Already adapted twice to the cinema without counting an appearance in the series, the character of the Ghost Rider deserved a complete in comics. This is done by this first volume published by Panini. Heat up the rubber to follow the ghost biker.
A start in fourth gear
The first episode immerses you in the atmosphere of a horror movie. In a first page on a street in the rain, the reader discovers a frightening biker with a flaming skull as his head. While the voice-over dramatizes this appearance, the chopper runs on the asphalt of a metropolis passing in front of a crime in progress around the corner. The mobsters want to kill this troublesome witness but quickly, they are the ones who will flee in front of this skeleton. Is he the one who will explain how he was cursed to become the Ghost Rider every night? Stuntman Johnny Blaze is a tormented man to whom many misadventures happen. Father dead in a show and no mother. He is adopted by a stuntman friend in the circus. His adoptive mother dies in a motorcycle accident and, before passing away, he promises not to do a show again. He falls in love with his adoptive sister. His adoptive father is suffering from an incurable disease while the family is on the verge of glory. Desperate, He appeals to the devil. Logical for a gypsy but, of course, the Faustian pact goes wrong. 
We are in the middle of personal melodrama while the outside world is dark. The streets are dirty and violence on every corner. Mike Ploog's drawing is similar. Through very precise forms, the artist uses strong images such as the transmutation of the flaming skeleton that finds a human figure on a blood-red background. The inking reinforces the dark atmosphere. But there are only a handful of episodes left before giving way to Tom Sutton, Jim Mooney, Herb Trimpe and Ross Andru with sometimes less talent.
A suite full of turns
The second episode remains in the footsteps of the beginning by mixing crime and Satanism. At night, the Ghost Rider confronts a gang of bikers, the Servants of Satan. However, in search of a social relationship, he agrees to join the gang. It's a scripted excuse to describe the life and rules of a gang. But the devil also lurks. It is the love for Roxanne – like Cyrano de Bergerac – that prevents Johnny from becoming a servile servant of the Master. The final fight of the first run ends in apotheosis in hell. It is regrettable, however, that the colors too bright sometimes make the reader leave the story supposed to be demonic and violent.
It is also the story of a trouillard. Johnny refuses to do the shows, runs away from his family to hide his situation and as Ghost Rider, he does not seek confrontation but flees several times. It is the problems that find it, not the other way around. However, the biker frequently finds himself involved in chases in the middle of aerobatic obstacles and then against a police car. He will gradually learn heroism.
As always at Marvel, the main character always has a personal life as well. By day, Johnny Blaze is an itinerant circus artist capable of performing stunts unique in the world. We discover the other side of stunt shows by jealousy between a technician and Johnny. The travels both allow Johnny to hide his condition but confront him with various demons like a huge Native American snake.
Editorial history
In the introduction, writer and editor Roy Thomas shows how everything starts from a western song in the 50s. The lyrics make a small publishing house want to create the character but it has nothing to do with the current anti-hero. Indeed, the first Ghost Rider is a cowboy who uses gadgets to pose as a ghost and deliver justice. When the rights passed into the public domain in 1967, Marvel's editorial director, Stan Lee, reclaimed the name to make it a short-lived series. It was in 1972 that screenwriter Gary Friedrich proposed to take the name to make him a motorcycle villain. The publisher Thomas wants to go further and make him a hero. The link with biker films is explicit. The two designed the origin with cartoonist Mike Ploog. It is now very fun to discover this office life at Marvel that no longer exists because all creatives work from home. Ghost Rider debuted in an anthology magazine, Marvel Spotlight, to test the popularity of the character. The success being at the rendezvous, Johnny Blaze goes in a solo series. This success will continue as shown as a bonus the major covers of the series until a very recent date but also pencils of the first episodes.
This first volume of the complete Ghost Rider takes you at full speed to hell. In a scenario certainly vintage but very fun to read, this anti-hero finds himself immersed in personal moral debates but threatened by Satanists or bikers, he never has time to solve them.
If you like horror stories, you can find our review on Faithless and the fantasy universe of Archie comics, Vampironica.
