Product Description: Stunning art and a story that only Garth Ennis could tell! He's paying the price for his deal with the Devil - is the Ghost Rider condemned to ride the highways of Hell for all eternity? His saving grace could be in the form of an unlikely ally - an industrious angel with a deal that would free Ghost Rider once and for all! Collects Ghost Rider #1-6.
Customer Reviews
Average Rating:
Rating: - GE + GR
Having read "Preacher" and "Punisher: Welcome Back, Frank" I was eager to see how Garth Ennis would approach my favorite character. It's a well-told story, full of Ennis' trademark dark wit and acidic commentary on religion. My only complaint would be that it's entirely a Garth Ennis story, as opposed to a Ghost Rider story: Johnny Blaze almost never appears in human form, and the narrative has almost nothing to do with GR's past. That said, Ennis is a virtuoso, and his fans will be satisfied.
Rating: - For a first, it was great!
This was the first Ghost Rider comic that I have ever read, and it was fantastic! I'm glad Garth Ennis (Preacher, Punisher MAX) was the writer for this dark, gruesome tale. I felt that the movie shouldn't been made and people at the theater just handed you this instead. The art is amazing! Very much worth the price. Remember when you read this: It is about Hell and Damnation. Don't expect it to be your typical superhero story.
Rating: - The long hard road out of Hell
Anyone familiar with the tumultuous history of Ghost Rider in comics knows that the character has never been handled particularly well. With the release of the movie starring Nicolas Cage (who I feel is quite miscast; for me, Kurt Russel would have been the best choice to be Johnny Blaze, but I disgress), Marvel is naturally blitzing everything Ghost Rider that they can, beginning with this mini-series released before the current series by Daniel Way. Written by legendary Preacher creator and current Punisher writer Garth Ennis, Ghost Rider: Road to Damnation finds Johnny Blaze trapped in Hell with no chance of escaping. Until he is made an offer by a mysterious angel to return an evil entity called Kazan back to where he came from, and in return, he can be free. So, off he goes, but not before running into a murderous archangel named Ruth, and a demonic, [...] cowboy named Hoss. If you're an Ennis fan, you'll be happy to find his trademark dark humor throughout this TPB, as well as his stabs at religion and violent absurdity. You'll also find Ennis making many stabs at the character of Blaze himself; fully showing off just how gullible he is. The best part of Road to Damnation is undoubtadly the stunning artwork of Clayton Crain; whose bloody CGI-esque renderings are simply mouth watering. Not to mention that for a book not under Marvel's mature themed MAX line (or even the Marvel Knights line), Road to Damnation features a boat load of gore and mature content that came as a surprise to me. If there's any downsides to the TPB, it's that it ends too quickly, and some of the dialogue is far from the best to come from Ennis. That aside, Road to Damnation is probably one of the best takes on Ghost Rider in recent memory, and whether you're a fan of the character or Ennis, you should give this a look.
Rating: - The Road to Mediocrity
With the new GHOST RIDER movie coming out, Marvel's taken the opportunity to cash in by producing some new GHOST RIDER comics, of which the miniseries collected here is one. The movie looks pretty awful, but I decided to take a chance on some of the character's new comics.
What you'll notice first and foremost about THE ROAD TO DAMNATION is the art by Clayton Crain (Venom vs. Carnage). The Rider has never looked better (he certainly looks for better in this book than in the terrible CGI on display in the movie's preview. . .). Just as Crain provided stunning renditions of Venom, Carnage and Toxin, so here his style is wonderfully suited to rendering Ghost Rider and the various landscapes and critters of Hell. That said, many of the panels featuring those critters are so busy that even with the tremendous amount of detail it can take a while to figure out what exactly you're looking at. And while Crain excels at portraying the grotesque, his normal humans often look odd, occasionally to a distracting degree.
Providing the script is the legendary Garth Ennis (Preacher, Punisher, The Boys, etc.). Unfortunately, he doesn't have much to work with. He's got his moments of epic scope and myth, he's got his black humor, he's got the occasional jabs at religion -- but it's nothing you haven't seen from him before, and, given that this is a regular Marvel book, it's generally kept lite. He's also very limited in where he can actually go with the character -- and Johnny Blaze himself is immediately recognized as gullible and fairly stupid, which generally doesn't make for a terribly interesting protagonist.
So: there's nothing new here, really. You've got visuals ranging from the absolutely stunning to the off-puttingly stylized, you've got a script that, while not terrible, is far below par for Garth Ennis, and you've got a character who looks kind of cool but isn't really all that interesting. A pretty mediocre book, all told. I'll give it three stars rather than two because if you're going to buy it, chances are you already know all of this and are okay with it.
Rating: - Husband is Happy
This was a gift for my husband. I can tell you, unless he is lying, that he is very happy with it, and was surprised that it was so inexpensive. The box came a bit broken up, but the shipper had packed it so well that there wasn't a single scratch. It also arrived much earlier than expected. My husband said this was a perfect gift for a Ghost Rider fan. Sorry I can't be more help. I am not a comic book buff.
- GE + GR 
- The Road to Mediocrity
- Husband is Happy
