The Punisher, Vol. 2: End of the Line

The Punisher (2016) (Collected Editions)

by Becky Cloonan, Steve Dillon (Illustrator), Declan Shalvey (Cover Art)

Collects The Punisher #7-12.

You can't keep Frank Castle buried for long. And the Punisher's mission to bring down a super-powered drug ring is about to reach new heights. As his quest sends him deep into the woods of the Northeast, it's time for Frank to go off-road. But as he gets deeper into the wilderness, has the predator finally become the prey? Agent Ortiz chased Frank into hell and came out the other side. Now she's out for revenge! And while Frank gets help from an unlikely source, trouble's not far behind! If you go out in the woods today, you're sure for a big surprise...

Genres: Comics, Marvel, Graphic Novels, Graphic Novels Comics, Superheroes, Crime, Fiction

137 pages, Kindle Edition

First published August 1, 2017

About the author

Becky Cloonan is an American comic book creator, known for work published by Tokyopop and Vertigo. In 2012 she became the first female artist to draw the main Batman title for DC Comics.

Reviews

[Chad · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was OK. Steve Dillon unexpectedly died while drawing issue #7. Matt Horak steps in to fill in and tries his best to mimic Dillon's art and it doesn't work at all. Losing Dillon really deflated not only my interest in the story but the story in general. It goes off the rails in the second half.

Steve Dillon is sorely missed, at least by me. He's one of my favorite artists. He is the quintessential Punisher artist. He teamed up with Garth Ennis to create some of my favorite comics over the years, Hellblazer, Preacher and Punisher to name a few. Not only were they great reads but they stick with me to this day more than 20 years later. They are books that sit on my shelves and I revisit every few years or hand out to friends who are looking for great comics. Steve Dillon, R.I.P.

[Carmen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Starts off with Castle slaughtering a lot of people in a bar.

Ridiculous subplot about Castle getting aid and shelter from a cantankerous old lady named Ethel.

I think the side plot between Face and Ortiz was actually pretty good and entertaining with some good dialogue. I like Ortiz.

The bad guy has some crazy idea about pitting all his men against Punisher on a ship. I can't really understand it. He wants to kill Punisher. He has the opportunity. He doesn't take it, instead he cuts Castle free and pits him against his men. It's ridiculous, but I can't really blame Cloonan, this is standard comic book fare.

TL;DR It's hard for me to pen reviews of graphic novels. This was fair. Moderately enjoyable. I've been spoiled by Bernthal, unfortunately comics cannot create such a nuanced character. Cloonan tries, to be fair.

[Frédéric · Rating 2 out of 5]

Bigger, louder, not better.

Becky Cloonan had done an average but decent vol.1, the Garth Ennis way. Here she tries even harder to copy the real McCoy. End result: A gross and ridiculous over the top shoot'em'up from page one to the last. Ortiz was a bit promising, she turns out to be a dud. Olaf's a 2-bit loser with pathetic motivations. The way the Face is dealt is paradoxically underwhelming. Dialogues are phony. And it's not even fun.

Could have been rated a bit better if at least decently illustrated.
Tough luck.

I don't think Becky Cloonan is a particularly bad writer. She should just stop looking over Garth Ennis' shoulder and start to write her stories.

[Tiag⊗ the Mutant · Rating 3 out of 5]

Still predictable, still dumb... still fun.

[Joe Young · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was just bad. The story is very poorly written. The art by Steve Dillon, sadly the last before his untimely death, is good. But the filler artwork is not. All in all, this is a pretty poor offering. Not recommended.

2/5

[Dimitris Papastergiou · Rating 3 out of 5]

It was good. I liked it. Fast paced read. Frank being Frank and all that. Nothing too special but not bad either.

Off to the next one!

[Dan · Rating 2 out of 5]

Definitely not as good as the original series. I also found the very cartoony artwork to be distracting and made me dislike this even more.

