Cover Date: July 1992; Publication Date: May 1992
With the Braineaters holding the little boy Billy hostage and Jack Russell seemingly dead, Ghost Rider has surrendered himself and has had his limbs chained to motorcycles. When the Braineaters attempt to rip him apart, Ghost Rider is able to break the chains, but the werewolves escape with Billy still in their possession. The weakened Ghost Rider is found by Russell, who barely survived his fall of the bridge. Jack has a plan and sends Dan Ketch out to local bars to try and locate the Braineaters in their human forms. At the Black Moon Bar & Grill, Dan finds the Braineaters and strikes up a conversation with their human concubine, Lupe. Dan sees through the girl's tough exterior and tries to appeal to the good inside her, but he's interrupted by the Braineaters. They drag him outside of the bar and beat him nearly to death, leaving him unconscious in the alley.
THE ROADMAP
This issue of Marvel Comics Presents also contained stories featuring Wolverine/Typhoid Mary, Thanos, and Nightcrawler.
The biker that gives information to Dan Ketch is named Fraser and he first appeared in Ghost Rider (1990) # 4 before appearing in this story's first chapter in Marvel Comics Presents (1988) # 107.
CHAIN REACTION
While the previous chapter of "Return of the Braineaters" was an ultimately unsatisfying fight scene, this one returns to form with more of the exploitation style tone that was making the serial so interesting at the start.
Writer Chris Cooper seems to be ticking off all the boxes for how to make this the grimiest story possible without going full lewd. Beginning with Ghost Rider being drawn and quartered by motorcycles, which is a great visual that I'm surprised hasn't cropped up more in stories over the years, and ending with the fantastically dirty Black Moon Bar and Grill, this chapter just oozes with style. I can imagine it's difficult to give new characters any kind of discernible personalities outside of broad stroke traits in the Marvel Comics Presents format, but Cooper breathes such life into Lupe that she's easily the most interesting character in the story. It's also nice to see Danny Ketch get some play, he's usually left out of the more action-oriented Presents series, and his interaction with Lupe gives us the best scene in the chapter.
Similarly, despite the action detour last issue that didn't really play to his strengths, artist John Stanisci turns out eight really nice pages of work. He has a great handle on Ghost Rider, and his rough slightly-distorted character work really sells the story's tone. He's able to make the Black Moon Bar and Grill into a realistic place while still being minimal in the details, and his panels of Lupe simultaneously show her off as the dangerous ingenue and overwhelmed innocent that her characterization demands.
I'm really, really enjoying this story whenever it steps outside of the fight scene format, and I highly recommend it for the atmosphere alone.
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