I’m not even going to try to be pretentious or high-falutin’ with this choice for Legendary Focus, you guys; it’s Frank Castle as Ghost Rider. I haven’t read the story (the trade came out this week) and I don’t know a damn thing about it other than the most basic of details, but it’s Punisher and Ghost Rider smooshed together into a cosmic stew and it is the coolest toy we don’t have sitting on our shelves.
The concepts of Ghost Rider and Punisher have been fairly mutable over the years. However, while Ghost Rider has gone through a number of hosts and variations, Punisher is always Frank Castle, though how frank Castle is presented shifts according to the whims or trends of the day. He’s been a black man, a strange Frankenstein creature, and even an angel. The less said about the angel days the better. Ghost Rider is about Vengeance, Punisher is about vengeance. It only makes sense to throw these two things together. Well, it makes sense in comicland, anyway, and that’s all that matters.
Personally, the story itself could be crappy and I wouldn’t care. It’s presentation that matters, and Cosmic Ghost Rider just looks cool for all the right reasons. Despite my ever-advancing age, I kind of refuse to grow up and accumulate all the adult prejudices regarding comics and action figures, so the fact that Cosmic Ghost Rider looks like the cover of a metal CD was impregnated by the ’90s somehow increases the shelf appeal. Punisher is all about the skull, and Ghost Rider is quite noteworthy for having a flaming skull, so someone somewhere decided that skull-stacking was the recipe for success.
And it works for me. It really works for me.
In fact, I’m thinking that there might not be enough skulls here. Why doesn’t he have skull kneepads? Shouldn’t his shoes be skulls? I really think he should be wearing boots made out of flaming skulls. It’s like they didn’t think it through all the way. More skulls!
Regardless of the fact that he might not have enough skull going on, Cosmic Ghost Rider is still a flaming skull on top of a costume that is about 50 percent skull, with glowing red chains and guns that look like what Rob Liefeld thinks about while he touches himself, and I have to have it.
Hasbro is not averse to grabbing visually catchy modern designs and translating them into action figure form. They did it once with Titus, who remains the coolest cybernetic tiger with a cannon arm that has ever had a figure, and they did it again with the recent Red Goblin, a figure that looks exactly like what happens when crack becomes sentient and designs an action figure. And I say that in the most loving way possible, despite so many people arching their brow at him.
Well, Cosmic Ghost Rider is another chance to grab the current zeitgeist by it’s schloogenforker and twist it until spikes shoot out of the shoulderpads. Because lest I forget that noteworthy aspect of the character design, Cosmic Ghost Rider has shoulderpads made of spikes. Why wouldn’t he?
A very quick scan of Cosmic Ghost Rider’s origin tells me that the Frank that is bonded to the Ghost Rider is from a different Earth, then yada yada yada Galactus, blah blah blah baby Thanos(?) and is now on our Earth. Or something. I don’t want to give away too much for myself before I read the story.
Obviously, being a Ghost Rider, he also has a space bike, but I doubt that he has the chance to be released in the deluxe vehicle line. I think the fans would riot if he were released before either Dan Ketch or Robbie Reyes. To be honest, while the bike would be nice, I don’t need it in order to enjoy having this figure. The figure itself is more than enough. Besides, he’s got guns. Guns and a chain, and spikes and skulls and probably nuclear nipples or something. That’s more than enough.
So yeah, make this dude, hasbro.