[David Dalton · Rating 4 out of 5]

Violent? Oh yeah. This is the Pulp Fiction of comics. Pretty darn graphic as well. Thank goodness there are only a TON of Punisher collections out there in Comixology Unlimited for me to access.

[Alex E · Rating 2 out of 5]

Frank fights some guys in a bar, gets help by an old lady then teams up with her to kill other guys, and then Frank fights on a ship.

...yeah. So the big thing about this volume is that it has the final art from Steve Dillon before he passed away. Which left the team scrambling for a replacement artist... who then goes on to try and mimic Dillon's style. I think that was a bad move as it just gives the book a disingenuous feeling. Then as the story progresses, the art changes again, which then makes it feel fractured on top, and the story itself isn't good enough to really carry these kind of artistic shenanigans.

I think Cloonan is somehow trying to get into a groove with the character, but so far, its not really working. The stories seem unrelated and dispassionate. I find myself not really caring about taking down the villains, which is essentially what you are supposed to feel from a Punisher comic, and if I'm being frank, its hard to even care about Frank himself. He seems mindless and very much a one-note character in these stories. Which is ok IF the story is itself good enough to carry that kind of characterization of Frank. Alas, it is not.

I hope the next volume of Punisher gets things back on track.

RIP Steve Dillon.

[Joe Bogue · Rating 1 out of 5]

The Punisher never dies... because no one stops talking long enough to shoot at him. Seriously, 3/4 of Castle's kills are the henches are talking, often about him, then he just walks up & shoots them in the face. Without an actual fire fight or you know, character development, I'm just reading about a dude killing other dudes. And this dude just happens to have a Punisher skin on it...

[Mike · Rating 5 out of 5]

At one point, Frank attaches a bear trap to a chain and wields it like a flail. He then proceeds to snap it to the front of a guy's head and rip his entire face off. No other explanation needed why this got 5 stars.

[Mark · Rating 3 out of 5]

Picking up where the previous volume ended, Frank Castle continues to pursue the dealers of the designer drug EMC before it can be put into distribution.

The brutality and violence are extraordinary; though there is one touching moment when Castle encounters an old woman that patches him up.
Still, the warning on the cover, "Not For KIds!", should be taken seriously.

[Daniel Butcher · Rating 3 out of 5]

Shoot em up Punisher story.

Ends as it needs to.

Sad to see Dillon's last Punisher.

[Brian Dickerson · Rating 3 out of 5]

Overwhelming sadness abounds as you witness the last creative flickers from the pencils of the great Steve Dillon. The story is the typical Punisher kills them all troupe, but Punisher comics are like pizza to me, even when it’s bleh, it’s still good.

[Gavin · Rating 2 out of 5]

Ok so THIS is the one Dillon dies on. But the replacement art is shit. Not anyone's fault, but when the story goes downhill too...ugh.

Don't bother.

[Jonathan Maas · Rating 5 out of 5]

A bit different than the normal Punisher fare - but perhaps this is a good thing

How do Punisher comics usually go?

Step 1 - Introduce a bad guy so wretched, you can not put the book down until the Punisher destroys the bad guy.

Step 2 - Keep going until the Punisher gets the bad guy.

And that's it. Each Punisher series has one main bad guy, a bad guy that does not last that long.

And then the Punisher returns to the long, cold dark night that is his life.



Enter Becky Cloonan's slightly different, and perhaps modern take on the formula

In The Punisher, Vol. 2: End of the Line, the main bad guy is not a bad guy, but rather a drug that turns people into bad guys.

So there are a lot of bad guys, and when the Punisher takes one down, another takes their place.

And this is the way things are in the real world, or at least a little closer. There isn't just one bad guy, or perhaps even multiple bad guys. There are bad ideas that drive bad behavior, and they are a little bit more difficult to solve than the rest.



OK, he is still the Punisher and does not see the world as a garden. He still solves things in a Punisher type way.

But still - great tale by Becky Cloonan, who finds a way to add a little bit of difference into the Punisher formula, but still keeping true to what the Punisher really does.

