10 Most Anticipated Comics Still To Come In 2017

6. Punisher: The Platoon

Punisher The Platoon Marvel Legacy
Marvel Comics

Release Date: October 4 (this week!)

It's been a while since we last saw Garth Ennis on a Punisher book, but - fortunately for us - he'll be making his return to the character with Punisher: The Platoon - a prequel of sorts to his seminal 'Born' storyline that fundamentally reinvented Frank Castle's origins.

The story will take place during the Vietnam War, and will see Frank on his first major tour of duty. Goran Parlov will handle the book's pencils, and we've been promised a look into Castle's very first time in combat and, more specifically, his very first kill.

The book won't be for the feint hearted, with Ennis having already established himself on the character during the Max-era - a period which saw Frank Castle blow away more than his fair share of bad guys with little restraint, depicted in full horror by the pencils of the late, great Steve Dillon. Keeping with that theme, we can expect plenty of gruesome moments in the upcoming comic, and while that might be enough to put off some readers, Punisher fans will no doubt be eager to pick it up once the series drops.

Born made readers totally reevaluate their perception of Frank Castle. If the Platoon can provoke a reaction just as strong, then it could be one of the year's greatest hits. At five issues long it's also accessible, so if you're after the perfect accompaniment to the upcoming Netflix series, then this could just be the book for the job.

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WhatCulture's very own resident movie guy, Ewan has been working in the content creation biz for over 10 years now, having started as a freelance contributor to WhatCulture Gaming all the way back in 2015. After graduating with a First-Class Honours in History from Northumbria University in 2017 (where he won a prize for a totally killer dissertation on the Watergate years), Ewan took on the role of Comics Editor at WhatCulture and quickly developed WhatCulture Comics into one of the biggest superhero-focused channels on YouTube. He followed this with a brief hiatus at Screen Rant in 2021, where he worked across the Gaming and Film sections as a writer and editor, before returning to WhatCulture as a Senior Content Producer / Presenter in 2023. He started his own podcast, We Love Dad Movies, in 2022, and has contributed several written pieces to the Eisner-nominated comics website Shelfdust as well. In his current role, Ewan incorporates his love of cinema, comic books, and history into written pieces and video essays for WhatCulture's Film & TV channel, as well as WhatCulture Gaming and WhatCulture Horror, with a particular focus on nineties-era Dad Movies, old school Westerns, and Golden Age Hollywood Noir. John Carpenter is his fave, and he thinks Batman Beyond should never have been cancelled. If that's your vibe, you'll probably like his stuff.