User reviews

Not content on dominating the big screen with a connected Marvel cinematic universe, Marvel now aims to create a connected anime universe. Avengers Confidential is a loose sequel to to Iron Man: Rise of Technovore. This time, Iron Man takes a back seat to previous supporting characters of Punisher and Black Widow. Following their debacle in Karachi, Frank Castle aka The Punisher, has returned to taking out organised crime lords. But when one of his hits crosses path with S.H.I.E.L.D, Frank is taken into custody. He has stumbled onto a vast international conspiracy involving an old Russian supersoldier programme and mind control. Unwillingly teamed up with s.H.I.E.L.D agent Black Widow, Frank has to deal with superpowered foes way out of his league while Widow must confront a shadowy figure from her past.

It is an intriguing story. Well written and feeling like it came straight out of the comic books. No surprise there that it was written by comic book writer Majorie Liu. This is a cool way to tie The Punisher into the greater world of Marvel anime characters, themselves already sharing a lot in common with the live action movie universe. In live action, The Punisher's gritty mafia/street crime stories just do not mix with the Avengers' high flying superheroics. If they cannot do it in live action, anime would have to suffice.

Credit goes to this movie for coming up with an interesting reason why the superpowered Avengers remain out of the picture. Since you have a villain who perfected mind control, the last thing you can risk is your most powerful heroes turning against you. So they get plain ol human Frank Castle, The Punisher, and plain ol human Black Widow. Except, the "plain ol human" bit is conveniently forgotten about 10 minutes in where both Punisher and Black Widow are able to go hand to hand with super soldiers, dodge bullets, punch people through walls and take injuries that would kill any normal human.

Now, this being Japanese anime, Marvel has allowed Madhouse Studios (creators of classics like Ninja Scroll, Trigun and the rest of Marvel's anime output) to sprinkle their own eastern touch into this tale. The result......a mixed bag. First is the screenplay, written by Mitsutaka Hirota of Ramen fighter Miki and YuGiOh Zexal fame/infamy. It is a stiffled screenplay, clichéd and lacking any of the wit or character interplay that marvel's live action universe excels in.

This is not helped by the mediocre voice acting from both Japanese and English actors. Punisher growls and grumbles his way through the movie lacking chemistry with Black Widow; herself portrayed more as a straightforward hero with a tragic past romance than a sultry manipulative secret agent whom no one can guess what she is planning to do next. This same screenplay turns our main antagonist into some love scorned brat with a serious inferiority complex who subjected himself to experiments to become a superpowered stalker after his old flame.

Once again, Marvel anime serves as a showcase of what anime always gets wrong. Hyper detailed artwork is ruined by animation shortcuts. First time Director Kenichi Shimizu who watched one too many Michael bay movies peppers this show with shaky cameras, extreme close ups and long lingering shots focused on Black Widow's shiny leather clad chest and bum areas. Nonetheless, the character designs look straight out of Vampire Hunter D Bloodlust with long curvy sharp featured women, square jawed bulky men and a shadow for every nook cranny and crease on a character. They look beautiful.

So in keeping with the usual Marvel Anime standards, we have another visually stunning little movie with a decent story but little else in terms of the script, characters and animation. Better than Iron Man: Rise of Technovore of course, and much better than that CGI atrocity Iron Man/Hulk: Heroes United. Yet no where near DC and Warner Premiere's most mediocre efforts.

Did not like it.

It was more talk than action. I kind of hate it when animation is all talk, what's the point? The animation does not even look cheap it looks like some effort went into it. Enough effort for it not to be just the characters talking for 90mins.

Maybe it would be worth the talk if it was not a story I heard many times. Though the addiction of the Punisher is some-what refreshing, listening to the Black widow and Nick fury defend their occupations as spies is only interesting when Sam L Jackson and Scarlett Johansson do it.

The voice acting was not worthy of all that talk. It was like they were just reading their lines and not really well.

