Ghost Rider: Vengeance Unbound

MARVEL SPOTLIGHT ON GHOST RIDER # 6

SYNOPSIS
A biker gang called Satan's Servants rides through the darkened New York streets, looking for someone to beat up. Their leader, a rider in a masked helmet named Curly, notices a lone rider ahead, and orders the gang to attack. The Ghost Rider turns and sees the advancing gang, and instead of fighting decides to run. When he quickly realizes that he can't outrun his pursuers, Blaze turns and lights the ground aflame with his hellfire, which causes most of the gang to run in terror. The only one that stays to confront Johnny is Curly, who invites Blaze to join the gang. Curly takes the Ghost Rider back to the gang's crash pad, where the other bikers give a less than friendly welcome to their new member. The gang leader takes Blaze into a back room and asks him to tell him everything about him, specifically why he has a flaming skull for a head. Johnny cannot help but talk, as Curly seems to possess almost hypnotic powers, and tells the biker his life story, including the origins of his curse. Curly then commands Blaze to go to sleep, and he falls to the floor. Surprisingly, Curly paints a pentagram on his chest and says aloud an incantation, which summons Satan himself into the room. The Hell-Lord commends his servant by allowing him to take his true form, that of Crash Simpson, who has struck a deal to return to life, with the cost being Johnny's soul. However, Satan is unable to claim Blaze's soul, as Roxanne's pure spirit still protects him. The demon tells Crash that he must first remove Roxanne, and only then will he retain his true form. Satan disappears, causing Crash to revert back to his guise as Curly.

The next morning, Johnny awakens in the biker gang's house, and slips out unnoticed. He returns to his hotel, where is confronted by Roxanne. He begins to tell her about his curse, but stops himself at the last minute, causing her to leave in anger. Blaze falls asleep, and sleeps until nightfall, when he is awakened by his transformation into the Ghost Rider. Immediately after, Curly walks in and tells Blaze that his cycle gang is going to kidnap Roxanne during her cycle show that night. Johnny immediately runs to his bike, and takes off toward Madison Square Garden.

Right before Roxanne's performance is set to start, Satan's Servants bust into the arena on their cycles. One of the bikers, Animal, grabs the girl by the waist and rides toward the exit, but is cut off by the Ghost Rider. The two then perform a death-defying chase through several of the arena's bike stunt ramps, until Blaze finally gets a chance to throw a bolt of hellfire. Animal wipes out, but neither he nor Roxanne are injured. Rocky recognizes Johnny, and tells him to take a bow to the crowd and pretend his appearance was part of the cycle show. Satan's Servants are immediately rounded up by the police and taken to jail.

A few minutes later, Johnny and Roxanne talk, and she tells him that she saw Johnny's transformation the night he sold his soul to Satan, and that she recognized him as soon as she saw him. Johnny brushes aside her offers to help him, saying that he can offer nothing but danger and eventually death, and rides away into the night. Hours later, a distraught Roxanne is confronted by Curly in her dressing room. He hypnotizes her to sleep, and then declares that he will do anything to return to life, even sacrifice his own daughter.

REVIEW
In his second issue, Johnny Blaze begins his first official story-arc following his origin story debut last issue...and boy is it a doozy in as many awful ways possible.

I don't even know where to begin with this story - "Angels From Hell" is probably one of my least favorite issues of Ghost Rider, a story filled with plot holes, terrible pacing, questionable plot choices, and confusing characterizations that drag it down to almost unreadable depths. I suppose any starting point is good, so let's begin with the big "what the fuck" moment of the book...Crash Simpson being Satan's servant.

From all previous accounts, which at this point included only the origin story in the previous issue, Crash Simpson was a good man. Gruff, yes, and a bit too macho for his good, but not a man that one would expect to go to Hell upon his death. If anything, his love for his daughter and adopted son would surely be enough to place him past the Pearly Gates of Heaven. But for whatever reason, Crash wound up in Hell and became a slave to Satan, blinded by the promise of eternal life in exchange for Johnny's soul and the death of Roxanne. A loving father now murdering his children in exchange for his life...does that sound like the man described by Johnny in the previous issue?

But even worse, let's take a look at Satan's master plan involving Crash. Satan takes Simpson's soul and returns it to Earth - either by changing his body to that of Curly Samuels or by having the soul take over Samuel's body (it's not clearly explained which, actually) - and sends him after Blaze's soul. So far so good, I suppose. Satan then sends Simpson/Samuels out into New York to become the new leader of the Satan's Servants cycle gang, who accidentally encounter the Ghost Rider on a midnight ride. That's right, Satan's master plan is dependant upon one huge act of cosmic coincidence...the lord of the underworld decided that Simpson must become the leader of a cycle gang with no prior history or contact with Blaze in order to claim Johnny's soul. Does that make any sense at all? I honestly don't see the point in the Curly Samuels charade at all, but the ridiculous happenstance of it all makes the story look like it was plotted out on the back of a napkin.

There's also some really shaking plot and script decisions in this issue. Was it really necessary to have a four page origin recap one issue after the character's origin story was told in detail? That, coupled with prose so purple it gave me a headache and the clearly-intentional homosexual undertones in Johnny's "attraction" to Curly, is a big part of what makes this issue so bad. We're also given our first "Roxanne Simpson: Damsel In Distress" plotline, only the first of many.

But of course, there are some good points to this issue. The chase sequence between Animal and the Ghost Rider through the various stunt devices is very clever, giving some much-needed variety to the motorcycle action sequences. We're also treated once again to the incredible artwork of Mike Ploog, who turns in an issue that's not quite as strong as the previous but still quite good.

This is the first chapter to Blaze's first extended story-arc, and it's awful...I'm almost embarrassed to say that things don't really get better until a few issues down the road.