Jon Bernthal is quietly having the biggest year of his career. The Walking Dead veteran has been dominating the box office through the past few weekends through the overperformance of Christopher Nolan epic The Odyssey and now he's set to do it all again with Spider-Man: Brand New Day. Let's also not forget that he starred in his own Disney Plus Special Presentation earlier this year, bringing Frank Castle back to the small screen in The Punisher: One Last Kill. Let me tell you something, man: Bernthal can do it all.
That being said, the acting veteran - who really made a name for himself as Shane Walsh on The Walking Dead all those years ago - has officially made history, bringing his version of The Punisher to the silver screen for the first time ever this summer. We knew it was coming as we had seen him in the multiple trailers for the Marvel movie, but seeing him in action was a completely different ball game.
Jon Bernthal brings his Punisher to the movies for the first time ever
With the release of Spider-Man: Brand New Day in theaters, Jon Bernthal has officially delivered a first that we will never forget. The film marks the first time that his portrayal of Frank Castle, a.k.a. The Punisher, has appeared in a Marvel Cinematic Universe movie - something that many wouldn't have thought possible just a few years ago.
The MCU movie has received rave reviews from fans and critics, with some calling the ensemble piece one of the best Spider-Man movies ever made. It's also set for a major overperformance at the box office, with estimates even suggesting that it could outperform Avengers: Endgame domestically. And this is pretty incredible for many reasons, including the fact that a film starring a street-level character like The Punisher is set to make so much money.
Bernthal has been portraying Frank Castle for over a decade at this point, but the character has always been a fixture of the small screen. He originally played the role in Daredevil season 2 for Netflix. At the time it was unclear as to whether the events of that show were canon to the MCU (as the Marvel Netflix shows were produced by a different studio) but he very quickly became a welcome part of the franchise, leading to him headlining his own spinoff series. The Punisher ran for two seasons before it was cancelled as part of the Netflix decision to distance itself from Marvel shows ahead of the Disney Plus streaming service's launch.
The Punisher's fate remained unclear for some time. Although Bernthal was initially offered the chance to play an alternate version of Frank Castle in rebooted Disney Plus series Daredevil: Born Again, he refused as he didn't think it was what the fans would have wanted. When Marvel retooled the series as a sequel to the Neflix franchise (retroactively canonizing it in the process), he brought his Punisher back in the first season of Born Again, which set the stage for his Disney Plus Special Presentation The Punisher: One Last Kill.
The version of The Punisher that we see in Spider-Man: Brand New Day, however, is a bit different from the violent, unhinged Frank that we met in his solo projects. While it's still inherently the same tormented, angry, and perpetually moody vigilante we've all come to know over the years, Bernthal manages to find a balance in the family-friendly movie that helps the character move a little closer to his comic book counterpart. He now feels like someone who could pop in other heroes' stories, whether that's the New Avengers or even another Hawkeye story.
Frank Castle is part of the bigger world of the MCU now, and it's particularly crazy that a beloved street-level character like him has finally made his debut in the MCU movies. It's just as jarring as seeing Charlie Cox's Matt Murdock (a.k.a. Daredevil) in 2021's Spider-Man: No Way Home was, but it's a welcome reminder of the kinds of crossovers that both Marvel and Spider-Man can bring to the table. We just hope that this is the beginning of a beautiful unlikely friendship between Frank Castle and Peter Parker.
We also hope that this is just the beginning of Frank's adventures on the silver screen.
Spider-Man: Brand New Day has arrived in movie theaters.
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