Double Takes: Punisher #1 and #2

Credits
Write: Rick Remender
Artist: Jerome Opena
Colorist: Dan Brown

Punisher #1

Frank Castle, the Punsiher, is back! And he's not happy with Norman Osborn now in-charge. In what appears to be Times Square after the Skrull attacks, Norman Osborn is addressing the crowd in a press conference. Four miles away, Punisher climbs on top of a building, aims his recently acquired Skrull sniper rifle at the noggin' of Osborn, and fires. Inches away from his head, the Sentry catches the bullet between his fingers.

In seconds, the Sentry is now face-to-face with Frank. Frank runs down the building leading Sentry, trying to slow him down with a bomb and a tank of acid. Cornered and and punctured deep on his side, Frank handcuffs himself, and threatens to blow up a hospital in five seconds.

Not willing to call his bluff, Sentry flies to the hospital. No explosions occur. By the time Sentry returns for him, Frank already uncuffed himself and is on the run. Frank retreats to his van, then a guy on the van's communicator warned him to leave as it is only seconds before the Sentry finds him. The mysterious guy guides him through the subway and streets, and managed to reach his destination before he finally passes out from the loss of blood and pain.

Punisher #2

Frank wakes up and finds himself stitched up and is in the bunk of a techie/nerd Henry. After the initial scuffle, Henry offers to help Frank wage his war against Norman Osborn. He offers his expertise to hack into online cameras, satellite stations, internet feeds, etc. to help hiim get the skeletons out of Norman Osborn's closet.

First mission: Frank enters a gun store which is just a front for a safehouse of high-tech weaponry. After dispatching the guards, Franks gets a hold of said high-tech weapons and is very, very, very happy.

Armed with his new toys, Frank then goes after the leads of Henry. He uses his recently acquired exploding arrows to kill off the armed guards of a batch of prostitutes, kills off the the foreign terrorists and Osborn's men doing a trade, and, gets the jump on a heroin crime ring. In all, he shot photographs of these.

After that, Henry -- clearly shaken and vomits after seeing the pictures for the first time -- arranges the pictures so they can get published on the media.

With the initial reports that crime is on a sharp decline after the Skrull invasion is questioned, Norman calls on one of his new allegiance to deal with the Punisher -- the Hood!

Reaction/Review

It's good to see the ol' Punisher back in business and gets his dibs into the mainstream Marvel storylines. The new volume promises a strong storyline with his involvement with the current Marvel saga. And, with him going one-on-one against one of Osborn's new inner circle of sorts, this shows promise of him becoming a leading figure in this saga -- hopefully.

Art for the new series reminds me of the old 1990's X-Men. I like it. The great attention given to details gives off that classic slash rustic look. Personally, I judge the comic art as follows: if it looks great without the colors, then it's truly great art. Nuff said!

All in all, I can't wait for the Punisher to go up against the Hood and -- most probably -- against his entire gang. Yipee!