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Fox To Turn The Punisher Into A ‘CSI’-Styled TV Show

Travis Woods — Fri, 21 Oct 2011 18:00:17 +0000

Because the kids sure do love those comic adaptations (right guys, right?) Fox has decided to take the comic book character The Punisher –a psychotic former Marine who launches a lifelong, mind-bogglingly violent campaign against crime after his wife and child are killed by the mob—into a television show. Which should work out pretty well, as The Punisher has so far been made into three—count ‘em, three—horrible, just plain horrible films, each one failing to launch a Punisher franchise.

But it’s totally not gonna suck this time, you guys, Fox swears!

The Punisher will get its own slightly more heroic take from former Criminal Minds showrunner Ed Bernero. He sees The Punisher as more of a standard police procedural, with Frank Castle working as a “rising star detective” in New York who moonlights as a vigilante “seeking justice for those the system has failed.”

So, essentially, one of the darkest and most bloodthirsty anti-heroes in Marvel Comics history is basically going to be transformed into CSI with skull shirts. Great. Which would be cool, if it weren’t for the fact that we’ve already seen that show—I liked it the first time I saw it, when it was called Dexter—and, these days, that show is almost as bad as the Punisher films were. But whatever. As long as Marvel doesn’t crassly start shoving out a bunch of by-the-numbers superhero films to basically act as $200 million, two-hour trailers for a crappy-looking Avengers film, we should be ok.

Wait a minute…

What do you think of the Punisher news?

Source: The AV Club

Thomas Jane Describes The Perfect Punisher

Krystal Clark — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 21:47:04 +0000

Remember the 2004 version of The Punisher that starred Thomas Jane and an over the top John Travolta? The film was critically panned, and easily forgotten by fans but that didn’t stop the studio from making a sequel. Last year, we got Punisher: War Zone, a grittier take on the established character that featured more violence and a new actor, Ray Stevenson. Once and for all Jane himself has opened up to MTV and discussed his view on the character and what he thinks went wrong with the franchise.

“My interest has always been based more in reality than in superhero fiction, and with the original Punisher I very much pushed them to try to make a movie that was more like Death Wish or Taxi Driver than Spider-Man. The strengths of The Punisher that I did lie in the reality that we were able to bring to the character, and the weaknesses of The Punisher I did were all based on people trying to make this a ‘comic book movie’—with funny characters and goofball s–t that has no place in a Punisher film.”

He went on to somewhat criticize the second film, which he opted out of during pre-production.

“Punisher 2 went more in the direction of goofball comic-book world than in reality. The portraits of Punisher that Tim Bradstreet did, that’s the movie I want to see. [Those portraits] have a reality, grit and truth to them, and I think every Punisher fan out there agrees with me. That’s what I was pushing for and that’s why I dropped out of Punisher 2 —because I’m not going to make a ‘comic book movie.’ It’s just doing a disservice to Frank Castle.”

“[The Dark Knight] made $500 billion at the box office, so I felt vindicated—because everybody in the business who was familiar with what I was trying to do with Punisher 2 recognized that as the tone I was going for in Punisher 2,”

I knew The Dark Knight was going to pop up somewhere in this interview. Ever since that film was released, all other comic book adaptations have been getting the short end of the stick. It’s not necessarily a horrible thing, because that means people will have to try harder when it comes to producing these films. Like Jane said, audiences know that this caliber of story can be done for a comic based film. My two major problems with the first Punisher film had to do with the length and the writing. The movie went on for ages and seemed too drawn out. It was boring, and when the action scenes hit the screen they were underwhelming.

What do you think of Jane’s views on the perfect Punisher?

BOX OFFICE NUMBERS: The Punisher Takes a Beating

Mali Elfman — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 17:00:39 +0000

I don’t think The Punisher did all that it hoped for. Sadly, it came in at number 8, just about Cadillac Records. Almost everything else is the same as last week. Four Christmases and Twilight are still holding on to the top two spots.

Here are this weeks numbers…

Four Christmases | Weekend Gross $18,180,000 | Change -41.5% | Average Per Theater $5,451 | Total Gross $70,843,000 | Production Cost $80 | Week 2
Twilight | Weekend Gross $13,197,000 | Change -49.9% | Average Per Theater $3,646 | Total Gross $138,552,000 | Production Cost $37 | Week 3
Bolt | Weekend Gross $9,696,000 | Change -63.5% | Average Per Theater $2,758 | Total Gross $79,281,000 | Week 3
Australia | Weekend Gross $7,000,000 | Change -52.7% | Average Per Theater $2,573 | Total Gross $30,869,000 | Production Cost $130 | Week 2
Quantum of Solace | Weekend Gross $6,600,000 | Change -65.0% | Average Per Theater $1,928 | Total Gross $151,468,000 | Production Cost $200 | Week 4
Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa | Weekend Gross $5,100,000 | Change -64.1% | Average Per Theater $1,538 | Total Gross $165,675,000 | Production Cost $150 | Week 5
Transporter 3 | Weekend Gross $4,500,000 | Change -62.7% | Average Per Theater $1,714 | Total Gross $25,381,000 | Week 2
Punisher: War Zone (NEW) | Weekend Gross $4,000,000 | Average Per Theater $1,595 | Total Gross $4,000,000 | Production Cost $35 | Week 1
Cadillac Records (NEW) | Weekend Gross $3,500,000 | Average Per Theater $5,102 | Total Gross $3,500,000 | Production Cost $12 | Week 1
Role Models | Weekend Gross $2,622,000 | Change -50.4% | Average Per Theater $1,375 | Total Gross $61,665,000 | Production Cost $28 | Week 5

NEW MOVIES: The Punisher, Frost/Nixon, Cadillac Records

Mali Elfman — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 18:06:56 +0000

Awesome week people! Frost/Nixon is definitely this film to see this week, possibly in a double feature with Milk . Next in line is, Cadillac Records, another step in the Walk the Line and Ray series. What have we learned? Being a musician kind of sucks. The best reviews so far have gone to Timecrimes, which has a limited release but if it’s near you is definitely worth watching. Check out the rest of the films below…