No Stupid Questions

I read some the comics after watching the Netflix series. I found the series (at least the first season) to be a compelling story about PTSD and the struggles of veterans. Tom Waits' "Hell Broke Luce" in the pilot was particularly telling.

So I started reading Garth Ennis's Punisher Max series from the early 2000s looking for that theme and I got something way different. Sure there are some hints of PTSD, but revenge is undeniably a central theme- though it is often portrayed as a complex emotion that many characters, not just Frank, greatly struggle with. I'll admit that some of the stories about revenge against crime families or Barracuda are a bit flat, but overall the comic is way more nuanced than violence for violence's sake.

The Punisher Max series has a really fantastic over-arching plot line involving the US miltary and Russia that portrays the Punisher as more than just a vigilante. I cannot recommend enough "Mother Russia" and "Man of Stone". Both have fantastic writing and strongly developed characters. "Mother Russia" has an amazing 4-way chess game between The Punisher with Nick Fury, corrupt US generals, the Russian military, and the Man of Stone. These stories and other ones like "Valley Forge, Valley Forge" also grapple with the trauma of major historic events such as the Vietnam war, the Russian invasion of Afghanistan, and 9/11.

I can't speak to other Punisher comics, but to dismiss the Punisher Max series as just an emo guy shooting people does it a great disservice. There's complexity in the fictional characters and plot that is grounded in very real events and emotions. And it also shows you don't need fancy gadgets or special powers to tell a rich and interesting story.

If you actually want to try to understand the appeal of The Punisher, read Garth Ennis's Punisher Max series. There are places to read it online for free and your local library might have it ditigally.

He wears all black, so he's emo

Punisher comics isn't the only thing you don't get.

Why don't you try reading them? I don't "get" most of the media I have never tried.

Superpowers, from a literary standpoint, can get a bit derivative and boring. It's hard to feel the stakes of a certain threat when the protagonist of a story can just superpower their way out of it.

The Punisher flips the superhero trope by portraying what a true to life superhero would probably look like. He isn't noble. He isn't invincible. He has no enhanced abilities beyond his ability to leverage violence and a pathological determination to pursue his own twisted vision of justice. He is a walking result of severe emotional trauma, and his coping mechanism is inflicting pain and death on others.

As a superhero archetype, he's very bleak. That's what makes him relatable to a lot of people.

He kills the bad guys. Batman doesn't make sense. How many people has the Joker killed? Yet Batman won't kill him and he keeps getting out and committing crime.

Because he's a cool dude who doesn't afraid of anything.

It's certainly a personal preference, but I'll give some insight as a casual Punisher fan:

A character doesn't need superpowers to be interesting. People can enjoy the Punisher despite him being "just a guy who shoots people with a gun" in the same way people enjoy "John Wick", Judge Dredd, "Taken", Jason Bourne, "Die Hard", or any movie starring Arnold Schwarzenegger. The archetypal "one man army with nothing left to lose" story is cliched and perhaps "basic", but can also be written in a compelling way depending on the author. Lots of different authors have written for The Punisher over the years, some being better than others.

I personally think a fun aspect of the character is his understanding that he isn't a good guy; he (in most continuities I've read) hates what he has become and only does it because it's all he knows. He doesn't characterize it as "justice", either. He does what he does as a means of punishment, vengeance, and retribution (and considers it a preventative measure when the criminal is irredeemably evil).

Some of his better stories explore the consequences of this judge-jury-and-executioner approach he takes. For example, killing an undercover cop who had infiltrated a gang that was on Punisher's hit-list. In that particular instance, he was willing to let the undercover cop's widow execute him as penance for his mistake. The widow lets him live because she doesn't want to be like him.

Punisher was created as a response to a very popular series of 1970s revenge flicks.

Death Wish (Novel, 1972):

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_Wish_(novel)

Death Wish (Movie, 1974):

https://youtu.be/2YPzSrb0NPI

Punisher's first appearance (1974):

Personally, I've never read it. But the reason people like or dislike stories isn't because of powers or machines in them.

People have different tastes? I find Superman incredibly uninteresting most of the time. I get why people like him, and if it floats their boat I'm happy for them but it ain't for me.

Punisher is basically just "what if Batman had less of a moral code, and wasn't a billionaire in his off time." That's got the potential to be an interesting character, even if it's not for me personally.

It's too bad the name Captain America was already taken, because this guy sounds slightly more accurate.

It's easier to fantasize about being somebody that doesn't require magical powers.

I didn't get to get a lot of comics as a kid. I got punisher because they tended to be more insular. I borrowed friends/relatives Carnage comics but never got to finish the run. I couldn't get into fantastic 4 partly because there were so many iterations, and some of those I would get the lecture of 'well you really gotta start here and this references this story line from 5 years ago'.

Punisher was simple action and tended to have shorter story lines.

Well, I'm glad there's so much here to learn about the comic in all the great comments. I really thought we were gonna talk about why there are so many cars with punisher decals and the like.

If OP wants to know why Punisher is plastered on so many cars, it's because of bigotry.

I've never been all that interested in The Punisher, but there was a comic arc a few years back in which he got his hands on the War Machine armor that was pretty good.

They're pretty niche, aren't they?

Because people enjoy the punisher pills and then become interested in the lore behind it.