Most fans are of the opinion that the Punisher simply wouldn’t work in a PG-13 environment, and for the most part, they’d be right. Frank Castle is a battle-hardened vigilante who makes a name for himself eliminating the criminal underworld in grisly fashion, using violence as a means to deter violence by putting his point across that if you do bad things, he’ll do a lot worse to you.
The three Punisher movies we’ve seen over the decades were all R-rated, but never managed to gain much traction at the box office, and it wasn’t until Jon Bernthal inherited the role as part of Netflix’s Marvel universe that the antihero was finally done real justice in live-action. Of course, Kevin Feige has already outlined why Deadpool 3 is set to be the only upcoming Marvel Cinematic Universe project being given an R-rating, leading to speculation that the next place we see the military veteran could be on Hulu.
However, a new report is claiming that both Bernthal’s Punisher and Krysten Ritter’s Jessica Jones will make their official MCU debuts on Disney Plus, although the show in question isn’t named specifically. The superpowered private eye has also been linked with a revival on the Mouse House’s other streaming service, though, so new and somewhat conflicting information doesn’t really clear things up.
In any case, we’re guaranteed to be seeing them sooner rather than later, after the rights to both the Punisher and Jessica Jones reverted back to Marvel Studios in February, but there’s still no official word on how, when or where it’ll happen. With upwards of 25 MCU titles in development across the big and small screens over the next several years, though, one thing we’re definitely not short on is options.
