The third “Marvel Special Presentation”, The Punisher: One Last Kill, offers up not only brutal violence, but brutal emotional drama as Jon Bernthal returns as Frank Castle.
Apparently based sometime before and during Season 2 of Daredevil: Born Again, The Punisher: One Last Kill feels like it could be set sometime after the original Netflix Punisher series, as there is basically no references to the events happening on Daredevil, like Mayor Fisk’s reign of terror or the Anti-Vigilante Task Force or even where we left Frank the last time we saw him, escaping from an AVTF detention center. Instead, we find Frank at one of his darkest moments yet, having wiped out the Gnucci crime family, one of the last groups that had a connection to the murders of his wife and children. Haunted by visions of his family and friends like Curtis Hoyle (Jason R. Moore), Frank is barely hanging on and close to ending it all. He finds himself confronted by Ma Gnucci (Judith Light), the Gnucci matriarch who has issued a bounty for Frank’s head, which funnels an army of thugs and killers to Frank’s apartment complex hideout.
Jon Bernthal delivers a tour de force performance in One Last Kill, showing off Frank’s raw tragedy and despair in the dramatic scenes, and the primal rage unleashed when he is forced back into the fight. He’s basically cemented himself as the best Punisher we’ve ever had. Judith Light is also excellent in her brief scene as Ma Gnucci, dripping venom as she slowly reveals herself to Frank, and hopefully, we get to see more of her in the future.
As far as action, this might be the best old-school action ever seen in the MCU. After Frank learns of the bounty on his head, the special basically becomes The Raid, as he fights off hordes of attackers, using various weapons and dispatching them in an incredibly brutal fashion. The MCU has always had big, CGI-driven spectacle, but One Last Kill is mostly practical, highly choreographed action (except for one CGI shot that is drawing some negative attention). The Netflix series also had some incredible, brutal action, and this continues from that in an extended, relentless sequence that makes up most of the second half of the special.
The Punisher: One Last Kill is a must-watch for fans of Bernthal’s Punisher, but those looking for ties to the larger MCU, specifically Daredevil, may be a bit disappointed. Hopefully, this is just a taste of more Frank to come, either back on Daredevil or maybe with a revival of his own series. It will also be especially interesting to see how he’s portrayed in Spider-Man: Brand New Day later this summer with what will probably be a much lighter tone.