I've seen better action sequences and the character design was weak. When The Avengers finally made it on screen, I was not excited to see them at all.

I do like seeing the villain Graviton done for animation but his appearance was to minimal too salvage the film.

Found it uninteresting.

I read some Punisher Comics and really liked them for their dark atmosphere and more or less discussing that whole thing about if it's OK or not to take justice in your own hands. And guess what? That was not a topic at all in this movie. And why did they have to team up Punisher and Black Widow? I have no idea, they don't really fit together... So the story is basically to stop the evil organization Leviathan from doing a very bad thing. The cool thing is that I liked the idea of this organization cause it was kinda vaguely described and fitted quite well as a placeholder for the Freemasons, Zionists elites, mafia or whoever really controls major crime stuff like weapon and human trafficking in our world. So the antagonist concept worked for me but the execution lacked. The movie starts OK but gets worse and worse, worst point the ending where suddenly some of the Avengers appear and they barely say a word and they are seriously unnecessary for the plot. So that was just a marketing thing I guess. Another thing is why does it have to be an anime style movie? I really don't know but the animation was well done so it's OK yet not the way it should be. This whole movie feels a lot like an 80s action movie and I think that's why I like it but it can't reach the emotional deepness and suspense that many DC animations reached so far - and I'm saying this as a true Marvel fan.

"Marvel" should stop butchering our favorite heroes by badly reworking them as Japanese anime. I like anime (the good anime) but in this movie the plot, the dialogs, the direction were just as bad as the worst anime titles.

Illogical cuts, characterization of protagonists (especially Punisher), shallow Fury, shallow BW; unnecessary love twist and motivation of the evildoers is so bad that this film could easily be one of the worst comic adaptations ever.

All falls apart in trying to explain the moral code of the main characters and, as we know from the comics, the question of morality for Punisher and Black Widow is the shadow line if there ever was one.

Marvel should employ some good comic screenwriters for their animated movie section and make them see DC's "Dark Knight Returns 1/2" to be sure that the characters and the storyline will be treated properly. That is, if "Marvel" really care about animated section at all. With the last year "Iron Man: Rise of Tehnovore" , "Iron Man & Hulk: Heroes United" and now this; Marvel is making themselves a bad reputation as far as the animated movies go.

Terrible movie. Not recommended to anyone. It doesn't matter if you're comic book fan or not. The people who did it just don't have the slightest idea about the characters on which they were working, and I should say even about good Japanese anime either.

I'm probably not the best suited person to analyze this movie as I am not the most knowledgeable of neither anime nor comic books. I like anime, and enjoy comic book films and television series, but I'm not a hardcore fan. Comic book fans go into movies already knowing the characters for the most part, whereas for me it's like I'm introduced to each character for the first time. In a way that makes me more objective as I don't know what characters are supposed to be like, and simply watch the movie for what it is. At any rate, I watched this movie and here are my thoughts.

I know anime fans have a debate on "dub" vs "sub"—that is whether they prefer anime movies dubbed into English or with English subtitles. While I normally prefer subtitles to maintain the authenticity of the work, in this movie's case, it is more like this is the English version of the movie than simply a dubbing.

As indicated by the title, this movie focuses on the character The Punisher. Even having seen "The Punisher" (2004), my memory of this guy is vague. He is a vigilante character, who is neither good nor bad, who does whatever it takes to protect the innocent regardless of whether his actions are with in the laws or not. He is arrested by the international organization S.H.I.E.L.D. and they plea bargain with him. An evil crime organization, Leviathan, has stolen weapons and plans to auction them off. The Punisher is sent on a mission with Black Widow to stop the sale of these weapons.

While the artwork was vivid, the animation was minimal—I suppose to keep the feel of reading a comic book. There was not a whole lot of movement in the animation, even in action sequences, and still shots of characters' faces or long pans of people or scenery was common.

Overall, the film is formulaic of any episode of a super hero animated television series. The bad guys have an evil scheme and the good guys have to stop it. That's not a bad thing, it's just what it is, and I happened to like that.

