The Original Ghost Rider (1992) # 2

"Angels From Hell"

Cover Date: August 1992; On Sale Date: June 1992

Writer: Gary Friedrich;  Artist: Mike Ploog; Inker: Frank Monte; Letterer: John Costanza; Editor: Roy Thomas; Reprint Editor: Evan Skolnick; Cover Artist: Javier Saltares

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.

Really getting into the act, huh Johnny?

THE ROADMAP

This issue is a reprint of Marvel Spotlight on Ghost Rider (1972) # 6.

This issue includes a Ghost Rider pin-up by Gavin Curtis.

CHAIN REACTION
This is another reprint without any new material, so I've not really got much to say about it. The colors seem more vibrant than in the original, but if the art has been touched up or re-colored I can't say, since just like in the original the colorist is absent from the credits. That's not surprising, since at the time of original publication colorists were routinely dropped from the creator boxes. 

I do remember first picking up this comic and being flabbergasted by how 1970s it all was. I was a teenager in the 1990s, remember, and was comparing this not just to the recently reprinted early 1980s material but also the concurrent 1990s series. Ploog's artwork was still on form, but the story was such a time capsule for an era I was totally unfamiliar with at the time. Imagine the culture shock! 

Still, it was great that Marvel was reprinting this material, because it gave new readers such as myself a way to immerse in the character's backlog and lore in a way that was pretty difficult to do otherwise.