[Mike Reiff · Rating 2 out of 5]

Hard to know what happened here: artist Steve Dillon’s passing obviously occurred during this volumes run, which lead to likely emergency fill ins - not great, but no fault. But Becky Cloonan’s - as good as Garth Ennis on the first stretch of the run, runs out of steam here, and quickly. Things begin strong with homicidal elderly women, the return of Face and even a fun side trip to a long suffering stay at home mom married to a merc, but then we get bland fighting on a boat, then an iceberg… still, check out the first volume of this run for a true swan song to legendary Steve Dillon’s work.

[Ma'Belle · Rating 2 out of 5]

This could have been a great middle section of Becky Cloonan's run of Punisher, but it was just predictable at every turn.

Also of note: Steve Dillon died after finishing the art for #7. I can't honestly give him the kind of postmortem praise that his colleagues are. Preacher is highly overrated and his art on this series brought it down before it could get up. The subsequent artists do a better job of storytelling, even if their styles aren't as recognizable.

[David Cordero · Rating 3 out of 5]

First couple of issues were drawn by the late Steve Dillon. Great conclusion to a great story.

[47Time · Rating 4 out of 5]

Frank digs himself put from the rubble after the Exeter Asylum crumbled from the explosion. He is followed by EMC-fueled Condor henchmen. He dispatches them with burnings and stabbings, then stumbles onto an armed old lady.

Ethel Bradford eventually welcomes Frank in her house and treats his wounds. They need to make a hasty getaway when Condor's assassins find Frank. The excitement is too much for Ethel's heart. Frank then gets his next lead from a bad guy and sicks a bear on him. And he smiles. Aw, Frank.

Ortiz has her own adventure with the Face. He kidnaps her, but the heavy dose of EMC is killing him. She gets him to reveal Condor's next location in Canada. Frank is already there. He kills everything he sees in spectacular fashion, but get tricked by the female assassin who survived the assault on Ethel's house. She captures him as Olaf takes control of Condor by coup.

Here is where Olaf makes a stupid move - he frees Frank and films his men as they fight him. Frank mops the floor with them and sets the ship to blow. Olaf resorts to dosing himself with EMC for a one-on-one with Frank. Ortiz reaches them before Frank delivers the killing blow. Frank returns to New York.

[Juan · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have been waiting for the conclusion of this story line but still want more. This is the first series of the modern day Punisher I have been following and I must say I enjoy hearing from the fans that the current team is living up to the standards and expectations established by previous Punisher writers. The series was fortunate to have Steve Dillon doing the art up until his unexpected passing. Still, the team was able to find a great artist who was able to conclude the arc with damn near comparable art. The series is very adult orientated and especially violent. Between the first and second arc of this story, we had an abused daughter used as a walking bomb, and we've had a mother and baby explode via a bomb trap set by the husband. The story is very gritty and I agreed with someone else's opinion in that the reader becomes invested equally into the supporting characters and not just The Punisher. I hope this is an ongoing series with no immediate end in sight.

[Krzysztof Grabowski · Rating 3 out of 5]

Pierwszy zeszyt tego zbioru i zarazem ostatni jaki wykonał Steve Dillon. Coś się kończy, coś się zaczyna. Całość to całkiem sprawny akcyjniak, ale bez tej iskry, którą mają inne serie. Jasne, miejscami bawi, ale w kilku momentach jest też niebywale głupi (trudno mi uwierzyć, że ktoś wykosił cały autobus).

Czyta się to szybko, nie ma czasu na przemyślenia. Jest za to wystrzeliwanie ton ołowiu i krwiste rozwiązywanie spraw wielu przestępców. Frank ponownie ma do czynienia z organizacją Kondor, w skład której wszedł jego stary znajomy. Na moment Castle jest zwierzyną łowną i ucieka, ale nie trwa to długo kiedy przechodzi do ofensywy. Na plus też agentka Otiz.

