Fans won’t have to wait long to see what Jon Bernthal’s Punisher has been up to. “The Punisher: One Last Kill,” a Marvel Television Special Presentation, will premiere on Disney+ on May 12.
That’s the same day that the season finale for “Daredevil: Born Again” Season 2 drops, so Marvel fans will get their fill of the MCU in just a couple of months.
Bernthal co-wrote the special with Reinaldo Marcus Green, who directs. Green first burst onto the scene at Sundance with 2018’s “Monsters and Men” and then went on to direct Will Smith’s Oscar-winning performance in “King Richard” and 2024’s biopic “Bob Marley: One Love.”
Green enlisted some A-list talent to bring “The Punisher: One Last Kill” to the screen — the special was shot by Oscar-winning cinematographer Robert Elswit, whose credits include “There Will Be Blood,” “Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol” and “Michael Clayton.” Elswit also shot Green’s last two films.
“The Punisher” is the second Marvel special following 2022’s “Werewolf by Night,” a Halloween-geared special directed by Michael Giacchino, but this one is billed as a “Marvel Television Special,” which denotes a slight differentiation between Marvel Studios.
The “Marvel Television” brand, relaunched in 2024, is meant to tell viewers they don’t have to have followed along with every single MCU update to understand the story. The most recent Marvel Television series, “Wonder Man,” just got renewed for a second season, and “Daredevil: Born Again” is also under the Marvel Television banner.
But “One Last Kill” won’t be the last fans see of Bernthal’s Punisher, as he reprises the character in this summer’s “Spider-Man: Brand New Day” opposite Tom Holland.