"... I enjoy your magazine, and find it a well put-together and entertaining overview of the current comics scene both in print and on film, but I would like to express a certain disappointment in your coverage of the Punisher movie.
In the last two issues, you have run consecutive articles on the film, the first with producer Robert Kamen, the following with director Mark Goldblatt. I am the original and solely credited writer on the film. It seems to me that both men, in particular Goldblatt, felt the need to spend almost as much time denigrating the drafts I wrote of the script as talking about their own contributions to the film. That is their right, as unpleasant as it might be to me reading it, but the tone of your articles, particularly the Goldblatt one, by Marc Shapiro, is disturbing. It didn't read like journalism, it read like movie hype. And it took Goldblatt's personal feelings on the script and presented them as unequivocal truisms. I quote--"It didn't take a degree in comic book lore to realize that what was being offered was Friday the 13th in sheep's clothing." Of Goldblatt's comment--"This script had many problems."--Shapiro states, "Obviously, these problems have been overcome since..." Has Marc read both scripts, mine and the rewrite? Has he formed an opinion based on the work, or just on the comments of the director? If it is the latter, I would recommend that, in the future, Marc let whomever he is interviewing speak for himself, but form his own opinion based on research and facts. To do otherwise is both lazy and immoral.
I respect the difficulties in trying to publish a serious magazine while keeping it entertaining, and the "wham-biff-zowie" tone that you so deplore in articles about comics in other publications rarely finds its way into your magazine, but this time, it did.
I would also like to express some of my feelings about Goldblatt's comments. I have read the drafts following mine. Goldblatt suffers from the common non-writer's malaise so prevalent in Hollywood--we take an original script, dicker around with it, change dialogue, take a scene that took place here and put it there, and presto, we made it all up ourselves. I am afraid not, Mr. Goldblatt.
As for the decision not to present the Punisher's origin at the beginning of the film, but to integrate it into the film as flashbacks--it was that way in my original script. I fought tooth and nail to keep it that way, and was fired for being uncooperative by the producers, who insisted on a prologue. They later screened it for some fans, and found it worked miserably. If there had not been a flashback sequence in my original script, I doubt they would have had the wherewithal to change it back in the editing room.
Another point I fought for was keeping the skull on the Punisher's shirt--which Kamen and Goldblatt dismiss with statements such as "When you put Dolph Lundgren in spandex, you gotta watch out, cause he'd look pretty silly." Please. In my script, he wore almost exactly what he wears in the film, only he spray-painted a skull onto his T-shirt. At a certain point, I gave up on the skull for most of the film, and had him spray-paint a kevlar vest just for the climactic sequence. Even that was rejected by the producer as being "too comic-booky." The fact is, there is a way to do comics on film and maintain their integrity, but the producers of this film have, sadly, little respect for the medium they were adapting.
As for the claim that my script was "Jason with a cape"--well, my draft was more violent than the rewrites, although not by very much; the main difference being mine had much more hand-to-hand combat, rather than the endless machine-gun fire it has become.
The Punisher I presented was tormented and tough, and his moments of humanity were few and far-between, but when they surfaced, they meant something. The Punisher as he is now is a more vague and amorphous character than in my drafts, and, I think, a less interesting and charismatic one. At any rate, what we see is what we get.
I did my best, bringing the Punisher to New World's attention when they had no idea who he even was, then writing the story and the screenplay on which the movie is based. I hope that the fans, of which I am one, will not be too disappointed with the dilutions of the character, and enjoy the resulting film as best as they can.

Boaz Yakin
California