‘Spider-Man: Brand New Day’ Star Jon Bernthal Gives Major Update on the Punisher’s Future in the MCU

Frank Castle has never been an easy character to soften, built as he is on grief, violence, and a moral code that leaves little room for redemption arcs. Jon Bernthal has spent nearly a decade playing him across Netflix and now Marvel Studios, and in that time, he’s become almost fiercely protective of what makes the character work.

That protectiveness has only deepened following his big-screen Marvel debut in ‘Spider-Man: Brand New Day,’ which finally brought the vigilante into the wider MCU after years spent building the role through Netflix’s ‘The Punisher‘ and this year’s ‘The Punisher: One Last Kill’ special. With the film now posting record-breaking numbers at the box office, Bernthal has already started looking ahead to what comes next for Frank.

Speaking with Rotten Tomatoes, Bernthal laid out a specific vision for where he’d like to take the character moving forward, saying, “I want to see how Frank can serve. I want to see how Frank can honor the dead, how Frank can honor the people that he lost by serving, not just by avenging.” He added that he believes the comics have already hinted at that path in certain storylines and that he genuinely wants to bring that version of Frank to the screen.

That framing marks a meaningful shift in tone from the character’s usual portrayal, one built almost entirely around revenge and violence rather than any sense of purpose beyond it. Bernthal seems keenly aware of how central that darker foundation is to the character’s identity, though, and made clear he has no intention of softening Frank into something more palatable for audiences.

He was explicit about wanting to preserve that edge going forward. “I also want to continue to have the courage and the willingness to turn my back on the audience as Frank does,” Bernthal said. “There’s nothing about Frank Castle that he’s trying to be likable. There’s nothing about Frank where he’s trying to win over your hearts and minds.”

That balance between honoring the character’s brutal reputation while exploring something more purposeful underneath it has been a consistent thread throughout Bernthal’s various Punisher projects. ‘The Punisher: One Last Kill,’ the Disney+ special he co-wrote with director Reinaldo Marcus Green, was described by Marvel Television head Brad Winderbaum as carrying “all the pathos and emotion that you want out of a Frank Castle story” alongside its more violent set pieces.

Bernthal’s commitment to the role has been evident well beyond just acting duties, too. He’s taken on writing and producing responsibilities across multiple recent Punisher projects, suggesting a level of creative investment in Frank Castle’s arc that goes far deeper than simply showing up for another paycheck.

With ‘Spider-Man: Brand New Day’ marking the character’s live-action leap from Netflix’s grittier corner of the Marvel universe into the mainline MCU, Bernthal’s comments suggest he sees this moment as just the beginning of a much longer arc for Frank. Whether Marvel Studios follows through on that specific direction remains to be seen, but Bernthal himself sounds fully committed to steering it there.

For a character so often defined purely by body counts, Bernthal’s vision of service and honor over vengeance offers a genuinely different lens on Frank Castle’s future. Whether Marvel takes him up on that vision could shape where the Punisher goes next in the MCU.

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