‘Punisher’ artist to make Soonercon appearance
Artist Mark Texeira is known for drawing hardedged anti-heroes like the Punisher, Wolverine and Ghost Rider. The gritty, urban feel of his drawings has made “Tex” a fanfavorite.
Texiera will appear at this year’s SoonerCon in Midwest City this weekend.
The artist first broke into comics in the early 1980s, and has since drawn for publishers, including Marvel, DC Comics, Image, Harris and Continuity.
His most recent projects include the miniseries “Punisher: Nightmare” and “Space Puni- sher” for Marvel Comics, both now available in trade paperback.
“Space: Punisher” follows an alternate version of Frank Castle crusading against criminals in space.
“Frank relates to all of mankind’s basic need for righting a wrong,” Texeira said at Marvel.com. “The elements would work in any environment; water worlds, desert worlds, jungle worlds, and so on.”
“Space: Punisher” features alternate versions of many Marvel heroes and villains, designed by Texiera.
The Punisher is earthbound again in “Punisher: Nightmare,” in a story that echoes the origins of Frank Castle.
“Punisher: Nightmare” was written by Scott M. Gimple, who co-wrote the film “Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance,” and in January was named the showrunner of the popular cable program “The Walking Dead.”
“Nightmare” features the Punisher coming to the aid of a returning soldier whose family is killed, a story that closely mirrors that of Frank Castle himself. Along the way, he faces off against Johnny Nightmare, a psychotic villain with supernatural powers of recuperation.
“One of the central aspects of the story was exploring how close the Punisher is to being a villain,” Gimple said at Marvel.com. “Whatever benevolent impulse drives Frank, ultimately what he does is kill. Frank doesn’t think he’s a hero at all, yet the only reason he does this is to make the world a better place. And he doesn’t derive any satisfaction from what he does; he does it because, basically, after his family died, he died too. This is all that’s left for him. I just really like the gray area that the Punisher exists in that way, so I wanted to explore it a bit.”
Gimple was ecstatic to be paired with Texeira on the project.
“I’ve been a fan of his since I was in high school, and when I was told he’d be doing the art, I was thrilled. There’s something about his stuff that feels immersive to me, he puts you right there into the environments he creates. I feel unbelievably lucky to be doing this book in the first place; to be paired with Mark on this story was insanely lucky. His layouts in this book are unbelievable and the way he portrays the action is electric.”
SoonerCon continues through Sunday in the Reed Conference Center in Midwest City.