Jennifer Blood

After having read the first three issues of Jennifer Blood, I am disappointed to report it as thoroughly second tier Ennis work. The concept comes across as a one joke premise, a joke we already get after the first page of the first issue. While reading Jennifer Blood, I can't help but imagine the story as a series of re-tooled Punisher scripts.

The "woman we all thought was dead" concept reminds of the Punisher: Widowmaker storyline. The disembowelment by automobile brings to mind the Punisher disemboweling a gangster in The Slavers. The villains, mobsters from the "Old Country" remind again, of the Slavers and every other Punisher story. While doing reconnaissance, she accidentally catches a disgusting display of public sex between an old man and his porn star wife. The Punisher ruefully admits he wishes he hadn't seen "the money shot" while spying on a gangster cheating with his boss's girlfriend in the MAX series. Drowning her enemies aboard their yacht brings to mind the Punisher sinking the cruise ship full of evil shareholders in Barracuda.

The harmless doap of a husband recalls Soap from the Marvel Knights run, and Jennifer imagining how she could kill the philandering husband has shades of Frank Castle attacking a man who left his wife in In the Beginning. And so it goes. Some interesting threads seem in the work. Just what did happen to her? Will the no good husband across the street try to blackmail her? But ultimately it feels like Ennis has done this material before, and better, in every imaginable configuration in his lengthy run on the Punisher.