'Rider' gets the whip

Growing up reading comic books, almost every kid loved Ghost Rider. How could you not find a man who became a fiery skeleton at night, rode a badass chopper and used a chain whip to fight the evil servants of the devil to be the coolest thing ever? The trailer to "Ghost Rider" said it all to me: Another of one my favorite comic book heroes just got pissed on. \nGood job writer/director Mark Steven Johnson! First you make "Daredevil" into an utter piece of crap, so why not ruin yet another Marvel property by completely bastardizing it -- filling it with shitty one-liners and enough God-awful CG that it makes those commercials you see on television for community colleges that offer computer design degrees look like WETA renderings for "The Lord of the Rings" films? \nIn "Ghost Rider" stuntman Johnny Blaze (a miscast Nicolas Cage) makes a deal with Mephisto (read: Lucifer, as embodied by Peter Fonda) to cure his father of cancer in exchange for his soul. Problem is his father still kicks the bucket and now Blaze lives life on the edge trying to prove he is the greatest stuntman in the world. That is until Blackheart (Wes Bently AKA the weird kid in "American Beauty") arrives in search of some scroll that has 1,000 souls on it so he can rule the world and dethrone Mephisto, his father. Blaze, being Mephisto's "bounty hunter," is transformed into Ghost Rider, the entity I just mentioned two paragraphs ago, only not as badass. \nThis film is a crock and I blame 99.9 percent of it on Mark Steven Johnson. He treats this material as a big joke, adding such brilliant writing as making Blaze say: "My skull feels like it's on fire!" Sam Raimi loves Spider-Man and Christopher Nolan loves Batman; Johnson just loves collecting paychecks on Marvel properties. The story doesn't even make sense as it jumps from action set-piece to set-piece, complete with a poor love story between Nicolas Cage and Eva Mendes, who is only worth mentioning for how much her cleavage is wallpapered on the screen. \nNicolas Cage as Ghost Rider? Is the "Spirit of Vengeance" really this man with a bad hairpiece and Southern accent who fades in and out? The answer, bluntly: No. Wes Bently as Blackheart is the biggest joke of them all, though. Last I remember, Blackheart was a giant black monstrosity with fangs who sucked the souls from the living, not a Hot Topic poster child who walked around with his three goth buddies who belong at a Cradle of Filth concert. \n"Ghost Rider" has two decent things going for it. The first is casting Sam Elliott as the Caretaker because that man never has to try too hard. Just have him speak with his cowboy twang and spit a lot. The second is the fact that they got the Ghost Rider transformation right, what with all the horrific screaming that turns to maniacal laughter. Still, it was Nicolas Cage doing it so it wasn't that good. Peter Fonda would've been cool were it not the obvious fact he was put there because some asshole probably said, "Oh, yeah, he was in that one motorcycle movie from the 1960s!" \nOh there was one more redeeming thing: The trailer for "Spider-Man 3" showed before the film. At least I have that to look forward to.