Punisher #3

Part three of Garth Ennis's "In the Beginning" arc arrives with a striking Tim Bradstreet cover that says everything without showing a face — a figure clad in black, bound at the wrists with handcuffs and wrapped heavily in chains, hands clenched behind their back. It's a quietly tense image that captures the raw, street-level tone Ennis brings to Frank Castle's world under Marvel's MAX imprint. With interior art by Lewis LaRosa inked by Tom Palmer, this 2004 series was clearly committed to a grittier, uncompromising vision of the Punisher.