You can see from the photo that this copy of The Punisher 2099 #1 has been around the block a bit, but there’s something about reading a dishevelled, well-loved comic book that makes it feel extra special.

Of all the comics in Marvel’s 2099 line, which ran for a few years in the 90s and fast forwarded the Marvel Universe’s continuity by just over 100 years, to a very cyberpunky world being choked by the iron grip of nefarious, multinational corporations (can’t think why that feels especially relevant now), I’d only ever read Spider-Man 2099.

I’d always been curious about the other 2099 titles, but for some reason never got around to reading any of them. I found the first issue of The Punisher 2099 from a bargain box at Portsmouth Comic-Con, however, and was lured in by its blue foil cover.

Of course, this being the 90s (and with the main character being a version of The Punisher), the edginess and grim violence is dialled up to as far as Marvel could go without it tipping over into proper, adults only, ‘mature’ content.

This being the future, The Punisher is kitted out with all sorts of fancy sci-fi weaponry and armour, as well as the tech that allows him to hide his identity from security cameras (in a neat touch, his face shows up as a pixelated version of the Punisher’s famous skull emblem. His identity is unknown to the police, who care less about the fact that he’s murdering vicious criminals in cold blood, and more about the fact that he’s going to cost them business.

Of course, we’re in the year 2099 so OG Punisher, Frank Castle is long dead, and our new anti-hero’s origin is a close mirror, in many ways, to Castle’s. In a neat touch, he’s directly inspired to adopt the Punisher’s identity by Castle’s final manifesto.

I actually had a blast with this comic; though there’s tons of stuff that weirdly dates it, and it feels like it’s trying way too hard to be edgy, it’s a clever sci-fi spin on a familiar character and very entertaining indeed. So much so that I’m tempted to read more of the series, as well as more 2099 titles in general.

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