Critics Scoreboard
All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...
Average Critic Score:
30
(24 sources)
30
(24 sources)
-
75
TV Guide
Rarely have moviegoers seen such a two-fisted wrecking ball of vengeance such as the one realized here by Ray Stevenson. Read Full Review » -
75
San Francisco Chronicle
Assuming you can appreciate the high level of gore and assorted sadistic weirdness, the action is satisfying. Read Full Review » -
58
Entertainment Weekly
Dominic West (The Wire) plays a facially mutilated Mob boss as if he's in a broad SNL sketch. Read Full Review » -
50
Variety
Along with torrents of gore, Punisher: War Zone has moments that are deliriously funny, because the violence is so awful and so casual. Read Full Review » -
50
Chicago Sun-Times
It looks great, it hurtles through its paces and is well-acted. The soundtrack is like elevator music if the elevator were in a death plunge. The special effects are state of the art. Its only flaw is that it's disgusting. Read Full Review » -
50
Chicago Tribune
The film works a bit better than the 2004 "Punisher" installment, the one starring surly, dislikable Thomas Jane as Frank Castle. Read Full Review » -
50
Village Voice
The script isn't what matters here: This is a slasher movie with guns, and, uh, huh-huh, that's pretty cool. Read Full Review » -
50
ReelViews
This is essentially a Steven Seagal movie without the Ponytailed One, and may appeal to those who enjoyed Seagal's rather bland, cookie-cutter action films. Read Full Review » -
40
Film Threat
Although it's possible to enjoy the first act and third act carnage without paying attention to the plot mechanics, the storyline itself continuously reminds us of the fallacy of Castle's quest. Read Full Review » -
40
Empire
Another violently unsuccessful attempt to bring this comic book character to screen. Read Full Review » -
40
New York Daily News
No worse than the second. Still, it pales in comparison to the first, which starred Dolph Lundgren. And that, right there, should tell you everything you need to know. Read Full Review » -
40
Austin Chronicle
The blood and gore quotients of Punisher: War Zone are extremely high and are sure to sop the appetites of the series' fans and virtual bloodlusters. Read Full Review » -
38
USA Today
The dialogue is beyond clichéd, and performances feel cobbled together from other movies. Read Full Review » -
38
Boston Globe
If most December movie releases are epic-length and Oscar-ambitious, then Punisher: War Zone has to be considered Hobbesian counterprogramming: It's nasty, brutish, and short. Read Full Review » -
38
Philadelphia Inquirer
The acting is better than the script deserves and Lexi Alexander's cut-to-the-hearse direction lends the film considerable kick. Read Full Review » -
38
Premiere
A disappointingly schlocky effort that gives up on trying to make a realistic Punisher movie, settling instead on a hokey, multi-colored-neon gun rave best enjoyed in Rob Zombie's family room. Read Full Review » -
30
Chicago Reader
This awful sequel dispenses with any such pretense, its cartoonish characters running an endless gauntlet of hypergruesome violence. Read Full Review » -
30
The Hollywood Reporter
So unrelentingly violent that all but teen boys might as well stay home. Read Full Review » -
25
The Onion (A.V. Club)
This is junk, a bunch of hard-R action scenes kept together by the thinnest of plots. Read Full Review » -
25
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
There is no stylistic thrill to this blunt object of a callous action film. It's content to bludgeon the audience into numb resignation. Read Full Review » -
20
Washington Post
Anyone with a modicum of good sense -- or a weak stomach -- will take it as a warning to stay the heck away from this literally and figuratively deadly "War Zone." Read Full Review » -
20
The New York Times
Does it have to be so witless, so stupid, so openly contemptuous of the very audience it's supposed to be pandering to? Read Full Review » -
0
New York Post
With its dopey fight scenes, grimy look and goopy gore, this movie is so far from ept that inept is the wrong word. It's anti-ept. Read Full Review » -
0
Baltimore Sun
All Alexander proves in Punisher: War Movie is that a martial-arts-trained woman can make a film just as stupid, coarse and numbing as any muscle man. Read Full Review »
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