Turns out Jon Bernthal has some real firearms skills.
One of the more frustrating things about movies and TV shows for gun enthusiasts is the plethora of mistakes that seem to plague them. You can have a great movie, but your suspense of disbelief is ruined when a character uses a wrong grip or when firearms make a bunch of unnecessary and realistic sounds.
It gets even worse when you start hearing names and terminology about firearms being thrown around. Remember the "porcelain Glock 7" from Die Hard II that can magically go through metal detectors? Yeah, some of the mistakes are downright embarrassing.
It is even worse when the actors clearly do not know what they are doing with the firearms and their character is supposed to be military or law enforcement. Well, before you go assuming no actor knows what they are doing, just watch Jon Bernthal of "The Walking Dead" and "The Punisher" fame show off some serious handling skills on the range.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bl3os91hJs0
The video's description states that these are blanks, but we are still impressed. Bernthal displays a proper grip on the classic Glock 17 and effortlessly switches from his right to his left hand. It is not just the speed either. There is some excellent recoil management on display here too. The actor does not have a background in the military or law enforcement which means he spent some real time training and studying to gain actual firearms skills for his roles.
It is refreshing to see. Especially in the Walking Dead which has some of the most laughable firearms mistakes in TV or movie history. We could fill a book with examples of ridiculous slide rack sounds, bad grips, and other technical gaffes. It left us with a sense of disbelief that any of the survivors could hit the broad side of a barn, much less a zombie!
This video also reminds us just how good Bernthal's run as the grief-stricken vigilante Frank Castle was in The Punisher. Many different actors have played that role, but there is no doubt, Bernthal was probably the best. We can only hope he gets another chance to reprise it in the future!
For more outdoor content from Travis Smola, be sure to follow him on Twitter and check out his Geocaching and Outdoors with Travis YouTube channels.
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