It was impossible to review this film because I fell asleep halfway and couldn't bring myself to continue.

Yes. It's THAT bad...and I'm a fan of comic-book animated films having watched most films in the genre.

I'm told that the Avengers do show up in the last 10 minutes. The challenge is to get through the drivel leading up to those 10 minutes. It seems Marvel is overplaying the drama between Punisher and Black Widow - but they are just not compelling enough to keep one engaged. After 10 minutes I felt as if I was watching an animated soap opera.

AVOID.

Didn't really love this movie! But it was somehow interesting!

This movie is almost unwatchable. Many have pointed out plot holes and poor writing in general but add to that the cringe inducing voice acting, the feeble attempt at an anime tone and the absolutely horrible editing. There are constant scenes of a character saying something in the middle of a conversation and unexplained delays before the other person says anything back. Maybe it would make sense if the director included a meaningful look or gesture or frankly anything but there's nothing. Half the time, while you're waiting for anyone to respond to a line the scene is just everyone standing or sitting and there's no expression on their face at all. I understand "meaningful" pauses but these are just pauses that make no sense.

So the writing is a mess, the voice acting is painful and the editing barely exist. Avoid this movie as if it will give your brain cancer - because it will.

Marvel never stood for dark and gloomy brutality, mutilation and mass murder / serial killings. So this movie simply uses popular characters in order to produce a gore-like film. It sucked at the beginning, it sucked in the middle and it sucked at the end...

Just because most kids nowadays have the IQ of an ice-cube and are trained to watch everything that is lowest quality does not give anyone the right to produce such a perversion of a film. Nothing but mayhem and slaughter, worst dialogue possible and more like that.

Its an insult to anyone who appreciates true stories and art well done. This movie only serves as the best example of one of the worst movies.

When I saw the title I thought it was going to be more of a Black Widow/Punisher story than anything and I was right I thought it made Punisher look like the bad*** that he is but it wasn't much of the Avengers the last 10-15 minutes had the Avengers appear which was for me the best part but the long drawn out story with Punisher and Black Widow was kinda dry more talking than anything it was somewhat boring but it was nice to see Punisher get to show how great he is the used Avengers in the name to get the dollars but it should have been called "Black Widow and the Punisher: Fight the Lavethian" ft. The Avengers cause that is pretty much what it was if it wasn't for the free ticket to see The Amazing Spiderman 2 that came with it I would be somewhat upset that I spent money on it

Recently added to Disney Plus, so now showing up near the top of my alphabetical trawl the films there, was this 2014 Anime film, that has decent action scenes, but very little else going for it.

Having initially worked against each other, and ruined a SHIELD operation, Frank Castle (Brian Bloom) is convinced to team up with Black Widow (Jennifer Carpenter) to locate a black-market weapons dealer named Caine (Kyle Herbert). They track him to the base of LEVIATHAN, a terrorist organisation and there come up against Elihas Starr (Grant George) a former SHIELD Agent, and lover of Widow, who was presumed dead.

I really struggled to maintain much interest in this. It's not without any merit, visually it's pretty good. It was the last thing produced with Madhouse Animation studios and their style is fun and dynamic. The story of this one is . . . Fine. Former agent assumed dead and now a villain is . . well, the Winter Soldier, I guess, but it's rehashed again here with the added twist that he was Black Widows lover at the time he was 'killed'. It actually does the thing that, realistically all Marvel movies should do, and calls in the rest of the heroes at the end to make sure that they don't fail. The story does have a reasonably sensible reason for keeping them out of it earlier though, which is a nice touch.

The vocal performances are really poor though. There are notable actors involved, such as Jennifer Carpenter, but there's a disconnect between the speech and the visuals (perhaps because it was designed around a Japanese performer?). There's also a lifelessness in the sound design, with no background noise in a lot of the scenes and the editing leaves a lot to be desired.

