Punisher MAX vol. 2: Bullseye

In his first volume of “Punisher MAX,” Jason Aaron did a great job of staking out his own territory with the title by acknowledging the character’s roots in the Marvel Universe and making Wilson “The Kingpin” Fisk the main antagonist.  Here, he shows us something else that will only help separate his run from the character-defining work of Garth Ennis:  His run is going to be an ongoing story.  Yes, we’re introduced to the MAX version of Bullseye, but there’s a clear sense of continuity with the characters that shows us this is only the second part of a larger arc.

The Marvel Universe version of Bullseye is best known as one of Daredevil’s foes, a lunatic hitman who can turn anything he gets his hands on into a weapon.  Here, the character is “just” a lunatic hitman, but he’s a far more interesting and creepy presence because of the methods he employs.  Hired by Fisk to take out Frank Castle, Bullseye first tries the direct approach — using a sniper rifle — before he tries to get into the man’s head.  Interrogating Castle’s arms dealers and sleeping in his old hideouts only get the man so far.  Soon he’s setting up families to die in the same fashion as his target’s did and earning the Kingpin’s wrath in the process.

Want to know the scary part about everything Bullseye does in this volume?  It actually works.  His antics make him an effective villain throughout most of the volume, but there appears to be little rhyme or reason to his madness beyond that.  Aaron reveals that this isn’t the case in the last two issues as the character, struggling to crack the enigma of the Punisher has an epiphany while killing his way through a half-dozen goons and then taking on the Kingpin himself.  This leads to an exchange in the final issue that has Frank Castle, for the first time ever, in a state of complete shock.  It’s a beautiful moment, sold perfectly by artist Steve Dillon who gives us a Punisher that is believably, utterly stunned by these unknown words.  If you have ever doubted Dillon’s ability to convey emotion on the printed page, this scene will erase all of your doubts.

It’s not all Bullseye in this volume, though.  We get more of the title character himself as we’re introduced to Dr. Bayer, an army doctor who patched Frank up back in Vietnam and continues to do so today.  Through him, we get some more insight into the character’s time in the war and how it changed his life with his family.  It ties in well with what has already been established about the character, and the doctor’s efforts to try and help his former comrade make him into a sympathetic presence.  No points for guessing what his ultimate fate is, though.  Fisk also gets a decent amount of face-time, and while the majority of his scenes have him acting as a foil to Bullseye’s antics, the few he has with his wife, Vanessa, are key to the direction of his character and the overall story.  They also establish Vanessa as a character with strong goals and opinions in her own right, and it’ll be interesting to see what her plans for the future are.

I should also mention that there’s plenty of creative violence and ptich-black humor to accompany all of the character development here.  Bullseye’s introduction provides and effective display of the creativity of his killing process, and a witty rebuttal of his skills in the regular Marvel Universe.  It involves a toothpick.  And I don’t know if this makes me a bad person for laughing at it, but the character’s reminder to his henchmen at the park was funny because it felt all too believable.  Though the volume also suffers from a surplus of “Just shoot him in the head!” moments for certain key cast members, it shows that Aaron is on the right track.  He’s using the freedom of a “mature readers” book to stake out new emotional ground for his cast and have them react in interesting, compelling ways.  Then you’ve got the ending, which leads into the “Punisher in prison” storyline for the next volume.  It sounds like a great idea, but more than anything else — I want to find out what Bullseye said to Castle in that scene.  Not telling us here may seem like a cop-out, but thanks to the well-orchestrated build-up I’m convinced it’s part of a plan.  When I’m convinced of that, that’s when a writer has me for the long run.