In Drawing Crazy Patterns, I spotlight at least five scenes/moments from within comic book stories that fit under a specific theme (basically, stuff that happens frequently in comics). Note that these lists are inherently not exhaustive. They are a list of five examples (occasionally I'll be nice and toss in a sixth). So no instance is "missing" if it is not listed. It's just one of the five examples that I chose.

Today, inspired by an e-mail from reader Luy W., we take a look at the Punisher's long history of escaping from prisons. This topic came about because Luy asked me whether we had actually seen the Punisher escape from the super prison that he was put into by the Avengers at the end of the Punisher War Zone miniseries. You can read that article to get the answer to that specific question, but it made me realize that, boy, we sure have seen the Punisher break out of a lot of prisons over the years!

The Punisher's first major stint in prison in the comics occurred during Bill Mantlo's run on Spectacular Spider-Man where Mantlo, clearly not a fan of the character, had the Punisher essentially snap and try to "punish" all sorts of low level offenders before being sent to prison as a bit of a mess. This was followed by the Punisher miniseries by Steven Grant, Mike Zeck and John Beatty, which is probably the most important Punisher comic book series in the history of the character (outside of his first appearance, that is), as it was this series that showed that the Punisher could sustain his own comic book series (heck, not just SUSTAIN his own series, but THRIVE with his own series).

One of the first things that Grant did in the series was to reveal that the Punisher had been drugged, which led to his strange behavior in those aforementioned Spectacular Spider-Man issues. Frank Castle then "crashed" an escape attempt by a gangster and his crew. Frank stopped them from taking the warden of the prison hostage. After that was dealt with, the warden then revealed that he was part of a secret group that wanted the Punisher to work for them to "punish" people with their help. So they sprung him from prison...

Of course, shockingly enough, the warden's secret group (The Trust) turned out to be villains themselves. But hey, at least the Punisher was free to punish them!

Again, as noted, the Punisher miniseries led to the Punisher getting his own ongoing series. Mike Baron took over as the writer on the series and remained on the book for a number of years. One of his last story arcs involved the Kingpin conspiring to throw Punisher into prison. Castle got into a knife fight in prison and so his face was bandaged up. This gave him the chance in Punisher #56 (by Baron, Hugh Haynes and Jimmy Palmiotti) to swap places with a fellow prisoner whose face was also bandaged up, whose gang was planning to spring him from the less protected medical ward...

As you might imagine, when they found out that the Punisher wasn't really their buddy, they were none too pleased. This story led to the infamous "Punisher turned his skin black to avoid arrest" storyline (Baron's swan song on the title).

After a few years, sales dropped on the Punisher's books. He was holding down THREE monthly series, but eventually all three were canceled and the Punisher was led into a crossover of a newly created group of Marvel titles (Marvel Edge) that resulted in the Punisher being brainwashed into killing Nick Fury (don't worry, he got better). The Punisher was sent to the electric chair in the debut issue of a new Punisher ongoing series by John Ostrander, Tom Lyle and Chris Ivy)...

As it turned out, the mafia faked his death to get him to work for them. He agreed (but obviously he had his own plans).

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The Cell, a one-shot by Garth Ennis and Lewis LaRosa, is really good, but it's not really a true escape comic book as it is a bit out of continuity. To wit, we don't actually see the Punisher escape. His whole plan in the comic is to be sent to the same prison as the people who ordered the mob hit that led to the death of the Punisher's family. They are in protective custody, so the only way to get to them was from within the prison.

Once he kills them all, he just sits back and waits for the riot cops to show up. It is implied that he will escape in the chaos, but the comic ends with him just sitting in a nice chair (the mob guys had nice chairs in their cells). So who knows?

When Ed Brubaker, Michael Lark and Stefano Gaudiano took over Daredevil from Brian Michael Bendis and Alex Maleev, the cliffhanger of the previous series was that Daredevil looked like he was heading to prison. This led to the opening arc of Brubaker, Lark and Guadiano's run, "The Devil In Cell Block D," where the FBI arranges things so that all of Daredevil's most dangerous enemies are sent to the same prison that he and Kingpin are stuck in, with the hopes that a riot could be created that will lead to Daredevil and Kingpin's deaths (as they both have too much dirt on the FBI). The Punisher was also transferred to the prison.

Well, the riot happens, but Matt Murdock is able to avoid being killed and actually saves the warden and his staff from the other prisoners....

Therefore, the warden erases any footage that would show that Matt Murdock's escape plan (him being held hostage by the Punisher) was actually concocted by Daredevil himself...

Very cool stuff.

Finally, in Nathan Edmondson and Mitch Gerads' Punisher run, the Punisher crossed over with the Black Widow, a series Edmondson was also writing at the time. The storyline ended up with the Black Widow (who didn't reference her fight with the Punisher from Punisher: War Zone) betraying the Punisher and throwing him into a Costa Rica prison.

He quickly starts a prison riot so that he can get close to a prisoner there. Once he gets the information he needs, he uses the riot to cover his escape...

The Punisher's prison escape on the recent Netflix series was very reminiscent of this escape.

As it turned out, the Black Widow didn't really betray him. Their plan always was for Castle to get into the Costa Rican prison to get close to the bad guy...

Thanks for the suggestion, Luy!

If anyone has an idea for a future Drawing Crazy Patterns, drop me a line at brianc@cbr.com!