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On Friday, last week, Jordan, Erin and I went to see Ghost Rider. It sucked. I mean, when Erin and I saw Love’s Abiding Joy I thought, “Nothing can be this bad,” and I was right. Ghost Rider wasn’t that bad, but it still really, really, really, really, really sucked. Love’s Abiding Joy is still my watermark for bad movies (can’t get worse, yet) but man did Ghost Rider really suck.

The movie started with the back story, the origin. I think this was a really bad way to start the movie. The reason this was bad was because you forced too much exposition on the viewer before the viewer was ready for the information. For two reasons I am going to pretty much share everything. The first reason, because the movie was really bad; the second reason, I pray that no one makes the same mistake in going and seeing it.

With that said, the movie begins with the origin story of how Blaze becomes the Ghost Rider. In short, he makes a deal with the devil to save the life of his father; who, in turn, is dying from lung cancer. The devil allegedly heals his father, and then his father dies in a motorcycle accident. The most immediate outcome is that Johnny Blaze rides off into the sunset leaving his girlfriend under the tree where they were supposed to meet and leave town together before she is sent off to school back east. (Everything is back east.)

As Johnny rides off he hits a crossroads and ditches his bike rather than hit Mesostopheles. The outcome is that Mesostopheles tells him that someday he will come and use Mr. Johnny Blaze for what he will.

Jump forward in time and Johnny Blaze is now jumping his motorcycle for thousands of fans. The problem, every time he jumps the bike, he crashes. And every time he crashes, he should be dead. Every time he should be dead, he isn’t. Instead, he gets up and walks away from the crash.

At the same time the viewer is introduced to some nuances of character. For starters Johnny doesn’t drink alcohol because it gives him nightmares. He reads a lot of books about religion and the devil. He lives in a loft that doubles as his shop. And he’s never gotten over the girl he rode away from that fateful, rainy, day. Oh, and Nicholas Cage sucks as a choice for this character.

Among those of us that watched the movie, the consensus was that the actor playing the young Johnny Blaze (in this role) was a much better actor than Nicholas Cage (in this role) and as such, Nick cage brought down the movie.

Further, the movie basically covers the first ride of the Ghost Rider. Meaning, Mesostopheles comes and tells him that he now has to fight three of the four demons that possess the elements; specifically: air, water, and earth. (Fire is withheld as the Ghost Rider is the embodiment.)

With Mesostopheles return, Johnny Blaze turns into a skeleton on fire and embued with powers. The difference, though, between this Ghost Rider and the ones in the past is that this one made a deal with the devil that was for a moral purpose. The moral purpose, that his father not be killed. This is important because it gives Johnny Blaze control outside of the influence of the devil and allows him to retain the mantle of the Ghost Rider when the end comes.

So, the three of us also decided that the movie needed to decide to be really violent and graphic or it needed to be a moral tale. It, however, could not be both. In this case, it tried to be both. Which meant that when the Ghost Rider fought the three other elements, he won; but the fighting didn’t come off effectively and they were beat like… like… like… well, pretty easily. It didn’t take any effort, whatsoever, to destroy the three elements.

When the Ghost Rider went up against the main baddie (not Mesostopheles) at first he goes up against him and attempts to use the soul searing power of eyesight. (Apparently, looking into the Ghost Riders eyes causes those who have done evil to have their souls seared.) However, since the main baddie didn’t have a soul, he can’t be destroyed that way.

The solution: give the main baddie a soul… or a thousand souls. They just happen to be the thousand souls that the movie started out with, that the backstory indicated were Mesostopheles’ greatest achievement and a thousand souls that could turn the tide of power in Hell. This resulted in the previous Ghost Rider, a Texas Ranger who’d gone bad and made a deal with the devil not to hang for his crimes, from giving it to Mesostopheles.

Because of that, the main baddie got the souls. The Ghost Rider was able to use his eyesight to sear the souls, and in the end wins.

Every piece of that, from actors to acting to graphics to the violence, is what is wrong with the movie.

