Set photos showing the filming of Marvel’s Punisher Special Presentation appear to have confirmed armed vigilante Frank Castle’s next major adversary.
Following his recent return in Daredevil: Born Again, Jon Bernthal’s popular take on Frank Castle, aka The Punisher, will next be seen starring in his own one-off Special Presentation, set to arrive next year on Disney+.
Plot details for the Punisher’s return have remained under-wraps — but location filming in New York now looks to have revealed a key scene, with Castle apparently meeting a memorable adversary from the Marvel comics.
Leaked images show Castle standing across from a dark-haired woman in a wheelchair — someone that comic book fans have instantly recognised as Isabella Carmela Magdalena “Ma” Gnucci, a mafia boss who seeks vengeance for the murder of her sons by Castle.
Gnucci is a memorable villain, whose story is as dark as you’d expect for a story featuring the Punisher. In the comics, Gnucci’s quest for revenge continues despite her being mauled by polar bears — set loose by Castle within New York City zoo — and subsequently left as a quadriplegic.
These photos show Gnucci already in a wheelchair, pointing her finger at Castle while they meet in a playground. We won’t spoil what happens next in the comics, but for anyone who might assume Castle goes easy on the mob boss — well, you don’t know Frank.
New BTS look at ‘THE PUNISHER’.
Possible first look at Ma Gnucci. pic.twitter.com/2gBk1ZzWZm
— Daredevil Shots (@_DaredevilShots) July 23, 2025
Next year marks a busy year for Punisher, who is also set to appear on the big screen opposite Tom Holland in Spider-Man: Brand New Day. Quite how the cheery Holland will feel about the gun-toting vigilante remains to be seen, though it’s been reported that the pair will team-up to once again pacify the Hulk.
“When Punisher is in the Spider-Man movie, it’ll be a different tonality,” Marvel Studios boss Kevin Feige recently told The Hollywood Reporter. “We are seeing for the first time in the Tom Holland Spider-Man stories him being a proper Spider-Man. Him being by himself, dedicated to saving the city, and dealing with, for lack of better terms, street-level crime, as opposed to world-ending events.
“So when you do that, you say, okay, who are the other street-level characters that we’ve never seen him interact with? And of course, I love that The Punisher started in a Spider-Man comic.”
There’s no word yet on when Frank’s solo Special Presentation will debut. Spider-Man: Brand New Day, meanwhile, will arrive in theaters on July 31, 2026.
Tom Phillips is IGN’s News Editor. You can reach Tom at tom_phillips@ign.com or find him on Bluesky @tomphillipseg.bsky.social
