Review by Frank Plowright

So what’s better, guns or claws? Well, under most circumstances that would depend on distance, but factor in how much a creator wants to exaggerate Wolverine’s healing capabilities, and it would seem the feral scrapper has the edge. His agent certainly negotiated title billing. However, since both essentially apply appalling methods to the greater good, the title is a slight misnomer, as they may begin as enemies in assorted stories gathered from 1989 to 2009, but there’s usually a bigger picture.

That also applies to a bulky collection reaching almost 500 pages and saving the fan the problem of acquiring a lot of long out of print back issue comics.

The content runs chronologically, so opens with Carl Potts laying out the art for Jim Lee, which still looks attractive. The opening bout takes place in Africa and if you can work past an exceptionally wordy script, Potts has some points to make in what’s a decent plot. It’s far better than Dan Abnett and Andy Lanning’s action thriller, let down by poor art from Hugh Haynes.

Potts reprises on the three chapters of ‘Damaging Evidence’, which has the Kingpin frame Frank Castle targeting him with a cyborg assassin, and Wolverine encountering the duplicate. Gary Erskine’s a promising artist here, but not great with movement, and Potts has been watching Terminator.

‘Revelation’ is from the best forgotten era of the Punisher as a celestial agent of vengeance with boosted powers. Overlook that, though, and the writing partnership of Christopher Golden and Tom Sniegoski weave a tidy plot around an imprisoned woman able to cause illness and death on a citywide scale. Pat Lee’s art is nice, but the writers might have moved the action out of the sewers. Three of four chapters there is too long.

Still, there’s some comedy relief from Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon afterwards as the Punisher figures out exactly how to deal with Wolverine’s healing factor. It’s a collection highlight. Frank Tieri and Terry Dodson take their cue from this to supply the Warner Brothers cartoon version of Wolverine and Punisher, but the results aren’t as enticing as the concept.

Peter Milligan also takes the comedy route for five chapters with art from Lee Weeks (sample art left), providing Nazis in lederhosen running a community where the very wealthy can hide from the Punisher. Except that it doesn’t quite work out that way. It’s an interesting creative clash with Milligan’s bonkers script drawn by Weeks as if he’s been given action gold, yet it’s fun and was previously available separately as Wolverine/Punisher.

The closer is six short chapters originally produced for digital consumption by C. B. Cebulski and Kenneth Rocafort. It was serialised in 2009, yet never issued as a graphic novel. Rocafort’s pages are illustrative energy (sample spread right), but his objectification of women is sordid, while Cebulski’s dialogue doesn’t have the intended snappy wit. Jim McCann is co-credited for the final chapter.

As a collection this really underlines that the definitive Wolverine and Punisher battle or team-up can still be written. Only Ennis and Dillon are creatively successful throughout, and there’s very little here you’ll ever want to read a second time.