Random Happenstance

A lot of times in the morning, I have the old western show Have Gun, Will Travel on, and one episode, "Full Circle," Paladin catches up with an old acquaintance, Quill, a shifty snake of a conman, who once sold him a bum mine, then skipped town in a dress to avoid gunmen, who then tried to kill Paladin. Years later, Quill needed Paladin, to verify his alibi for a murder he was actually innocent of, but Paladin's leaves him hanging, saying "you should've kept me alive, Quill." Of course Paladin gets sucked back into that one, and also has to settle with a old skunk and his two jerky kids who try to steal his stuff; Quill is later shot while again fleeing in a dress. It's immensely satisfying: everyone who gets shot in this one absolutely had it coming, and the old skunk laments his lost son, "who died for five dollars." I mention this, because you used to see this on old TV shows: a crook dressing up in drag to avoid the cops or something. It wasn't perhaps honorable, and certainly wasn't usual, but it wasn't considered pervy or anything. It's probably insensitive to the drag community, but then I kinda figure if that plot was tried today some viewers would make more of a stink about a dress than any crimes committed. Like a triple homicide, fine; but wearing a guy in women's clothing would corrupt the youth of the nation. Come to think of it, I think there's an old Power Records Batman story, where Bats sleuths out Catwoman disguised as a man, by her lack of Adam's apple. Which you don't usually notice in comics...

From 1989, the Punisher #20, "Bad Tip" Written by Mike Baron, pencils by Shea Anton Pensa, inks by Gerry Talaoc. Omigod, this dates back to when people could smoke indoors! And in comics! Frank is in Las Vegas, trying to stop the assassin only known as Belzer (Not that one! Probably...) from whacking a key witness in a mob trial. Frank did not have a lot to go on: Belzer maybe liked to gamble, and that was about it. A private investigator tries to take Frank with a blackjack later, thinking he was Belzer, which is a solid two-page fight sequence that just annoys Frank.

Spoilers for a 36-year-old comic after the break!

Frank sees where Belzer planted a bomb, and figures he would've wanted to be somewhere he could see it go off, like a nearby casino. Frank busts into the lounge, calling out Belzer's name; and he sees the woman that chatted him up earlier! The way she held 'her' cigarettes would've obscured her Adam's apple, and 'she' had a high-collar number on here. It was Belzer in drag...maybe. It's definitely a guy in a dress, but maybe wasn't even Belzer? With Frank wearing people-clothes, 'Belzer' has got no idea it's the Punisher, and is just as confused as Frank. Also, traditionally you can't put a silencer on a revolver, which I remember from a Batman issue with Jason Todd.

This was, as we've mentioned before, back when Frank could put on a suit and pass as a normal human being; as opposed to the Garth Ennis/MAX era, where a grizzly bear with a hat on would look less like a serial killer than Frank. (Having a regular haircut instead of a buzzcut/military one helps a ton.) It grated eventually, but I have an immense fondness for this stretch of low-continuity stories where Frank fought a wider variety of crime than just nondescript gangsters or gangbangers; even if I mock it occasionally for almost reading like it was generated with a plot wheel. "Today, in...Akron? The Punisher fights...videotape pirates...with a .50 Desert Eagle and a corkscrew."