Jeżeli szukacie prostej fabularnie, ale bawiącej historii dla dorosłych to trafiliście dobrze. Przygody Punishera jakich wiele i z pewnością po lekturze zapomnicie o co chodziło, ale w trakcie będziecie się dobrze bawili.

[Luke Sims-Jenkins · Rating 4 out of 5]

This volume has the last of Steve Dillon's artwork before he died and its such a shame that he passed away. One gets the feeling that Becky Cloonan was writing this brand of crazyness for him to draw.

Enter Matt Horak, the guy with the unenviable shoes of filling in for and eventually taking over from Dillon and he does a wonderful job. He has a fan cartoony way of illustrating and is quite adept at action set pieces. Horak finishes off issue 7 and issue 8 has fill in artwork, but from 9 to 12 its all him and he's great.

The story follows on from the previous volume where Frank and a DEA agent Ortiz are looking to shut down a mercenary group known as Condor. It didn't quite end the way I expected it to, but thats a good thing and I hope we see more of Ortiz in the future.

[Nate]

Worse than the first volume, which had some promise. Cloonan’s dialogue isn’t as strong and I once again don’t care for the predictable plot. A few good lines and over-the-top moments can’t save the bland story.

Steve Dillon unexpectedly died while drawing issue 7. Though I got into comics late, I’ve become a big fan of his work and call him one of my favorite artists. He’s a truly great storyteller. I own his runs on Hellblazer, Preacher, and Punisher and will read them many more times in the future. When I close my eyes, I can see panels he drew clear as day. That’s the mark of a great artist. R.I.P. Mr. Dillon.

[Jesse · Rating 2 out of 5]

I definitely liked this one a bit better than the previous. It had better art throughout. While the overall story was pretty boring/confusing, it did have one real standout issue. The second issue in the book (#8) had Punisher staying with a tough old lady in the middle of the woods. When bad guys come they fend them off and escape together, ending in a great scene. This one issue put the entire book higher in my esteem. Nothing I'd need to own, unless I really start collecting Punisher books in earnest. This series is continuing, so I'll probably check more out eventually.

[Jesse Post · Rating 3 out of 5]

Solid but definitely the back half of a story started in Vol. 1, all payoff and no setup. But with that said, it’s missing all of the emotional payoff it could have had given the long histories between the characters. Instead we get limited “cartoon villain” motivations and a lot of action plot. The latter almost makes up for the former — it’s action entertainment but on its own I wouldn’t put it up on the top shelf of Punisher stories. Matt Horak deserves credit for a superb art job with an impossible act to follow.

[Villain E · Rating 3 out of 5]

Continuing off the previous volume. The Punisher is trying to take down a mercenary outfit who have become drug dealers, while a DEA agent pursues the drug dealers and the Punisher both. I have trouble with the timing. They put together a funeral for one of the characters who was killed in the previous volume which would take a week minimum, but then a character who OD'd is still ODing, which I would think means it's the same day. There are graphically bloody scenes, like someone's face getting cut in half, but the swear words are hashed out, because America.

[Bill Williams · Rating 3 out of 5]

Drug-dealers have invented a drug that gives the subject super-rage and it makes them almost immune to pain. The Punisher has blown up the factory, and now he is chasing a large supply of the drug into the wilderness. The story is very direct and linear and predictable.

There is a little bittersweetness on the art side. This was the last comic project where Steve Dillon was a contributor.

[B · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's like Metal Gear Solid except instead of the villains having special powers and cool Mega Man X names, they're all featureless skinny white guys with blonde hair named Sven.

This needed a dash of something. Maybe more of a sense that the Punisher could be in danger? Batman has this same kind of invincibility but there's usually a mystery or a hostage or something.

[Chimene · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not bad but for a Sunday quick read.

There's something missing in this volume for me though... Maybe its the artwork.

Storyline continues from volume one - pieced together ok.

Although this volume doesn't make it to my awesome list- The Punisher is still one of my most favourite hero stories.