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5 Reasons Why 'The Punisher: One Last Kill' Sucks
Jon Bernthal returned as a PTSD-addled Punisher in the One Last Kill Marvel TV Special, trying to find a direction in his life. The action and the acting were praised, but the plot dissatisfied a lot of Punisher fans. Here are the top 5 reasons why The Punisher: One Last Kill sucks.
MOVIES
Culture Treasury Staff
9/5/20264 min read
After getting two seasons of his own television show, Frank Castle ‘The Punisher’ got his own Marvel Studios TV Special with ‘The Punisher: One Last Kill’. In this 48-minutes-long TV special, Jon Bernthal reprises his role as the MCU Punisher. The Marvel Cinematic Universe version of The Punisher is considered by many to be the toned down version of how the Marvel’s ‘King of Killers’ is supposed to be but Bernthal played the part of the angry, seething US marine quite well TV show; his is the slightly family-friendly version of the former Vietnam war vet turned vigilante. With The Punisher: One Last Kill, however, things have gone downhill for The Punisher when it comes to plot and story. Here are 5 reasons why ‘The Punisher: One Last Kill’ fails to make a mark story-and-plot-wise.
The Punisher could have killed Ma Gnucci when he killed her son
The comic book Frank Castle is the kind of man who deeply researches people on his kill list before wiping them off the face of the planet. But we have the MCU Punisher here, instead. In The Punisher: One Last Kill, we learn early that the MCU Punisher has offed four members of the Gnucci family and is at loss with a sense of direction in his life. But didn’t he research Ma Gnucci? How could he leave her out? She is the matriarch of the family and deeply involved with crime. His leaving out Ma Gnucci from his kill list makes absolutely zero sense for the character. He should have killed her right after he crushed Ma Gnucci's youngest son’s skull with his right boot before her very eyes. Not killing her then caused him (and plenty others in the building he lives in) a great deal of pain later.
The Punisher is living in the former neighbourhood of the Gnucci gangsters
The Punisher is renting a place in Little Sicily, the former neighbourhood of the Gnucci crime family. It is absurd, risky and very stupid of him to try and live right in the place the Gnucci crime bosses used to frequent. The comic book Punisher does not operate that way. And anyway, once you have killed off the four members of the Gnucci family, you could leave the place, right? But no, the MCU version of The Punisher chooses to keep on living right in the area of the Italian gangsters. It is understandable that he thinks he has got nothing else to do after the revenge and even comes close to committing suicide later, but did he get careless because he thought his mission was over? The viewers are supposed to assume something like that.
The Punisher’s place should be rigged with bombs and tripwires
What are The Punisher’s living quarters supposed to be like? Extremely well protected with cameras, tripwires, guns and other equipment. He should also have figured out a way for a quick escape in case the bad guys found out where he was holing up. But in The Punisher: One Last Kill, none of the aforementioned precautions seem to have been taken. Granted, Frank is struggling with PTSD, he suffers from constant hallucinations but it shouldn't be this easy for someone to just set his room on fire. Ideally, The Punisher's place should be ready to ambush the ambushers.
The Punisher doesn’t walk up to people in broad daylight to kill them
In One Last Kill, he does that. Takes a life in broad daylight. It’s not like he is Spider-Man or Iron Man or Sentry and can afford to make a super quick getaway. The comic book Punisher would have identified his target, learned of the places they usually haunt, learned of their habits as well and then planned his move to take them out, preferably at night. He would have calculated the risks well before killing. But Jon Bernthal's Punisher just struts out in the day in full Punisher gear and delivers justice. We say it again: a behaviour like that is not consistent with the character.
The crime levels shown on the streets of New York City are insane
The Little Sicily neighbourhood shown in the The Punisher: One Last Kill TV show has crime filled up to its throat. No corner is safe. Anyone can come up from behind you at any time and club you to death. Are the cops that powerless in this NYC region? The Punisher TV Special shows it that way and it looks over-the-top and unreal. Mobsters could have the police in their pockets but a lawlessness of this level? It’s insane.
The arguments in favour of the MCU Punisher could be that the PTSD side of the character has never been explored in the pre-Jon Bernthal versions of the antihero, and since the MCU Punisher has killed the last bunch of crime lords responsible for the deaths of his family, he thinks that his personal war in now over (it is never over for the comic book version of The Punisher, do note) and hence drops down his guard. That his PTSD is in advanced stages now and since he thinks his family's murderers have been accounted for, he is ultimately ready to take his own life. These are valid arguments for this different version of The Punisher, brought to life by Jon Bernthal in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, but the antihero people know from the books does not behave or operate the way Bernthal’s Punisher does in One Last Kill. It is one thing to add something different to the character, tone-and-style-wise, and another thing to change the way the character inherently functions. In our view, the source material should not be overlooked that much. Overall, The Punisher: One Last Kill is well-acted, with some powerful action, but it felt too short and could have done a lot better story-wise.