Punisher Noir (2010)

Dutch sent in the big guns, huh? No problem. I got some big guns of my own.

This is my first read from the Marvel Noir range of books. In this set of books, well known Marvel heroes are taken from their modern setting and re-imagined in the crime ridden landscape of thirties American cities. The heroes chosen so far include Daredevil, Iron Man, Spider-man and the X-Men. This book collects issues 1 -4 of the Punisher Noir series. The creative was new to me and consisted of writer Frank Tieri (which is coincidently {?} the name of a, now dead, convicted mobster) and artist Paul Azaceta.

The story is set in two main time periods - 1928 and 1935. In 1928, Frank Casteliano Sr. is a single parent trying to keep his son Frankie on the straight and narrow while resisting the offers of protection from Dutch Schultz's gang. Frankie is running with gangs of his friends on the streets and taking part in petty crime until he refuses to commit a robbery in a church. He returns home to tell his father only to find that the hitmen Dutch Schultz has sent round - Barracuda and Jigsaw - have murdered his father. In the 1935 story line, Frank Jr. has taken on the persona of a pulp radio show character, the Punisher, and hunts down those responsible for his father's death while concealing his identity behind a death's head mask.

The criminal boss who orders the hit on Frank Casteliano Sr. is Dutch Schultz. I thought I recognised the name and Googling found out that he was a real life New York gangster who died in 1935 - in a washroom just as in the comic though probably not at the hands of the Punisher. Further reading shows that Frank Tieri has mingled real life with fiction throughout the comic - other real life gangsters, such as Lucky Luciano, are mentioned or make an appearance as does the US Attorney Thomas Dewey who was also investigating Schultz in real life. But there are plenty of fictional characters too such as Jigsaw, Barracuda, the Russian and Detective Soap. Usually I like this mixing of fact and fiction, as in the TV series Dark Skies, but because it is such a narrow band of American history that I know little about it did not really add anything to the story for me.

Nevertheless, it was still an enjoyable story with atmospheric art and colouring from Paul Azaceta and Nick Filardi. The new origin was an interesting parallel to Batman in that Frank lost his parents (one to cancer and one to the criminal element) rather than his wife and children as in the modern continuity. It was easy to imagine the Punisher as part of the crime laden streets of New York in the 30s but I wonder how well some of the other heroes chosen will translate. I think if I read another I will try one of the powered superheroes such as Spider-man, Iron Man or the X-Men. The only faintly ridiculous plot point was the meeting of the Russian and Frank Casteliano Sr. after the First World War and the later effect of the injury to the Russian when we meet him again in 1935. Apparently, Tieri has a reputation for black humour in his books and the plot with the Russian might be the result of that but I felt that it wasn't needed and detracted from an otherwise well written story.

First published on RevolutionSF on Monday May 30, 2011