I’m never entirely comfortable when the Punisher operates in the Marvel U proper; I think he’s usually diminished somewhat. After all, he can’t really kill too many well known characters and he’s completely outclassed when he goes after the real villains of the MU.

Rick Remender’s current series kind of underlined that, and had Frank tooling up against the Hood and his back-from-the-dead minions using a bunch of leftover Marvel weaponry. Fortunately, for the Dark Reign: The List: Punisher one-shot, most of the outlandish weaponry is ditched and it’s just Frank against Daken.

And, well, it’s brutal – and when you’ve got John Romita Jr on his game, it’s really brutal.

Once Daken cuts Frank’s throat, you know he’s in trouble – but (if you haven’t been paying attention to solicits) just how bad that trouble is may come as a shock to you.

Damn. And that was his gun hand too.

Thing is, and this is Frank to a tee, that just means he’s going to use a knife with his other hand.

Although that may not turn out too well.

Crap. Two arms gone. Could things get worse for Frank?

Well…yes.

There’s a bit more, as Daken kicks what’s left of Frank off the roof into the alley below, and all his body parts pile in a heap, just in case you want to get a bit of closure.

The Punisher is a marquee character for Marvel. A name that a lot of non-comics people know – and they just had the lookalike of another big Marvel name cut him, literally, to pieces. I know this is comics, I know that Frank’s coming back as a Frankenstein-style character (and god knows why they think this is a good move for him), but still…

It doesn’t get much more brutal than this in a mainstream Marvel U comic.