Writer: Felipe Smith; Artist: Juan Gedeon; Letterer: VC's Cory Petit; Colorist: Tamra Bonvillain; Editor: Mark Paniccia; Editor In Chief: Axel Alonso; Cover Artist: Francesco Francavilla
At the Killiseum, the entertainment center of Battleworld, a massive crowd is in attendance for the Ghost Races. Each attendee has their favorite racer, but the most popular by far is Robbie "the Hell-Charger" Reyes, who is preparing for the race. The proprietor of the Killiseum, Arcade, introduces the crowd to the Spirits of Ignition, and the race begins!
The race between the five competitors is fierce, with Alejandra "Nicaraguan Hellfire" Jones nearly winning in the last moments before being taken out. The winner is Reyes, who comments to the spirit of Eli Morrow inside him that the race was too close and they almost lost. While Reyes is taken to the victory podium, the losing competitors (Johnny Blaze, Danny Ketch, Alejandra Jones, and Carter Slade) are all "de-spirited" and taken into custody by the Killiseum guards. Reyes is interviewed by a reporter who comments that he now holds the record for the most victories in the Ghost Races. Before he can comment, Danny Ketch yells to Reyes that he'll suffer for the torture that the rest of them have to endure, and that no one can escape the curse of the Ghost Racer.
Later that night, Robbie and his younger brother Gabe are treated to VIP status at Club Jekyll & Hyde. The two brothers watch a highlight reel of Robbie's victories in the races, with Gabe calling Robbie his hero. Meanwhile, at the Killiseum, Arcade and his "guardian angel" Zadkiel are supervising the torture of the racers who lost. Arcade checks in on the statistics of the night's race and comments to himself that Reyes is too good a racer, and it will make Arcade even richer if Reyes never sees the finish line again.
Due to the nature of Battleworld, none of the Ghost Riders featured in this series come from the established Marvel Universe; all of them hail from alternate realities, which explains the inconsistencies in characterizations.
The Ghost Racers featured in this issue include: Robbie Reyes (who first appeared in All-New Ghost Rider (2014) # 1), Johnny Blaze (first appeared in Marvel Spotlight on Ghost Rider (1972) # 5), Danny Ketch (first appeared in Ghost Rider (1990) # 1), Carter Slade (first appeared in The Ghost Rider (1967) # 1), and Alejandra Jones (misnamed Alejandra Blaze in this series, first appeared in Ghost Rider (2011) # 1).
Zadkiel, who appears here as the handler for the Spirits of Ignition, was the angel responsible for the creation of the Spirits of Vengeance in the 616 Marvel Universe. He made his first appearance in Ghost Rider (2006) # 27.
This issue also included a 1-page text/art article by Juan Gedeon called "The Devil's In the Details Part 1: Horsepower From Hell", which features commentary on his design for Carter Slade.
CHAIN REACTION
All-New Ghost Rider is transformed into Ghost Racers as it enters the Secret Wars event, sorta but not really continuing the story of Robbie Reyes while offering some really wild interpretations of other Ghost Riders (sorry, Ghost Racers).
Secret Wars was such an uneven, weird event for Marvel, particularly when it came to the tie-in series (of which there were MANY). Most of the tie-ins were simply sequels or retreads of past Marvel event stories, like "Inferno", "Future Imperfect", and "House of M". Only a handful brought something truly original into the patchwork Battleworld, and those were generally the most interesting of all the titles. The Marvel creators were given the choice to do a Secret Wars tie-in or to wrap up their titles with "Last Days" stories; Felipe Smith chose to do the former, but since Ghost Rider doesn't really have a classic event story to call back on (unless you go with "Siege of Darkness", but who would want to read that again?), he went for a concept that was simultaneously batshit crazy yet a natural fit for the character.
Essentially, he did Deathrace 2000 with all the Ghost Riders, and it's fucking brilliant.
There isn't much of a story here, since most of the issue is a showcase for our first Ghost Race, but so much of the characterization is on display during the race that it feels like more happens than really does. Robbie is pretty much the same as his previously established counterpart, but the personalities of the others vary wildly from what we've seen before. Carter Slade as a demonic cowboy centaur with miniguns? Okay, yeah, I can go with that. I also think that this is the most personality Alejandra has ever shown, I actually liked her here far more than I did in our own series a few years back. The problem, though, is that any emotional connection you may have with these characters are there in name only due to this all being alternate earth counterpart stuff. Danny Ketch as a Sons of Anarchy type is interesting, sure, but it's Danny Ketch in name only. Even Robbie doesn't feel the same, because all of the development he got during his last series has been erased, so while he's basically the same the differences in, for example, his relationship with Gabe makes things profoundly difficult to attach to.
The real showcase here is the artwork by Juan Gedeon, who has redesigned all of the Ghost Riders except for Robbie, some in very particularly awesome ways. Carter Slade, as I described above, is a lot different from "He Who Rides the Night Winds", and it's fantastic that Gedeon was able to get across so much personality with each character design. Plus, he was able to make a character who can easily get confused with other incarnations visually distinct from Rider to Rider. He also excels at drawing chase scene action, which is notoriously hard to pull off in a dynamic way, given that comics are a visual sans motion.
So, while the characterizations are a problem, that's really not Felipe Smith's fault given the mission statement of these Secret Wars titles. He came out and made something really distinct and interesting, and I for one applaud this series.
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