Axel Alonso, Chief Editor of Marvel Comics, almost revealed that The Punisher will find himself in Weirdworld during today’s weekly Axel-in-Charge interview on Comic Book Resources.
To fans, I’d say: Weirdworld is here to stay. It’s an essential component of the Marvel Universe. Anyone that’s been jonesing for the type of dark fantasy that was pioneered by Robert E. Howard or Tolkien or Marvel’s classic “Weirdworld” series from back in the day, will find what they want in this series. Barbarians — check. Wizards — check. Elves — check. Cavemen — check. Dragons — check. The Punish — Next question!
Who will really be ending up in WeirdWorld soon, The Mainstream 616 Punisher….or Franken Castle? Now Franken Castle’s is indeed a pretty weird character who turned up in Rick Remender’s awful Punisher run, where Frank got sliced and diced by Daken who lefted him there in many pieces before he was brought back to life as a Frankenstein monster. Thankfully he wasn’t in that state for long. The bloodstone restored The Punisher back to what he was before. But his Franken Castle incarnate was seen on the cover of BattleWorld #1, apparently coming from an alternative universe where movie style monsters, such as Dracula and Werewolf, exist (Earth-666) and brought to BattleWorld by Dr. Doom who destroyed his universe to salvage what’s left of it to create BattleWorld. Fast forward to the end of Secret Wars. BattleWorld is gone (Good Riddance!), the mainstream Marvel Universe is restored, and The Punisher returns to the All-New, All-Different Marvel Universe to take on more criminals and villains and destroy them.
But will WeirdWorld be where Frank goes to find the source of the unstable version of the Super Soldier Serum in Becky Cloonan’s newest run? Or will we find Franken Castle, The Punisher incarnate, call WeirdWorld his home while the mainstream Punisher goes out on the road trip across the northeastern sections of the U.S. and destroy the drug and the source? Only time will tell.
Sherry Konkus lives in Owosso, MI. She is the proud owner of the Camac Athena EX Concert Grand Harp named “Grover” and Camac Mademoiselle named “Ernie.” She’s also the proud author of The Punisher Harp Zone. Sherry is the one who came up with the idea of portraying The Punisher from Marvel Comics as the punishing harpist who plays the harp in memory of his family who was killed by the mob years ago.