Post by @neil4LOST
Punisher War Zone #1 Review
WRITERS: Greg Rucka
ARTIST: Carmine Di Giiandomenico
COLOR ARTIST: Matt Hollingsworth
LETTERS: VC’s Joe Caramagna
COVER: Marco Checchetto
ASSISTANT EDITOR: Ellie Pyle
EDITOR: Stephen Wacker
EDITOR IN CHIEF: Axel Alonso
CHIEF CREATIVE OFFICER: Joe Quesada
PUBLISHER: Dan Buckley
EXEC. PRODUCER: Alan Fine
Release Date: October 24th, 2012
Published
monthly by Marvel Worldwide, INC.
ADDITIONAL DETAILS:
Price – $2.99
(23 Pages,
single-issue, color)
INTRODUCTION: (From page 1)
Frank Castle’s
plan to take down The Exchange didn’t turn out exactly the way he had hoped it
would. Not only did several police officers die in the process of taking down
The Exchange, Rachel Cole-Alves is now under custody and Spider-Man is not
happy that some of his equipment was found to play a part in the showdown.
Now
Spider-Man and the Avengers will be coming after Castle to take him off the
streets for good. But as we all know…the Punisher won’t go down without a
fight.
WRITING:
Rucka has
made a name for himself again in the world of comics with his run on The
Punisher series. Now that it has come to a close and Rucka told a fabulous
revenge story that intertwined the characters of Rachel Cole-Alves and Frank
Castle, Marvel has asked for Rucka to conclude this chapter of Frank Castle’s
life in Punisher War Zone.
Rucka has
approached this limited series as a natural continuation and throughout this
first issue he carries on the style and approach of a slow-burn build up. This
works really well in an introduction issue where each of the Avengers need to
understand the situation and decide how they will react. Rucka writes each
Avenger in a very unique way…none more in my opinion than Wolverine himself.
It is
obvious that Rucka knows exactly where he is taking this story. It is too bad
he had to conclude his story as a mini-series but nevertheless, he is doing a
hell of a job.
Rating – “A”
ARTWORK:
Carmine Di
Giandomenico does an admirable job drawing in this book. He of course is no
Marco Checchetto but he is able to successfully draw emotion and character rich
panels of interaction. Where he does seem to lack or suffer however is in his
depiction of action. Hopefully this will improve over the course of the next
few issues as the Avengers begin to square off with Frank Castle more…
Rating – “B”
STORY:
(WARNING –
THIS SECTION MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS)
Spider-Man
is upset. Evidence of his web slinging device was found at the mass murder at
The Exchange headquarters where several police officers will killed. Spider-Man
finds Frank Castle and tells him that Frank’s day is over…that he is going to
have to answer for his crimes. Of course Frank has a few tricks up his sleeve
and cleverly creates a diversion to escape.
Spider-Man
then calls the Avengers together to get agreement about what should be done
with The Punisher. At first, the Avengers have no interest in Spider-Man’s
plea. But Captain Rogers finds reason in Spider-Man’s plea and agrees that if
the Avengers do not take action they will be sending the wrong impression of
what and who the Avengers stand for.
Frank
prepares for the mission of survival ahead and Wolverine, who doesn’t completely
feel that Frank Castle is an enemy goes and warns Punisher that the Avengers
are coming.
Rating – “B
+”
ENTERTAINMENT VALUE:
The story is
great. Anyone that has followed Rucka’s Punisher run is highly anticipating the
events that will take place over the next four issues. There is a wide cast
involved here that allows Rucka to experiment and deal with a very interesting
topic in the world of Marvel. What do you do with a good guy that now everybody
believes is a bad guy…
Rating – “A”
OVERAL RATING OF ISSUE: “A-”