With the new Greg Rucka Punisher series debuting in July/August, The Punisher officially marks his seven thousandth first issue. Okay, there is a bit of hyperbole involved in that statement, but it's close enough to being true that it almost bears the weight of such an outlandish statement. Many have been duds, but several are truly great reads. Here are my favorite first issues to come from the House of Idea's black-clad vigilante.
Garth Ennis ushered in the Golden Age for Frank Castle. His first issue of his adults only take on Punisher is the best first issue Punisher has ever seen. It doesn't get much better than the one-two punch of Garth Ennis and Lewis Larosa. Frank's old ally Micro returns, officially marking the new territory Max would take Frank through. Instead of being in a world of spandex posers, the max version of The Punisher gives us a look at world without superheroes in which Frank can just kill, kill, kill until someone finally takes him down. This first issue perfectly sets the tone for the remainder of the best title this character has ever seen.
Rucka starts off the latest Punisher series almost perfectly. Frank Castle has no lines of dialogue in this issue at all. He's a force of nature, the boogie man in his own book. In all of the interviews leading up to the start of the series, Rucka was saying all the rights things to make Frank Castle fans know he "got" the character. Fortunately for us all, he was more than right.
Welcome Back, Frank? More like "Thank God for Garth Ennis!" After some middling attempts to revive Punisher after the early to mid-1990s glut, Garth Ennis saved the character for creative purgatory. Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon added a mixture of dark humor and the typical Punisher violence. This issue was as much a love letter to the long-suffering Punisher fans as it was a hint at the greatness Ennis would later achieve with his Max series. Any Punisher story that starts with Frank Castle lecturing some mafioso about getting his hair cut is Top 10 material.
This first issue finds Punisher in prison. Though a tired cliche in today's terms, this is probably the first and best of the "Punisher in Prison" stories. The excellent debut for the miniseries sent the Punisher from wallowing in the dregs of the Marvel Universe to A-list stardom.
After Ennis left the Max series, a parade of creators were brought on for single-arc stories. While none of these stories were terrible, the creators involved were telling stories nowhere near the caliber of stories Ennis was doing. Marvel decided to relaunch the series as the terribly named PunisherMax. Dumb name aside, Jason Aaron brought the Max incarnation of Frank Castle back to the land of the awesome. Aaron built on the foundation of what Ennis started. While Ennis wasn't too keen on bringing existing Marvel Universe characters under the Max banner, Aaron has taken a different approach. This issue introduces the Max version of Kingpin. If readers thought Kingpin was a twisted individual in the Marvel Universe, they haven't seen anything yet. Steve Dillon helped usher in the transition from the Ennis era into a new, but creatively stable environment.
To many readers, Frank Castle is a one trick pony that's easy to figure out. Garth Ennis did his part to change that perception by going back to the Vietnamese War to explore the violent, dirty origins of The Punisher in the jungle. While readers had seen Frank in the jungle many times, most famously in the awesome The'Nam series, this was the first time where an honest portrail of the war had been seen through a Frank Castle colored lens. It was dark, bloody, and beautifully sad. I remember reading this issue for the first time and being blown away by it. Here is a story that takes Frank castle's origin seriously. It's a painfully honest and bleak reading experience that paints Frank Castle as both being a tad bit more sympathetic and altogether more scary all at once.
Carl Potts and Jim Lee provide the creative force behind this second Punisher ongoing. War Journals first year is an exercise in great reading, but the first issue gets everything started on the right footing. Frank wants to visit his family's grave, but naturally work gets in the way. "Sorry honey, I had to waste some perps before I could visit your grave." It's almost as good as lecturing thugs about their haircuts.
Chuck Dixon and John Romita, Jr. started this third Punisher ongoing with a bang. Essentially, the Punisher goes deep undercover in the mob. It's a fun read from what would be the peak-era for the gluttonous deluge of Punisher titles to hit the market in the early 1990s. The die-cut gimmick cover was super cool to my young mind and it's still cool today. This series also has a warm spot in my heart as being the first real Punisher series I collected regularly. Ah! Warm, bloody memories.
This is probably one of my favorite Punisher miniseries or one-shots ever made. Jonathan Maberry sets Frank loose in an alternate universe controlled by plague-frenzied superheroes. Many fans may cringe when Frank is taken out of his element of wasting bad guys left and right, but Maberry gets the tone right for ultra-violence. Goran Parlov, another one of my favorite Puni9sher artists, brings life to this zany, but oh-so-awesome to read first issue.
In 1994, Marvel jumped on the Year One bandwagon and released a four issue miniseries describing Franks early days as The Punisher. Featuring the creative team of Dan Abnett and Andy Lanning on writing chores and Dave Eaglesham on art, this first issue focuses on that fateful day Frank Castle died and The Punisher was born. Jason Aaron is currently (and quite brilliantly) retelling this story in the PunisherMax arc simply titled "Frank." That retelling is currently one of the best Punisher arcs ever, this underrated miniseries gives a more direct, but engaging reading experience from a period not exactly known for quality Punisher stories.
