YMMV / Punisher: War Zone

• Awesome Music:
  • "Take Me Away" by 7 Days Away.
  • "Days Of Revenge" by Ramallah, which was also featured in one of the trailers.
  • "Historia Calamitatum" by Rise Against, which plays during the parkour scene, and is pretty epic.
• Broken Base: As mentioned below, people either don't mind its gore or hate it.
• Crosses the Line Twice: Jigsaw gives an uncomfortably hilarious patriotic speech to several groups of blatant national stereotypes. It's done in such a way it's impossible to get offended.
• Cult Classic: Very much like The Punisher (2004), albeit due to completely different reasons, this movie has a small cult movement and considered by some fans to be the most faithful adaptation of the character. Nathan Rabin even covered the film here.
• Magnificent Bastard: Frank Castle, The Punisher himself, was a former Force Recon Marine Instructor who lost his family to a mob war. Dedicating his life to wiping out every crime family he can get his hands on, especially ones who manage to escape justice, Frank starts the movie eliminating the heads of the Cesare crime family by staging a blackout during a dinner party, then using a chandelier to wipe out oncoming mooks. Planning to retire after accidentally killing an undercover FBI Agent named Nick, even leaving behind his savings to Nick’s family, Frank promises to rid the city of the rising gangster Jigsaw as his final job. After Jigsaw kidnaps Nick’s family and his friend Microchip, Frank fights his way through Jigsaw’s entire army to save them, eventually saving Nick’s daughter at the cost of Microchip’s life. With Jigsaw soon finished, Frank goes back on his word and returns to his life of vigilantism to protect those who need saving the most.
• Moral Event Horizon: When Jigsaw kills (fortunately off-screen) Microchip's senile mother.
• Narm:
  • The ease with which people are dismembered becomes hard to take seriously after a while. A villain's importance to the plot can be gauged by how close to normal their resistance to injury is; If anyone other than Jigsaw had been in that broken glass, they'd be salsa.
  • During Jigsaw's Rousing Speech, he and Loony Bin Jim are seen going down a sidewalk...doing a silly, exaggerated walk. Synchronized.
• Narm Charm: Frank shooting mobsters while hanging by his legs from a chandelier is incredibly silly, but also looks incredibly awesome.
• Nightmare Retardant: The scene where Loony Bin Jim murders an orderly isn't nearly as scary as it could be if not for Jim's absolutely hilarious "yummy, yummy, yummy" speech. And Jigsaw's (who's standing right next to him) cheerful, shit-eating grin while he's watching the entire thing. Which escalates into gleeful laughter once his brother goes in for the kill. And let us not forget about his "he's doing just great" remark in response to suggestion of one of his mooks that they should take the medicine Jim's been taking "in case he starts not feeling so good". All in all, you may spend this scene either being creeped out or laughing at the sheer absurd of the situation. Or both.
• Questionable Casting:
  • Microchip is Wayne Knight. Y'know, Newman from Seinfeld. Yes, really. In defense, he really works.
  • The voice actor behind Caillou's Dad, Pat Fry, appears in this movie as the orderly at the asylum. And yes, we mean it.

• So Bad, It's Good: How some viewers see the film, as explained here.
• Too Bleak, Stopped Caring: This is such an unrelentingly dark and bleak film that many viewers were unable to enjoy it.
• Vindicated by History: While this movie bombed to an absolutely comical extent on its first release and remains somewhat divisive for its extreme violence and its po-faced take on the Punisher, it's picked up a rather large cult following due to its visual style, Stevenson's performance in the lead role, and the simple fact that it's one of the very few action movies directed by a woman.
• Visual Effects of Awesome: The film's lighting and color work makes the film look like it came right from the pages of a Punisher comic book, creating a dark and vibrant environment that pops out well. Beyond this, Jigsaw's makeup both looks awesome and gruesome at the same time.

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