Here’s what might have made it better. First, Nicholas Cage was not the best choice for the role. I think he took it because he wanted something that could, potentially, turn into a lucrative action movie franchise. Comic book movies, done right, are money-makers… in perpetuity. The X-Men movies, the Superman movies, the Batman movies are ones that pay dividends to the studios, to the actors, to the writers for years to come. In my mind I am thinking Nicholas Cage took one look at the script, thought, “Moneymaker,” and then signed on the dotted line. He claims he’s a fan. He claims he’s always wanted to see this made into a move. And yet, the outcome isn’t that this was made into a movie or that it should have been, but rather that the studio making it was hoping to reproduce success where it was undeserved.

You see, they started with the origin story. Not enough people, in the world, know who the Ghost Rider is to care whether or not he has an origin. In my estimation they should’ve cut out the first twenty minutes of the movie and having Mesostopheles return and just introduced the character as already existing. Who cares whether or not you understand that this movie is about the consequences of making a deal with the devil. You can get that from character choices, through dialogue, through interactions with the various bad guys you interact with (as well as love interests), the audience didn’t need the backstory. Moreover, this isn’t Batman or Superman; because it’s neither of these franchises, the backstory obfuscates the story, in general, and as a result, the viewer is left with more information than is necessary or wanted.

Watching Batman, you kinda like to see what the mythology of the Dark Knight is. You want the backstory. So, taking Christian Bale, cast him as Bruce Wayne/Batman, and introduce how he is created to include the steps he takes, as an adult, to become this fighting machine. The audience was introduced to Batman a thousand different ways from comic books to a campy 70’s TV show to movies to cartoons. People know who Batman is, they wanted more and are willing to sit through the early exposition to get to the end.

Superman, pretty much the same way.

With the X-Men, Brian Singer pretty much left out the details in the first movie and allowed the only story that needed to be told as Wolverines because, this may shock people, an inordinate number of people, for some really strange reason, know who Wolverine is and, as a fan and non-fan favorite, want to see how he joins the X-Men. Truth told, he is the one who we follow through the three movies. He is, in essence, the POV character and that is a good thing. We get introduced to characters, the cast grows, we learn a lot about the man and in the end, things just happen.

Even Spiderman has had a pervious life on TV, in comic books, and (I believe) in movies. People knew who Peter Parker was and were willing to sit through the tedium of the origin story in part because Sam Raimi is good at making things like the flow well.

For Ghost Rider the origin story was too much, it was unnecessary, and it would’ve been better to make the story more like the first Tim Burton Batman movie where the movies starts with Batman already being the Dark Knight, already patrolling Gotham, and the police already aware of his existence. For Ghost Rider he should’ve already had his powers, was already nomadic, and, really, was already a good guy, from a bad situation, looking for redemption of soul and lost loves. Then, during the main storytelling, you can introduce some of how he got his start without boring the audience.

The movie really did need to decide whether or not it was going to be violent or not. If violent, then it needed to be really violent; if not violent (e.g. love story) then it needed to be something else entirely. I think the one interlude, where Johnny learns some of the extent of his powers when he judges a thug trying to rob a fat chick, more of this would’ve been appropriate as he built to fighting what is inside of him, the deal he made with the devil.

Instead, you are left wishing for the good parts (the thug) and hating the bad parts (nearly everything else). Erin made a comment, during the movie, that I thought was rather good, “What, you turn him into a flaming skeleton and all he can do is grunt with one word answers?” That’s pretty much the extent of the movie. Nicholas Cage isn’t good for the part, the script was really bad, the direction was substandard (which is why writers should direct and produce (and certainly not act) all at the same time). There was a lot of potential for storytelling and Marvel, who owns the franchise, failed to deliver here. They are so desperate to have a successful franchise that they are forgetting that the audience will become less and less enthused about forthcoming comic book movies if they continue to produce crap. In this case, the movie was bad enough that I am surprised I didn’t start suggested, from the first crash, that we leave and do something else.

If you want my advise, go watch something good, like… I don’t know… something with Kevin Costner in it, than to suffer through this movie.

One final thought, in High Fidelity Jack Black’s character asks a questions, I paraphrase, “Should a once great artist be condemned for his latter day sins; is it better to burn out or fade away?” In this case, Nicholas Cage is fading away and, gotta be honest, he’s doing it in the worst possibly way. This was a bad choice for a movie.

John Hattaway | smokingpen | Alicia Grey | Denny Crane | Bond. James Bond