How Marvel Fans Wouldn’t Let the Company Kill Off Punisher’s Dog

Welcome to the 929th installment of Comic Book Legends Revealed, a column where we examine three comic book myths, rumors and legends and confirm or debunk them. In the third legend of this installment, see how Marvel fans wouldn’t let the company kill of Punisher’s dog, Max.

Recently, I was writing about the different standards that go with a creator killing off their own characters that they created as opposed to killing off established characters (that, in turn, sent me off on a Comic Book Legends Revealed tangent, noting how Frank Miller actually DIDN’T plan on killing off Elektra when he invented her). I thought of this with this legend, as it is pretty evident that Mike Baron clearly introduced a specific character with the intent that this character WOULD die soon after being introduced.

The problem that Baron didn’t expect is that this character that he created to die? It was a dog, and Marvel fans did NOT take kindly to killing off the Punisher’s dog, and so due to fan outcry, the Punisher’s mercy killing of his own dog somehow became…emergency surgery?!?

Who is the Punisher’s dog, and how was he created to die?

In late 1991, Mike Baron started on what would turn out to be the penultimate storyline of his long run on the Punisher (it was Baron who launched the Punisher into an ongoing series after Steven Grant, Mike Zeck and John Beatty proved that the character was a star with their 1985-86 blockbuster miniseries). Titled, appropriately enough, “Final Days,” it involves the Kingpin kidnapping Microchip, and blackmailing the Punisher into doing a job for him. After being tortured by the Kingpin’s men, Microchip reveals the location of the Punisher’s safehouses, so in Punisher #54 (by Baron, Hugh Haynes and Jimmy Palmiotti), Frank has to go to one that he put together without Microchip’s help, and it is guarded by Max, an abused dog that the Punisher got off of a bad guy, and who now who guards this secret safehouse…

Well, three issues later, Micochip (who has gone on the run after the Kingpin incident), stops by the secret safehouse (the Punisher would have a hard time keeping any secrets from Microchip), and one of Kingpin’s men tracked him there. The Kingpin’s men break into the safehouse, and Max attacks…

However, despite fighting valiantly, Max is shot, and clearly mortally wounded…

When Frank arrives later, he is saddened to see Max’s nearly lifeless body, and as he tells Max he is a good boy, Frank pulls out his knife for a mercy killing…

And that was that. Very sad, but that was that.

Or was it?

When did the Punisher’s dog, Max, return, and how do we know fan outcry saved him?

At the end of 1993, Chuck Dixon and Gary Kwapisz did a two-part storyline where Frank brings his new associate, Lynn Michaels (this was during a period where Marvel kept hinting that maybe there would be a NEW Punisher, and Lynn was one of the possibilities), to a secret safehouse in Punisher War Journal #59, and guess who is guarding this safehouse? Yep, it is MAX!

It looks like Max is now a different breed of dog, but it is not a new dog named Max, but rather, the same Max (as will be made clear later on). However, after Frank and Lynn leave, some bad guys break into the house, assuming it is guarding something special, and while Frank’s defenses kill a lot of them, enough survive that they get to Max, and they dognap him, and sell him to a dog fighting ring. This, naturally, makes Frank irate (there is a cool bit where he is all, “I was going to kill them already for ruining a perfectly good safehouse, but now that they’ve taken my dog, I can’t make them dead enough.”

The Punisher has to kill a bunch of bad guys in the next issue, as Max tears his way through a bunch of dogs before they are reunited…

This is all well and good, of course, but naturally, comic book fans being comic book fans, people wrote in to ask, “Uhm…didn’t Max die in Punisher #57, like, two years ago?”

And the answer in the letter column of Punisher War Journal #62 was hilarious in its honesty (and its amusing attempt at a “retcon”)…

Max was indeed grievously injured in the issue you mention, but what appeared to be Frank performing euthanasia was actually some emergency surgery. That explanation goes to show how important you readers are to us. When that scene occurred, the resulting tidal wave of mail was phenomenal. The consensus was overwhelmingly unanimous: Don’t kill off Max! So we didn’t.

Yep, when Frank pulled out that knife, it was to do some awesome emergency vet surgery. That is too, too funny. On the bright side, at least Max was back alive!

Then, oddly enough, Max wasn’t seen again (outside of one flashback story showing how the Punisher got him in the first place, and various handbook entries). I hope Max is okay, and not stuck in some safehouse somewhere!

Check out a TV Legends Revealed!

In the latest TV Legends Revealed – Did Chuck originally have a SECOND love interest as a cast member on the TV series, Chuck?

That’s it for Comic Book Legends Revealed #930! We’ll see you soon for the next installment! Be sure to check out my Entertainment Legends Revealed for more urban legends about the world of film and TV. Plus, Pop Culture References also has some brand-new Entertainment and Sports Legends Revealeds!

Feel free to send suggestions for future comic legends to me at either cronb01@aol.com or brianc@cbr.com.