Because I'm watching everything on Disney Plus (or at least trying to) I'm sure I'll get around to the other collaborations with Madhouse, but I hope they're a little better finished than this one is.

For having so much potential the writing or story telling is simply abysmal. The dialogue is some of the worst I've heard, well... period. The voice acting is solid and the animation isn't bad. Like I said, lot's of potential. So much excellent source material to work with. I have no idea how anyone can write dialogue this terrible.

Second and final film in the Marvel Anime series. As the sequel to Iron Man: Rise of Technovore, this one too had its ups and downs. I couldn't handle its slow pacing and bland storyline.

Black Widow & Punisher is an anime film within the Marvel Universe. It has two Marvel Heroes (the latter being more of an anti-hero) in an interesting pair up with a fairly decent premise. But the main problem this film has is its execution.

The art style and cinematography is great for the most part and does give a slightly different feel compared to other animated superhero films. It adds to the slightly mature tone and mildly gritty atmosphere. It also makes for some fairly good fight scenes, as they are well animated and punchy.

But the story and characters is this film's biggest flaw. The premise is decent, but the actual storytelling isn't all that compelling. Punisher's characterization starts off strong but ends up a little mischaracterised later on. His arc is interesting as he deals with having to hold back his need to go off the rails and kill as an anti-hero. But Black Widow's arc and characterization is just... meh. She's great in action scenes, but in the actual narrative she doesn't bring much to the table in terms of something interesting, other than a shoehorned love plot that has no compelling or impactful factors.

Overall, mediocre movie. It's visually good, but narratively lost.

I love Black Widow, she's one of my favourite heroes, so when I saw this movie at the library I had to borrow it; and I have to say, I was thoroughly disappointed. They tried to make it too much like an anime and forgot that it was also still a superhero movie. Don't get me wrong, I like a good anime as much as the next person, but this was anything from good. Not only this the actual story was lacking too, when I first found it I thought - aha! Black Widow/Punisher team up, it's a great concept, what could go wrong? - Well apparently a lot could and did. Needless to say, next time I go to borrow something like this I'll read up on it first.

I wasn't expecting much when I turned this on. After the magnificent show of the Avengers, it's hard to elaborate on the fringes of the Marvel Universe. However, this movie goes to show that even the fringes can be as exciting as the main course.

Focusing on the Black Widow and Punisher, this movie was clearly made by a Japanese anime fan for all the anime fans out there. And it doesn't get too aloof with the fact that it is quite anime. I am not a purist, but this was an exciting romp with a little twist of Japanese. Kind of like a light beer with a wedge of lemon.

You get a decent enough storyline, punctuated with fast fight scenes and the Black Widow twisting herself into impossible routines, for your pleasure. The fight scenes are pretty much the highlight of the movie, with the story taking a bit of a back seat, so don't expect award winning script writing.

You will find the dialog a bit cheesy, but we are dealing with a comic book story line. I feel it doesn't detract too much from what the movie is intended to be, purely a popcorn munching, time passing movie. I would probably watch it again in a few years, just to refresh myself.

Graphics are standard Japanese anime, with Black Widow looking thoroughly like what a animator would have imagined her to look, svelte with flowing hair. Punisher gets beefed up and looks precisely like the comics.

Voice acting in my opinion was spectacular. I enjoyed Jennifer Carpenter doing Black Widow - barely recognized her from her Dexter days, but it's definitely her. Brian Bloom gives a great performance as a gruff talking Frank Castle, reminds me of some of his work on A-Team in 2010.

My advice is to watch this with an open, clear mind. Don't expect to see world class action scenes, with Joss Whedon witty banter. It's a Japanese anime mixed into the Marvel Universe and it gets a fair storyline through.

At the end, it's a 5 dollar thrill ride on a roller coaster at a local fairground. Gets the job done, for a good price.

I give this 10/10 for exceeding my expectations and having a solid casting and believable storyline.

Kudos to the filmmakers.