okay.
00:59:52
Speaker
I think if they were going to go over the top at which they went over the top in that kind of way, as opposed to going over the top with Dominic West and Doug Hutchinson doing their weird brother routine. Right. So would you say like the Ennis stuff is more like that? And what about the Jason Aaron stuff? No, if it's Punisher Mac stuff, it's much more grounded. But if you go back to his and when Ennis was doing it with Marvel Knights, it's very much in the tone of this movie.
01:00:16
Speaker
So Marvel Nights was just before they started doing Max. Yeah. Yeah. OK. He did Marvel Nights. Tracy, the it was it started with a 12 issue Maxi series. OK. And then. I'm checking to see about the Marvel Night stuff, because that went on for a good while.
01:00:43
Speaker
Did the Marvel night stuff involve other people too? Like that kind of thing? Yeah, that was said in the Marvel universe. So that had, it had like... Blade? Not Blade, no. But Spider-Man was in a few times, Daredevil, Wolverine, The Hulk, all them, they appeared. All of them made appearances. I'm just doing it. I think, I'm not sure if Nick Fury appeared in that. Okay. Check it in here.
01:01:15
Speaker
Yeah, I guess I mostly read the Mac stuff. Probably just, yeah. I think this is it. Yeah, so it looks like the Marvel Knight stuff went on for about 37 issues, it says here, on Comixology. OK. Right. And then they just keep rebooting all these series now so we don't have really long runs anymore.
01:01:44
Speaker
No, like that seems what they're doing. Now I think eventually they're just going to get rid of the individual numbering altogether and just go for more. Throw that legacy number on the bottom corner or somewhere, top corner. They even stopped doing that. I think they'll just, yeah, yeah. They stopped doing that a while back. I think they'll just probably just move on to like digital offerings or trades or just have like, you know, story arc type things. So like, you know,
01:02:08
Speaker
the Punisher, you know, subtitle or whatever. Right. Which is probably a better way to do it anyway. It's less confusing, I think. Sure. All right. Yeah, I'll be glad. I'd be like to see some of the characters from the television series come back, certainly. I think that, you know, that John Bernthal is good and I'd like to see him do a little bit more with it. And the kingpin, of course, is fantastic. Yeah. Yeah. It'll be interesting to see what happens with that. I mean, I'm not going to hold my breath until I see an official Marvel press release, though.
01:02:38
Speaker
Right. Yeah, I think it's hard to put them all in, you know, they're just, how are you going to have Norse gods together with, yeah, like street level gun toters doesn't really work. I don't think you'd have them in the movies. I think you'd probably do like something on Hulu. Right. Makes no sense. Okay. All right. Ashley, anything else you wanted to mention about, about war zone?
01:03:01
Speaker
Uh, no, not a lot, I guess. I think, I mean, like I say, I think, like you said, this is probably the best film rendition of the character. I think Ray Stevenson does a good job, but tonally, it's all over the place. Yeah.
Ray Stevenson's Comic-Accurate Punisher
01:03:16
Speaker
Yeah. I mean, I wish they would have stuck more with, uh, more consistently with the, the Ennis stuff. Um, and I would have liked,
01:03:24
Speaker
In fact, I think if you had had like John Travolta playing this in this movie instead, I think it would have been much better. But he had been in like the kind of subdued style that he was in the 2004 version. With a jigsaw face? Yeah, why not? I could definitely, I could see it working a lot better than Dominic West at least. Right. Yeah, it's unfortunate because Dominic West is a good actor.
01:03:50
Speaker
He is. Yeah. I don't know what he was thinking with this. Yeah. It's very weird coming off. I think right off the wire, isn't it? I believe so. Yeah. Yeah. Which is just, I'm so different. So maybe that's why it was just a challenge. Also, you know, I mean, Lexi Alexander too. I hope she gets some more action movies because she knows even, even with the problems of this movie, there's no problems with the, with the direction. Right.
01:04:17
Speaker
And she does television series mostly now mostly looks like from looking at her, her credits looks like she's mostly done television since then. She's done. She did an arrow episode of arrow. She did an episode of Supergirl. Limitless American Gothic taken how to get away with murder, SWAT, LA's finest. So she's just doing like, and it's only one episode for all of them. Right.
01:04:44
Speaker
bring her in for an action episode of those series? Probably, yeah. So yeah, I mean, I hope she gets some more work and I hope she gets another chance to make an action movie again, because she knows what she's doing. She knows how to she knows how to shoot shoot action. It's just this movie was just kind of all over the place. And I think it just came at a wrong time. I think it was
01:05:10
Speaker
It just wasn't the right time for this kind of movie. Yeah, all that said, I mean, do you think ever in the future they would throw a bigger budget at a Punisher movie? I don't think so. I mean, like, I don't see any reason why you would do it as a movie. That's the thing, because back then a movie made much more sense, but now with, you know, you can do streaming, you can do limited series. It makes so much more sense to do it as a TV show on like Netflix or Hulu or something.
01:05:36
Speaker
because they can spread out the story a little more. They can spread out the story. They can have a larger cast. And yeah, it works much better that way.
Future of Punisher Projects on Streaming
01:05:45
Speaker
Yeah. All right, Ashley. Anything else you want to mention? Anything you want to promote before we head out of here? No, I don't have anything to promote. I'm just absorbing content, not making any. All right. Well, thanks again forward to the upcoming content. That's all. Yeah. Yeah.
01:06:02
Speaker
All right, thanks for coming back and it was good talking to you again and I have to have you back again at some point in the future. Anytime. All right, that does it for us. Thanks so much for listening and we will see you next time. Please make sure to write and leave a review on Apple podcasts or anywhere you get your podcasts and we will talk to you next time. Thanks again.
01:06:23
Speaker
You have been listening to the Superhero Cinephiles podcast. Follow us on Twitter and Instagram at SuperCinemapod. Join our Facebook group by searching for Superhero Cinephiles, where you can interact with us and other superhero fans. If you'd like to support the show, you can become a regular supporter at Patreon or make a one-time donation through PayPal, both of which can be found at our website, SuperheroCinephiles.com.
01:06:45
Speaker
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01:07:16
Speaker
Good night. Good evening. God bless.