Broken Frontier

In a move that has comics fans puzzled and buzzing at the same time, Rick Remender has turned Frank Castle into Frankencastle, a pulpy take on a horror icon.

I don’t read previews like I used to.  It is a bad habit I have to find a nice happy medium for.  When I read it, I want to read all of the comics that are printed in it and have neither the time nor the money to do such a monumental task.  I do pay attention online for upcoming storylines and such, but rarely read articles about books I have yet to read.  I don’t like spoilers to begin with and as a reviewer, I like to keep myself impartial until I have had a chance to read it myself.  So when I saw ads and articles about Frankencastle, I sort of assumed it was a mini-series.  It would be coming out around Halloween time and Remender was writing with Moore on pencils, so it should be fun.

Then I read Dark Reign - The List: Punisher. It was the best Punisher book I had read that was not written by Ennis.  It was visceral and exciting and the art by Romita made it spectacular.  Then Daken chopped off Castle’s head and I was all like “what the... shut your mouth...”  The Punisher just died.  What in the world?  Immediately I rushed online to check out the comics forums and see the buzz about what I thought was a shocking turn of events.  This is how I found out that Frankencastle was continuity.

The talk was along the lines of it being a stupid idea.  Honestly, I was kind of taken aback, as well.  After the Howling Commandos book a few years ago, another failed volume of Blade, and the meager sales of the Marvel Monsters books that sported Powell covers, I figured Marvel was done with the crazy monster stories.  The cult popularity of the Legion of Monsters mini-series was a fluke and we wouldn’t see anything like that for a while, would we?

Well, Remender had other plans for us.  Fans may be left wondering why Marvel would green light the story, but in the long run it makes sense.  Jason Aaron just got done revitalizing the Ghost Rider franchise after one of the dumber storylines by making it a pulp horror book.  On top of the critical and somewhat bolstered sales success of that storyline, why wouldn’t Marvel want to do more of what it was famous for in the Seventies?  Especially when you are brought the idea by the creative team behind the awesome Crawlspace: XXXombies.  Talk about crazy storylines - porn stars saving us from zombies has to take the cake, right?  Problem was that book was an amazing spectacle of fun comics storytelling.

Here we see that magic working again.  The moloids snatch away Frank’s body from Norman’s cronies.  Next thing we see is Frank waking up to Morbius and Werewolf by Night talking about his usefulness.  Then we see it, Frankencastle.  The rest is just good comic hijinks.  The Legion of Monsters are scared of some force headed their way and there is a lava priest guy preaching to the monsters.  Morbius has a proposition for the newest Marvel monster, but will Castle listen or will he just smash stuff?

With all the fun of the script, Moore creates some of his most fun looking art.  Man-Thing is playful.  The moloids look like they have bred with the iszs and Frankencastle is just ludicrous looking.  It’s all in good comics fun.

So, let the haters hate.  This is pure pulpy comic gold.  Let the continuity bible keepers howl.  There is Punsher Max for the more hard-boiled adventures of comics' toughest vigilante.  Let the comics readers rejoice, because as this fun book proves - anything is possible in the world of comics.